Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2026.
In an article in the Minnesota Star Tribune on Feb. 1, 2026, “How ICE Crackdowns Are Moving Some MN Teens to Action,” Laura Yuen interviews several students, including Muno, a student at Shakopee High School.
Like many other students, Muno, age 18, asked Yuen to hold her last name because of fear of retaliation. Some of her fellow students had death threats during a school walkout, and Muno did not want to have her last name in the paper.
According to Yuen, Muno shared three stories she couldn’t shake from her mind during Operation Metro Surge in Minnesota over the last three months, the Immigration and Custom Enforcement agents immigration enforcement.
Then Muno craved carne asada. In West St. Paul, she pulled up to a taco shop. She saw a Latino boy, about her age, sizing her up from the store wood. “He apparently is the store’s makeshift security guide, there to prevent ICE agents from entering. He unlocks the door to let Muno in and quickly locks it after her.”
According to Yuen, lots of stories allege ICE is racially profiling residents, but Yuen was told by Muno that there is not enough about how the current climate of fear forces people of color to profile strangers back. “Even a teenager is open to make a split-second calculations, rooted in bias, to protect their family and their livelihood.”
So Muno tells the boy, “I’m sorry you have to do this, all day and every day,” then breaks down in her car and cries.
Later, Muno is going to her friend’s house, where she and several girls planned to bake cinnamon rolls and post selfies on TikTok in their matching pajamas. “Then her friend sends a warning to the group chat: ICE agents just detained a construction worker in her neighborhood.”
According to Yuen, “It’s the juxtapositions of frivolity and fear that fills Muno’s day-to-day life.” According to Muno, “I don’t want to stop being happy. I don’t want that normalcy being taken away.
But it’s so hard. You just can’t look away.”
Muno visited the memorial for Renée Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother of three and poet, who was fatally shot by an ICE agent on Jan. 7, 2026, in Minneapolis, during Operation Metro Surge. The shooting, ruled a homicide, occurred as she observed federal immigration activity from her car, sparking national protests and a federal investigation.
“Muno sets down her flowers and her signs and pays her respects. Out of nowhere, a random Somali auntie reminds her to zip up her jacket and hands Muno a hot cup of tea. An older white man offers Muno food. This is the Minnesota she knows, the place that reared her and continues to protect its youth.”
“She said immigrants and their children won’t stop enduring or giving back to the state,” according to Yuen in the article about Muno.
“Yes, ICE is still happening, but I still have dinner plans Friday. I still have band practice. I’m still going to college. I’m still making my parents proud.”