Trump-nominated judge dismisses administration's challenge to Minnesota sanctuary laws

A federal judge nominated by President Trump sided with Minnesota in tossing the administration's lawsuit against the state's sanctuary policies, a setback for the White House's legal campaign to force state cooperation with federal immigration enforcement.

U.S. District Judge Eric C. Tostrud dismissed the case Monday, rejecting the administration's argument that Minnesota's sanctuary laws violate the Supremacy Clause, the constitutional provision that federal law overrides conflicting state and local law. In his written ruling, Tostrud found that the state's challenged provisions "do not single the federal government out for less favorable treatment, at least not in any sense that shows an intergovernmental immunity violation."

The ruling lands in the middle of an already tense standoff between the Trump administration and the federal judiciary. Courts across the country have blocked or struck down administration actions on multiple fronts this year, and the Minnesota case adds another loss to the ledger, this time from a judge the president himself put on the bench.

Tostrud already held DHS in contempt over a botched detainee transfer

Monday's dismissal was not the first time Tostrud clashed with federal immigration authorities. In February, the judge held the Department of Homeland Security in civil contempt for violating a court order after DHS transferred a Mexican citizen identified as Fernando to a detention facility in Texas the previous month. Fernando was later released from the Texas facility in late January without his belongings.

Tostrud ordered the federal government to pay for Fernando's return flight to Minnesota. He noted that federal officials had yet to properly explain their actions surrounding the transfer.

That contempt finding set an early marker: this was a judge willing to enforce his orders against the executive branch, regardless of who nominated him.

Minnesota became ground zero for immigration enforcement earlier this year

The sanctuary-law fight did not arise in a vacuum. Minnesota sat at the center of a major immigration enforcement surge earlier this year, with more than 3,000 federal immigration personnel deployed to the state at one point, The Hill reported.

That surge turned deadly. In January, federal immigration authorities killed two U.S. citizens, Alex Pretti and Renee Good, in Minneapolis, sparking mass outrage. The specific circumstances of those deaths, including which federal unit was involved and what prompted the encounters, remain unclear from available reporting.

Separately, ICE officers fatally shot multiple people in recent weeks in incidents in Texas and Maine. The details of those shootings also remain limited.

Against that backdrop, the administration's legal challenge to Minnesota's sanctuary policies carried high political stakes. The White House filed a court document Monday asserting that the state's laws, which limit local cooperation with federal immigration authorities, were unconstitutional under the Supremacy Clause. The administration sought both a declaration that the laws were invalid and a court order blocking them.

Tostrud rejected both requests outright.

No response yet from the Justice Department

The Hill reached out to the Justice Department for comment on the ruling. As of the article's publication Monday night, no response had been provided. Whether the administration plans to appeal the dismissal remains an open question.

The case highlights a recurring pattern in the administration's legal strategy: aggressive executive action followed by courtroom losses, sometimes before judges with no partisan axe to grind. Tostrud owes his seat to Trump, not to a Democratic president. That fact strips away the easy narrative that judicial resistance is simply partisan obstruction from Obama- or Biden-era appointees. Federal judges have also permanently blocked other Trump administration policies on separate grounds.

Still, the legal question at the heart of the Minnesota case, whether states can refuse to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement, is far from settled nationally. Different courts in different jurisdictions have reached different conclusions on similar disputes. A single district court dismissal does not end the broader fight.

The administration has shown a willingness to press these cases on multiple fronts, and an appeal in Minnesota remains possible. Meanwhile, tensions between the executive branch and the judiciary have continued to escalate. The firing of a court-appointed U.S. attorney in Seattle underscored the friction, and Justice Amy Coney Barrett recently told Congress that threat levels against federal judges are at alarming highs.

Sanctuary policies remain bad policy, they shield illegal immigrants from federal law and put communities at risk. But if the administration wants to dismantle them, it needs legal arguments that hold up in court, not just ones that sound good in a press release.