What happened
The top prosecutor in Minneapolis yesterday said her office is investigating at least 17 potential crimes committed by federal immigration agents during Operation Metro Surge. Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said at least one of the incidents involved Border Patrol official Greg Bovino (pictured above), the former public face of President Donald Trump’s aggressive deportation operations in Minneapolis and other cities. She encouraged the public to submit photos, videos and eyewitness accounts of “potential unlawful behavior” by federal agents. “We will investigate and pursue charging where appropriate,” Moriarty said. 

Who said what
“There are many victims whose stories need to be told,” Moriarty said at a news conference. The incidents under review include the use of tear gas and chemical irritants in public parks and a high school, and Moriarty said she was “confident” her office will be able to pursue charges in the shooting deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal agents. 

The Department of Homeland Security said the investigation was “unlawful,” because “federal officials acting in the course of their duties are immune from liability under state law.” Moriarty disputed that, saying “there is no absolute immunity for federal agents. “She will have to find “evidence that agents acted unlawfully and outside the scope of their authorized duties,” Rachel Moran, a criminal law professor at the University of St. Thomas School of Law, told The Associated Press. But “I think agents did illegal things here. I watched it.”

What next?
The Justice Department is investigating Pretti’s shooting but not Good’s, and it “continues to actively obstruct” any state investigation into their deaths, said The Minnesota Star Tribune. Moriarty said she was prepared to sue for access to the withheld federal evidence from the shootings if she didn’t hear from the feds by today.

What happened
A divided Supreme Court yesterday temporarily blocked California from enforcing policies that discourage public school teachers from outing transgender students to their parents without consent. The unsigned order said the parents who sued California were likely to prove the policies violated their religious and parental rights. The three liberal justices publicly dissented, criticizing their “impatient” conservative colleagues for using “shortcut procedures on the emergency docket” to rush out a “terse, tonally dismissive ruling designed to conclusively resolve“ the thorny legal dispute without a hearing.

In a second emergency-docket ruling yesterday, the Supreme Court paused a New York federal judge’s order to redraw the lone Republican-held congressional district in New York City, keeping the seat’s GOP lean for the midterm elections. The three liberals also dissented in that case. 

Who said what
The transgender case is “rooted in a 2024 California law that prohibits school districts from requiring staff to inform parents about a student’s gender identity without the child’s permission,” Politico said. A federal judge blocked that law in December and barred “school employees statewide from using new names and pronouns for students if their parents objected,” The Wall Street Journal said. A U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals panel then blocked that ruling, calling it overly broad and a misreading of state policy. 

The Thomas More Society, the conservative legal group representing the parents, called the Supreme Court’s revival of the judge’s ban “the most significant parental rights ruling in a generation.” California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) office said the order “undermines student privacy” at the expense of their education and turns teachers into “gender cops.”

What next?
This was the “latest clash over transgender issues to reach the high court,” The Washington Post said. In two argued cases earlier this term, the court “seemed inclined” to uphold state bans on trans women playing women’s sports and “appeared skeptical of a Colorado ban on conversion therapy for gay and trans minors.”