He also highlighted a historical moment in his win that got glossed over when he was onstage at the Grammys. Continue reading…Country Music News – Taste of Country
Month: February 2026
Country star and soldier Craig Morgan is turning to his fans for help tracking down a fan whose story left a lasting impact on his life more than a decade ago.
In a recent social media post, Morgan shared a powerful memory from September 6, 2013, when he headlined the Washington State Fair shortly after releasing his album Journey. Following the show, Morgan took part in an autograph session, an experience that would unexpectedly become one of the most meaningful moments of his career.
“On September 6 of 2013, I headline the Washington State fair. I just released a new album called Journey. So after the show I did an autographed session there was a young gentleman there who had a prosthetic leg and wanted to tell me a story,” Morgan wrote.
The man waited as the “Almost Home” singer finished signing autographs and meeting with the other fans.
“I tried to get him to go ahead and tell me his story but he insisted on waiting until everyone was through,” Morgan recalled. “It was a story that changed the way I looked at what I was doing in the music world.”
While Morgan didn’t share details of the story itself, he made it clear that the interaction deeply impacted him and has stayed with him ever since. Now, more than 12 years later, he’s hoping to reconnect.
“If anyone knows who he is and can get him to respond. We would like to talk to him,” he shared.
Fans quickly flooded the comments section, praising Morgan for the heartfelt post and offering to help spread the word in hopes of locating the man.
“I’m in washington. I’ve got this to our local radio station and a few local groups to that area. Lets find him,” one user urged.
Another shared, “I used to bring groups of Wounded Vets from JBLM/WTB through my nonprofit Operation Ward 57 during that time to the fair for concerts/meet and greets. It might not have been my group but might be able to narrow down who.”
At the time of publication, it does not appear that the individual has been located. If anyone has leads, please reach out to Craig Morgan on his official Facebook page.
Craig Morgan is a singer, author, actor, and soldier who was recently promoted to Chief Warrant Officer 2 in the U.S. Army Reserve. The promotion ceremony took place on January 15, 2026, at the Pentagon, the headquarters of the Department of Defense, with Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth officiating.
Morgan is approaching two decades of dedicated service to the nation. He previously served 17 years in the Army and Army Reserve with the 101st and 82nd Airborne Divisions. The country music star, author, and patriot returned to military service when he was sworn into the Army Reserve on the stage of the Grand Ole Opry on July 29, 2023.
The post Craig Morgan Searches for Fan With Prosthetic Leg After Life-Changing 2013 Encounter appeared first on Country Now.
Country Now
NEW YORK — New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s pick to succeed him in the state Assembly cruised to an easy victory Tuesday night. But Diana Moreno’s win in that Queens special election is likely the last cakewalk we’ll see from a Mamdani-backed candidate in the near future.
The new mayor has endorsed Brad Lander in his quest to unseat Rep. Dan Goldman in New York’s 10th Congressional District and Assemblymember Claire Valdez for the NY-07 seat being vacated by Rep. Nydia Velázquez.
The pair of Democratic congressional primaries is expected to be far more competitive than Moreno’s race, raising a central question: How far can a Mamdani endorsement get you?
“We’re testing that out,” said Grace Mausser, co-chair of the Democratic Socialists of America’s New York City chapter, which has endorsed both Moreno and Valdez, but not Lander. “He has a lot of hard resources that come with an endorsement: his impressive volunteer and donor lists, his strong reach on social media … There’s also the soft power that we’re testing out now, right? Who is the leader of left and progressive politics in New York right now?”
Mamdani has so far been more involved in boosting Valdez than Lander.
The mayor appeared with Valdez — a Queens lawmaker, former United Auto Workers union organizer and the first elected official to stand with Mamdani in his campaign for mayor — at an event the day after she launched her bid. He also filmed a whimsical social media video set in a subway station to boost her fundraising.
Valdez is running against Antonio Reynoso, the Brooklyn borough president who Velázquez has endorsed as her preferred successor. Queens City Council Member Julie Won also recently entered the race in the progressive Brooklyn and Queens district.
