A U.S. citizen on her way to a medical appointment in Minneapolis
was dragged out of her car and detained by immigration officers,
according to a statement released by the woman on Thursday,
after a video of her arrest drew millions of views on social media.
#Aliya #Rahman said she was brought to a detention center where she was
denied medical care and lost consciousness.
The Department of Homeland Security said she was an agitator who was obstructing ICE agents conducting arrests in the area.
That video is the latest in a deluge of online content that documents an intensifying immigration crackdown across the midwestern city,
as thousands of federal agents execute arrests amid protests in what local officials have likened to a “federal invasion.”
Dragged from her car
Rahman said that she was on her way to a routine appointment at the Traumatic Brain Injury Center
when she encountered federal immigration agents at an intersection.
Video appears to show federal immigration agents shouting commands over a cacophony of whistles, car horns and screams from protesters.
In the video, one masked agent smashes Rahman’s passenger side window
while others cut her seatbelt and drag her out of the car through the driver’s side door.
Numerous guards then carried her by her arms and legs towards an ICE vehicle
"I’m disabled trying to go to the doctor up there,
that’s why I didn’t move,”
Rahman said, gesturing down the street as officers pulled her arms behind her back.
Rahman was caught in a “terrible and confusing position”
and had
“no where to go,”
according to Alexa Van Brunt,
Rahman’s attorney and director of the MacArthur Justice Center.
“Her only options were to move her car forward in the direction of ICE officers and risk being accused of trying to harm them
—which led to Renee Good’s death
—or stay stationary,
which in the end led to physical violence and abuse,”
Van Brunt wrote in a statement
