Minnesota Lt. Governor Peggy Flanagan rejected accusations that she led a private Signal chat group that was recording the license plates and locations of ICE officers.
Her office forcefully pushed back against online sleuths who said she operates anti-ICE activities on Signal under the handle “Flan Southside.”
Ms. Flanagan is among several Democratic officials the online sleuths tied to the coordination of the protesters who have been obstructing and harassing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Minneapolis as they seek to round up illegal immigrants.
Signal chats helped direct the protests Saturday outside of a Minneapolis donut shop where activist Alex Pretti was fatally shot by ICE agents. The agents were at the business to arrest a criminal illegal immigrant. Activists were alerted to their arrival there on the Signal chat and swarmed the area.
“If this is true, and if the Signal chat can be tied to the Pretti shooting, LG Flanagan is in serious trouble,” said former Justice Department Chief of Staff Chad Mizelle.
Ms. Flanagan’s spokeswoman, Lexi Byler, told The Washington Times, “It’s not true.”
She said the Signal chat handle does not belong to the lieutenant governor, who is a vocal opponent of ICE.
According to media reports, Mr. Pretti, an ICU nurse, was involved in his neighborhood’s Signal ICE group chat used to respond to ICE agents. Critics of the chat groups are blaming them for the increasingly violent protests and for fostering the environment in which Mr. Pretti was shot.
A second Democratic official, state Rep. Alex Falconer, said he is helping to run a resistance network through Signal and is working to add residents to the chat group to widen the surveillance of ICE agents.
“We have a couple of groups on the app Signal that we’d love for you to join,” he recently told residents at an anti-ICE community meeting.
He described the ICE apprehension as “terrible times,” and said he is helping to lead “the community response, the rapid response” to ICE.
The Times reached out to Mr. Falconer.
A third Democratic official, Amanda Koehler, has been identified as an administrator on the MN ICE Watch signal chat group, which also tracks and organizes protests around ICE agent activities.
Ms. Koehler served as a campaign strategist for Gov. Tim Walz. She reportedly operates on the Signal chat group under the name “HAH.”
Ms. Koehler’s LinkedIn profile has been recently deactivated. Screenshots show she was a policy development consultant and the owner-operator of an organic micro-farm.
Mr. Walz called on ICE to leave the state. He, too, urged the public to keep protesting.
“We’re winning it with Minnesota grit, Minnesota humor, Minnesota decency,” Mr. Walz said, addressing protesters with a blue bullhorn two days before Saturday’s fatal shooting. “The resistance matters. We are not telling people to be silent, but we are not telling people to go out and cause problems. We’re going to cause good trouble.”
Mr. Mizelle, who also served as the acting chief of staff to the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, said those involved in coordinating interference of federal immigration operations in Minnesota could be charged with participating in a conspiracy.
“And if someone dies as part of that conspiracy, even if the deceased was a co-conspirator, all participants in the conspiracy can be charged with murder,” he said.
Ms. Flanagan responded to the shooting of Mr. Pretti on X.
“A man was killed today because a reckless paramilitary force has been released on the American streets against its own citizens,” she said. “Everyone should be outraged. We need Trump to remove ICE from MN immediately. Stop killing us.”
On Jan. 21, three days before the shooting, she posted a photo of a five-year-old Minnesota boy detained by ICE after his father fled agents who were pursuing him.
“ICE is completely out of control and beyond fixing,” she wrote.