The mayor has been largely hands-off in Lander’s campaign after endorsing the former city comptroller on the day of his launch for Congress. Lander, who cross-endorsed Mamdani in last year’s mayoral race, is running in Brooklyn and Manhattan against an incumbent with more than three times as much campaign cash on hand and the backing of Democratic House leadership, including Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.
A political adviser to Mamdani said his team is still assessing how much to get involved in the two congressional contests and cautioned against reading anything into the fact that the mayor has been more involved in Valdez’s race so far. The adviser said the Mamdani team is waiting to make major moves in NY-10 pending the outcome of a court case that could scramble the lines of the district in such a way that Goldman may run in the neighboring 11th District instead.
Regardless, the Mamdani adviser, who was granted anonymity to discuss internal strategy, said the mayor simply lending his name to Lander and Valdez “already carries a lot of weight that these campaigns can make the most of.”
“His direct involvement is always going to be second to governing,” said the aide. “Ninety-nine percent of his energy is going to be focused on running the city.”
The politics-versus-governance balance is part of Mamdani’s clash with Velázquez, the highly respected progressive who effectively warned him in a New York Times interview to stay in his lane.
And the mayor does have a lot of work to do at the helm of the country’s largest city. June’s congressional primaries fall around the same time he and the City Council will be putting finishing touches on the city budget amid serious fiscal headwinds.
“I don’t know if that was the wisest thing for him to do because the job of being mayor is so big,” Democratic strategist Lupe Todd-Medina said, arguing Mamdani could end up in a situation where he’s not able to stump for Lander and Valdez as much as they want and need him to due to the sheer burden of governing New York City.
As June’s primaries still loom more than four months away, a Lander campaign official, granted anonymity to share sensitive considerations, said his team is also still waiting to see if a court decision could rip up the lines of NY-10.
But if the race ends up competitive, the Lander aide said his team is confident Mamdani will help fundraise and campaign for the former comptroller. The fact that Mamdani hasn’t done so yet, the aide said, is understandable since the mayor has been focused on governing in his first month in office.
The two House primaries have different dynamics but they’ll determine whether Mamdani can replicate the magic that catapulted him from relative obscurity to the nation’s second toughest job.
“He has a lot at stake by pushing in some chips on two fronts, but I think he has more at stake in the 7th District,” said Michael Lange, an analyst who specializes in progressive politics. Valdez “is a really close ally who comes from his political movement and his political home.”
Politics
By: James Brooks, Alaska Beacon
Former state legislator Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins, a Democrat from Sitka, is running for governor, he said Tuesday.
Kreiss-Tomkins, frequently known as “JKT,” served in the Alaska House of Representatives between 2013 and 2023. He becomes the 16th candidate and third Democrat to enter this year’s gubernatorial election.
Incumbent Gov. Mike Dunleavy is term-limited and unable to run for a third term.
In Alaska, the top four vote-getters, regardless of political party, advance from the August primary to the November general election. In November, Alaskans use ranked-choice voting to name their preferences.
Kreiss-Tomkins said he’s running because Alaska has big problems and he’s interested in solving them.
“I really enjoy working with people from diverse backgrounds and different viewpoints and perspectives to try to forge compromise and get things done,” he said.
While in the Legislature, Kreiss-Tomkins was a member of the bipartisan, bicameral fiscal working group that in 2021 drafted a plan intended to bring the state’s finances in line over the long term.
Though that plan was never enacted, its components resemble the fiscal plan introduced this year by Gov. Mike Dunleavy.
“We’re in a perpetual budget uncertainty,” Kreiss-Tomkins said, identifying the state’s fiscal situation as his No. 1 issue.
Since oil prices plunged in 2015, legislators and governors have struggled to balance Alaska’s budget on an annual basis, occasionally bringing the state to the brink of a government shutdown.
“We’re living and dying by the price of oil, and we have a structural budget deficit, so the state’s finances are not especially in order, and that is, I think, probably the highest-order problem,” Kreiss-Tomkins said.
He said Dunleavy hasn’t been able to work across party lines and hasn’t been successful with the Legislature. Kreiss-Tomkins contrasted that with his own experience as a member of a Democratic-independent-Republican coalition majority in the state House.
