A judge in the United States has declined to order President Donald Trump’s administration to halt its immigration crackdown in Minnesota, amid mass protests over deadly shootings by federal agents in the US state.US District Judge Kate Menendez on Saturday denied a preliminary injunction sought in a lawsuit filed this month by state Attorney General Keith Ellison and the mayors of Minneapolis and Saint Paul.Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of listShe said state authorities made a strong showing that immigration agents’ tactics, including shootings and evidence of racial profiling, were having “profound and even heartbreaking consequences on the State of Minnesota, the Twin Cities, and Minnesotans”.But Menendez wrote in her ruling that, “ultimately, the Court finds that the balance of harms does not decisively favor an injunction”.The lawsuit seeks to block or rein in a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) operation that sent thousands of immigration agents to the Minneapolis-Saint Paul area, sparking mass protests and leading to the killings of two US citizens by federal agents.Tensions have soared since an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shot and killed Minneapolis mother Renee Nicole Good in her car on January 7.Federal border agents also killed 37-year-old nurse Alex Pretti in the city on January 24, stoking more public anger and calls for accountability.Tom Homan, Trump’s so-called “border czar”, told reporters earlier this week that the administration was working to make the immigration operation “safer, more efficient [and] by the book”. Advertisement But that has not stopped the demonstrations, with thousands of protesters taking to the streets of Minneapolis on Friday amid a nationwide strike to denounce the Trump …
