A patch referencing St. Paul on an ICE agent’s uniform was authorized, but that wasn’t the case for an ATF agent’s patch that people noticed during a federal law enforcement operation in Minneapolis this week, the agencies said Friday.
A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer wore a circular patch on the arm of his uniform reading “St. Paul Field Office Special Response Team.”
Each of the 25 ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations Special Response Teams across the U.S. has a unique patch, an ICE spokesperson said Friday.
The St. Paul patch is intended to depict an “ancient Scandinavian warrior and a Vegvisir, or ‘wayfinder,’ and ties into the regional identifiers for Minnesota including a nod to the Scandinavian heritage of many of the early European settlers in Minnesota,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
The imagery raised questions for some people. Brandon Schorsch, who took video of the patch and posted a photo of it on social media, wrote: “I am deeply concerned about this patch.”
The vegvisir has been co-opted by some far right extremist groups, according to a senior research analyst with the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Intelligence Project, though more information has to be known about a person’s intentions to determine the significance of the image in a particular use.
The ICE patch “is in no way an affiliation to an extremist group,” the agency spokesperson said.
ICE patch drew attention
On Tuesday, a large federal law enforcement presence drew protests in South Minneapolis from people concerned it was an immigration raid. Officials from the FBI, ATF and the Department of Homeland Security gathered with tactical vehicles at the corner of Lake Street and Bloomington Avenue late in the morning.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said it “was related to a criminal search warrant for drugs and money laundering and was not related to immigration enforcement.” It was one of eight search warrants “for a transnational criminal organization,” according to Hennepin County Sheriff Dawanna Witt.
“Federal investigators conducted a groundbreaking criminal operation today — Minnesota’s first under the Homeland Security Task Force (HSTF) umbrella — marking a new chapter in how we confront complex, multidimensional threats,” Jamie Holt, ICE Homeland Security Investigations special agent in charge for St. Paul, said in a statement.
Schorsch, of Minneapolis, heard from his wife about armored vehicles and the large amount of law enforcement gathered Tuesday. “That’s going to make people feel frightened,” he said.
He went to the area and was recording video when he noticed the ICE agent wearing the patch. He had an audible, “Ohhh,” reaction on the video when he saw it.
“In my job, I do look out for things like this,” said Schorsch, who works as the combatting hate organizer for Jewish Community Action, though he was not there in his work capacity on Tuesday.
The Southern Poverty Law Center says there are Neo-Völkisch groups that “rely on a romanticized Viking aesthetic and mythos — imagery they use to perpetuate their belief in white racial superiority. This adaptable and covert messaging, anchored by a nationwide network of ‘kindreds,’ has allowed these groups to grow in recent years.”
More people are on the lookout for symbols that may have nefarious meanings, Schorsch said.
An ICE agent was seen last week in Martha’s Vineyard, Mass., with a tattoo of a Valknot on his arm. The symbol is used in Norse mythology. “Some white supremacists, particularly racist Odinists, have appropriated the Valknot to use as a racist symbol,” according to the Anti-Defamation League.
‘The Others’ patch not authorized
Schorsch also saw two ATF agents on Tuesday with a small patch on their uniforms that said, “The Others,” and he photographed one of them.
The agent seen in the photo is an ATF special agent assigned to a sheriff’s office taskforce, said Ashlee Sherrill, a spokeswoman in the ATF’s St. Paul Field Division, in response to a reporter’s questions.
“The patch in question is not an authorized part of the ATF uniform and has been addressed internally,” Sherrill said, adding that she couldn’t provide further information on personnel matters.
It’s not clear what the patch was meant to convey.