“I feel like we need that same spirit in the executive branch, and if we could have a governor and an executive with that approach and mindset … there’s a tremendous amount of good that we can get done for Alaska,” he said.
Kreiss-Tomkins said the campaign season will show how he differs from the other two Democrats in the race: former state Sen. Tom Begich, and current state Sen. Matt Claman.
When it comes to the number of other candidates in the race, Kreiss-Tomkins said it’s not a bad thing for Alaskans to have so many choices.
“Seeing so many people willing to run sort of reflects the importance of the election and the gravity of the problems facing Alaska,” he said, adding that he expects “some winnowing of the field as time goes on.”
Candidates for Governor
- Former state Sen. Tom Begich (Democrat)
- Former state Sen. Click Bishop (Republican)
- Former Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson (Republican) and Lt. Gov. candidate Josh Church (Republican)
- Former state revenue commissioner Adam Crum (Republican)
- Current state Sen. Matt Claman (Democrat)
- Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom (Republican)
- Matanuska-Susitna Borough Mayor Edna DeVries (Republican)
- Kasilof resident Jessica Faircloth
- Anchorage podiatrist and state medical board member Matt Heilala
- Former state Sen. Shelley Hughes (Republican)
- Former state Rep. Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins (Democrat)
- Author Hank Kroll (Registered Republican) with Lt. Gov. candidate Tommy Nicholson (Undeclared)
- Angoon resident and former teacher James William Parkin IV (Republican)
- Former Attorney General Treg Taylor (Republican)
- Palmer resident Bruce Walden (Republican)
- Businesswoman Bernadette Wilson (Republican) with Lt. Gov. candidate Mike Shower (Republican)
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As we previously reported, Savannah Guthrie’s mother, Nancy Guthrie, went missing from her home on Saturday night.
Police believe foul play was involved and that Nancy, 84, was injured during a possible abduction.
As the search drags on, investigators remain baffled, but one journalist believes a prime suspect may have been identified.
On the latest episode of her “Drop Dead Serious” podcast, former NewsNation anchor Ashleigh Banfield reported that her “law enforcement source” told her that Tommaso Cioni is being investigated.
Cioni, 50, is married to Savannah’s sister, Annie.
Annie had dinner at Nancy’s home on Saturday night and was the last person to see her before her disappearance.
It’s not clear if Cioni was also present that night.
According to Banfield, investigators have towed Annie’s car, which, she says, has “some connection” to 50-year-old Cioni.
Banfield notes that the cameras in Nancy’s home were all smashed in. And earlier today, NewsNation published photos of a trail of blood that was found inside the home.
In response to Banfield’s claims, police in Tucson issued a statement saying they have no suspect or person of interest at this time:
“We have not identified a suspect or person of interest in this case. Detectives continue to speak with anyone who may have had contact with Mrs. Guthrie. We are also awaiting additional forensic results,” said a spokesperson (via TMZ).
“We are not confirming the car being seized, we are unsure where that reporter is getting that information.”
This news comes on the heels of reports that TMZ received a ransom note demanding millions in Bitcoin in exchange for Nancy’s safe return.
It’s unclear if the note is legitimate — or why it would have been sent to TMZ instead of to the Guthrie family.
The Guthries have asked the public for their help in searching for Nancy, but it seems that police are no closer to finding her.
Earlier this week, Savannah took to her Instagram page to ask followers to pray for her missing mother.
“We believe in prayer. We believe in voices raised in unison, in love, in hope. We believe in goodness. We believe in humanity. Above all, we believe in Him,” Savannah wrote on Instagram late Monday night.
“Thank you for lifting your prayers with ours for our beloved mom, our dearest Nancy, a woman of deep conviction, a good and faithful servant. Raise your prayers with us and believe with us that she will be lifted by them in this very moment,” she continued, adding:
“We need you.”
We will have further updates on this developing story as new information becomes available.
Police Deny That Savannah Guthrie’s Brother-In-Law Is ‘Prime Suspect’ … was originally published on The Hollywood Gossip.
The Hollywood Gossip
On the Hawaiian island of Oahu, a local huli huli eatery is not much more than a yellow food truck, but it’s one of Diners, Drive-Ins and Dive’s best spots.
Mashed – Fast Food, Celebrity Chefs, Grocery, Reviews
The Patriots are not shying away from the underdog label in Super Bowl LX. “Somebody has to [be],” coach Mike Vrabel said Monday during opening night festivities. “I don’t think we dislike it.” But schematically, what will it take for the Patriots to actually topple the favored Seahawks in the fight for the Lombardi Trophy? Here are three keys to victory for New England: 1. Drake Maye must use his legs With 1:57 left in the AFC Championship Game, the Patriots faced a third-and-5 and were looking to ice a grind-it-out 10-7 victory over the Broncos. Drake Maye faked a handoff to running back Rhamondre Stevenson on his right and then booted to his left. In the open field, the Patriots quarterback outraced Broncos outside linebacker Jonah Elliss to the sideline, where he secured the game-clinching conversion. It capped a 10-carry, 65-yard rushing performance. Maye’s legs were pivotal in getting New England past Denver, and they will be just as vital in getting the Patriots their seventh Super Bowl title. While he’s most lauded for his efficient throwing and deep-ball prowess, the MVP finalist is also one of the league’s most mobile quarterbacks. He led the league in scramble first downs (27) and ranked third in total scramble rush yards (423) during the regular season, according to Next Gen Stats. Maye averaged 26.5 rushing yards per game for the year, but since Week 15, that’s up to 38.9 rushing yards per game (on 6.6 carries per contest). In the regular season, the Seahawks allowed 5.3 rushing yards per carry to opposing quarterbacks, the fourth-most in the league, per NGS. So that’s something for the Patriots to exploit. 2. Blitz Sam Darnold The Patriots aren’t a heavy blitzing team — they blitzed on 26.6% of dropbacks in the regular season, which tied for 18th in the NFL — but it’s a viable option for slowing down the Seahawks quarterback, who played the best game of his career in the NFC Championship Game. Darnold completed 62.5% of his passes when blitzed during the regular season, posting a 10-7 touchdown-to-interception ratio with a 93.6 passer rating, per NGS. Not bad, sure, but certainly not as deadly when defenses sent four or fewer passer rushers at him. Under those circumstances, Darnold posted a 15-7 touchdown-to-interception ratio with a 102.1 passer rating. So blitzing at a higher rate than normal may provide New England with the best opportunity to get Darnold to cough up the ball, which he did at a high rate during the regular season. He had a league-high 7.2% turnover rate on pressured dropbacks in 2025, per NGS. Patriots defensive backs Christian Gonzalez, Carlton Davis III and Marcus Jones have all made a play on the ball on a higher percentage of their targets in the playoffs than in the regular season, according to Next Gen Stats. Gonzalez, Davis, Jones and safety Craig Woodson have four pass breakups apiece this postseason. 3. Use multiple running back sets Playing Stevenson and TreVeyon Henderson together in the backfield is a way for the Patriots to both shore up Drake Maye’s protection and put stress on the Seahawks’ vaunted defense. New England has struggled to keep Maye upright in the playoffs. He’s been sacked 15 times this postseason (five times apiece in the wild card, divisional round and AFC title game), the most by any player to reach a Super Bowl since 1970, per Next Gen Stats. Two running back sets would give Maye an extra chipper/blocker up front against Seattle’s strong pass rush and an outlet in the quick/short passing game to find a rhythm. That could bring up Maye’s passer efficiency, which is down significantly in the postseason. Jumbo formations, with multiple running backs and tight ends, could be a great option for New England in short-yardage situations as well. Stevenson and Henderson thrived in jumbo during the regular season, averaging 9.8 and 5.8 yards per carry on such rushes, respectively, per NGS. Of players with at least 20 carries in such formations in 2025, Stevenson ranked first in the NFL in yards per carry and Henderson ranked fourth. The Patriots had a league-high 10 touchdowns out of jumbo formation this season.Latest Sports News from FOX Sports
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Chris Harrison will soon be back in your living room, folks.
Not literally, of course. That would be weird.
According to a recent social media post by Lindsay Liles Casting, the former Bachelor and Bachelorette host will return to a genre he knows well:
Fronting a dating-themed program that is based around two people meeting on camera, possibly falling in love and then getting married.
“NOW CASTING! Chris Harrison is back with a new show, and we’re looking for men and women who are sincerely seeking love and a traditional marriage,” Lindsay Liles Casting posted online this week.
The surprising post states that “a prominent streaming service” is casting singles 21 and older who “want to be in a traditional, marriage-minded partnership built on commitment and shared values.”
It also states that the series is looking for individuals “who believe in clear roles, long-term commitment, and building a life together — and who are dating with real intention.”
It’s unknown at this time what the show will be called… what network it will air on… or when it will premiere.
But we’re not going out on a huge limb by assuming Harrison will NOT be working with ABC again.
“It changed my life, but at the same time, I can also be grateful that I’m gone,” Harrison said in 2023 on an episode of Jason Tartick’s Trading Secrets podcast. “That’s a relationship I don’t need to be in anymore because it wasn’t healthy.”
Harrison, of course, served as the host of both the aforementioned franchises for many, many years.
He was essentially let go by executives in early 2021 after he made racially insensitive remarks, telling the public at the time:
“I have consulted with Warner Bros. and ABC and will be stepping aside for a period of time and will not join for the After the Final Rose special…
“I want to ensure our cast and crew members, to my friends, colleagues and our fans: this is not just a moment, but a commitment to much greater understanding that I will actively make every day.
“From here I can only try to evolve and be a better man, and I humble myself before all of you.
“I hope I will again live up to the expectations you all rightfully have for me and the expectations I have for myself.”
Harrison never returned to The Bachelor.
He’s mostly stayed away from the spotlight in general, although he did hint at a return to reality television way back in March 2024.
“People got to know and love me for two decades hosting The Bachelor, so, yes, we are going to be creating a reality dating show,” Harrison said to Entertainment Tonight back then.
“For years and years I said, ‘This is the most dramatic show ever.’
“We want to create a show where those words actually ring true, so this dating show will be the most dramatic ever — that you can be sure of.”
It’s unclear whether Harrison was referring almost two years ago to the show that now appears to be coming to fruition.
Jesse Palmer now hosts both The Bachelor and The Bachelorette.
Harrison’s departure from the company was ugly for awhile, with the TV personality demanding a whole lot of money to walk away from his job.
The two sides eventually negotiated a buy-out, however.
This past October, Back in October, Harrison spoke to People Magazine about his post-Bachelor life, as well as his life in Austin, Texas where he and wife Lauren Zima purchased a home in 2020.
Although Harrison called Austin “the new Hollywood,” he told the outlet there was “a next chapter coming up very soon” for himself and that he was “very excited” to soon talk about it at length.
Chris Harrison Books Return to Reality TV!!!!!!!!! was originally published on The Hollywood Gossip.
The Hollywood Gossip
Reading Time: 4 minutes
Everyone at the Grammy Awards used their platform to condemn ICE as the agency lays siege to American communities.
(Almost everyone, anyway)
Now, Trump’s Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem has a bone to pick with winners like Bad Bunny and Billie Eilish.
She essentially says that they’re being unfair to ICE agents, who are just following orders. Take a look:
Is it unfair to denounce ICE?
On Sunday, February 1, multiple winners used their platform at the Grammy Awards to denounce ICE.
“No one is illegal on stolen land,” Billie Eilish affirmed while accepting the award for Song of the Year.
“I feel really hopeful in this room, and I feel like we need to keep fighting and speaking up and protesting,” she expressed. “Our voices really do matter, and the people matter.”
Eilish concluded: “And f–k ICE, that’s all I’m gonna say, sorry.”
She had also worn an ICE OUT pin to the event, ensuring that the message came across alongside her diamond ring whether she won the Grammy or not.
Bad Bunny has already been a target of conservative vitriol ahead of his Super Bowl Halftime performance.
During his own Grammy acceptance speech, he declared: “Before I say thanks to God, I’m going to say ICE out.”
He emphasized: “We’re not savage, we’re not animals, we’re not aliens — we are humans, and we are Americans.”
ICE is known to have detained at least 170 US citizens recently. While that pales in comparison to the terror and violence that they’re bringing to American communities — or the Americans whom they’ve executed in the streets — it’s still a point worth making.
Incidentally, some … whatever the opposite of “geography wiz” is … have decried Bad Bunny’s Halftime performance ahead of time on the grounds that he is “not American.” One actual football player said this.
Bad Bunny is from Puerto Rico … which is part of the United States of America. He is a US Citizen. This should not be new information for an American adult who feels equipped to weigh in on current events or politics.
She says that Bad Bunny and others are ‘ill-informed’
As you can see in the video below, Kristi Noem spoke to Fox News about the Grammy winners who used their platform to oppose ICE’s war in Minneapolis and beyond.
“I wish they knew what wonderful, amazing people our ICE officers are,” she lamented.
Noem asserted: “Many of these officers live in these communities where they are doing enforcement activities.” She did not provide any evidence of this outlandish claim.
“Their families live there,” she again alleged, “and that’s their neighbors they are protecting by getting dangerous criminals off the streets.”
Willfully mischaracterizing ICE’s assignment and mission, Noem boldly lied: “They are going after those murderers and rapists, people that are trafficking drugs, and protecting America.”
MIC DROP: Secretary Kristi Noem pushes back after Bad Bunny, Billie Eilish, and celebs bash ICE at the Grammys:
“I wish they knew what wonderful, amazing people our ICE officers are.”
“It is too bad that ill-informed famous musicians make statements like that without truly… pic.twitter.com/x42ERbVB3H
— Fox News (@FoxNews) February 3, 2026
Noem went on to emphasize that this is what Donald Trump “said he would do, he said he would make us safer, and he has done that.”
She went on to mention that many forms of violent crime are down across America. While that was true years ago, it seems that she’s trying to imply that this is somehow due to Trump or his gestapo.
In an accidentally true statement, she added that “people are feeling it in their communities.” It in this case being the sting of teargas on their faces and on those of their children.
“And it’s too bad that ill-informed famous musicians make statements like that,” Noem whined, “without truly knowing what great Americans our ICE and Border Patrol officers are.”
It’s 2026. The threats to our nation are serious, but the people causing the problems are deeply unserious. They can’t even bother to tell convincing lies anymore.
Is ‘Abolish ICE’ ever going to be enough?
Mixed reports suggest that Noem may lose her job soon. She’s been defensive, insisting that she’s only following orders from Trump and from Stephen Miller.
Truth be told, the firing of Noem would be a half-measure. Just like the alleged plans to make ICE goons wear body cameras and (gasp) maybe stop wearing masks to conceal their identities while they commit crimes.
Eventually, the American people have to put every one of these people — from the bottom to the top — on trial. Some on social media are calling this “Nuremberg 2.”
It’s a little aspirational, and justice seems so rare these days. But it’s important. Merely abolishing ICE is not enough.
One of President Biden’s biggest failings — perhaps the biggest of all — is not doing enough to bring Trump and his accomplices to justice the first time around. The next administration needs an unquenchable thirst for justice if we’re going to preserve America.
Kristi Noem: Bad Bunny Doesn’t Know How ‘Wonderful’ ICE Agents Are was originally published on The Hollywood Gossip.
The Hollywood Gossip
Forcibly entering homes without a judicial warrant. Arresting journalists who reported on protests. Defying dozens of federal orders. Killing U.S. citizens for noncompliance. Asking constitutionally protected observers this chilling question: “Have you not learned?”
This is daily life in Minnesota. Operation Metro Surge, ostensibly an immigration enforcement initiative, has become something more consequential: a constitutional stress test. Can constitutional protections withstand the actions of a federal government seemingly intent on aggressively violating the rule of law?
In Minneapolis, a city still reckoning with its own grim history of policing, the federal operation raises fundamental questions about law enforcement and the limits of executive power.
Legal scholars and civil rights advocates are especially worried about ongoing violations of the First, Second, Fourth and 10th amendments, as are other observers, including historians like us.
Catalog of violations
First Amendment concerns stem from reports that agents from ICE – described by some scholars as a paramilitary force – and the Border Patrol have deployed excessive force as well as advanced surveillance methods on suspects, observers and journalists. When enforcement activity impedes the rights to assemble, document and criticize government action, that chills those rights, and the consequences extend beyond any single demonstration. These rights are not peripheral to democracy. They are central to it.
Second Amendment issues erupted following the fatal shooting of a legally armed Alex Pretti in Minneapolis. Highly placed administration officials claimed Americans could not bring firearms to protests, despite a long-standing interpretation that in most states, including Minnesota, a person who was legally permitted to carry a firearm could bring it to such events. The assertion was in fact contrary to the Trump administration’s support for gun rights.
Thanks to the videos flooding social media, Fourth Amendment concerns are the most familiar. Allegations include entering homes without warrants, stopping, intimidating and seizing legal observers, and detaining suspects by virtue of their appearance or accent. Those are clear violations of the Fourth Amendment’s safeguards against unreasonable searches and seizures, which were adopted to prevent the exercise of arbitrary government power.
Finally, the 10th Amendment lies at the heart of Minnesota’s legal cases against the federal government.
One lawsuit contests the federal government’s refusal to allow the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension to investigate the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. Another challenges efforts to pressure local governments into assisting federal immigration enforcement. These disputes implicate federalism itself – the constitutional division of authority between states and the federal government that is the foundation of the American system.
The massive and rapid accumulation of these alleged constitutional violations – now working their way through the courts – in a single geographic locale is striking. So are the mass resignations from the state’s U.S. attorney’s office, which is responsible for representing the federal government in these cases.
And so is the deeper historical context.
A retreat from federal constitutional oversight
Starting in 1994, federal intervention became a powerful corrective whenever local police violated constitutional rights.
From Newark to New Orleans, federal oversight was not always welcomed, but it was frequently necessary to enforce equal protection and due process.
Federal oversight has been essential in enforcing civil rights when municipalities would not. Active monitoring of policing in those cities kept officers and administrators accountable and encouraged officers to follow constitutional standards. At its core, what experts call “constitutional policing” requires that government’s use of authority to ensure order be justified, limited and subject to oversight.
In that vein, after the 2020 murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis policeman, the 2023 U.S. Department of Justice report on policing in Minneapolis identified questionable patterns and practices. Those problems included the “unreasonable” use of deadly force, racial profiling and retaliation against journalists. The Department of Justice’s proposed consent decree – grounded in constitutional policing – offered a way forward.
But in May 2025, the Department of Justice, under the leadership of President Donald Trump’s appointee Pam Bondi, withdrew the recommended agreement.
Seven months later, Operation Metro Surge deployed thousands of federal agents to Minnesota with a markedly different enforcement philosophy.
Indeed, the recent expansion of federal enforcement authority in Minnesota followed a retreat from federal constitutional oversight.
courtlistener.com
Taking the handcuffs off
A presidential executive order, signed by Trump in late April 2025 and titled “Strengthening and Unleashing America’s Law Enforcement to Pursue Criminals and Protect Innocent Citizens,” pledged to remove what were described as “handcuffs” on police.
Soon thereafter, the administration deployed the National Guard to Los Angeles amid immigration protests.
Though a federal judge later rejected the legal rationale for that deployment, in August 2025, the president sent National Guard forces to Washington, D.C., purportedly to reduce crime. In September 2025, Trump described American cities as potential “training grounds” for the military to confront what he called the “enemy from within.”
Each episode reflects an increasingly expansive view of executive branch authority.
Whether Operation Metro Surge ultimately withstands judicial scrutiny remains to be seen. Numerous lawsuits continue to wind their way through the courts.
But the broader question is already clear: When, in the name of security, the executive branch directly challenges so many Bill of Rights protections at once, how much strain can the American legal system absorb? Will basic constitutional rights survive this moment?
What is unfolding in Minnesota is not simply a local enforcement story. It is a test of whether the Constitution as we know it will survive.
The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Politics + Society – The Conversation