Transcript of Partial Drawdown In Minnesota, NPR Poll: Trump and ICE, Nuclear Treaty Expires New

700 federal agents are leaving Minnesota.

The agents who remain want more access to a local jail. Does the administration have a plan for immigration enforcement with less chaos?

I'm Leila Fadel. That's Stevenski, and this is Up First from NPR News. Surveys used to show that border enforcement was the President's strongest issue. Now that Americans see how the administration is operating, two-thirds disapprove. Even the President said briefly that he learned from the public response.

I learned that maybe we can use a little bit of a softer touch, but you still have to be tough.

Also, the last major nuclear arms treaty between the US and Russia expires today. What happens now? Stay with us. We've got the news you need to start your day.

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Whitehouse border are. Tom Homan says 700 federal agents will be leaving Minnesota.

It's the beginning of a retreat from a state where federal agents confronted protesters and killed two Americans. But most agents that were brought in are still there, and Homan says any further drawdown would depend on state and local cooperation.

Let's talk about that with NPR's Meg Anderson, who's in Minneapolis. Meg, good morning. Good morning. How much is really changing?

Yeah, so the numbers don't point to a big change. It still leaves around 2,300 federal agents here. That's still more than the combined Twin Cities Police Force. It's more than the number they originally brought in before Renee McLean Good was killed by a NICE agent. Homan did say he wants to see the presence of ICE officers in the state go back to what it was before the surge began. He said he wants that partly because ICE has plans for operations in other parts of the country.

You got agents here from LA, New York, and Portland. There's problems there, too. We want to get people back to their home station to force immigration laws in those areas.

Homan, specifically zeroed in on the cooperation of sheriffs. That makes sense. Sheriffs run county jails, and around the country, they've played a key role in holding undocumented immigrants for ICE.

Okay, so he wants more state and local cooperation, but I feel we have to talk about this. Federal authorities have complained that state and local officials do not turn over people with deportation orders who turn up in jails or who are convicted of something and are in prison. State authorities say that's not true. Actually, they do cooperate, and the feds pretend they don't. The state's turning over people from prison and from many jails. But there was one big jail that limited its cooperation up to now. What do you hear from them?

I spoke with that jail system. I spoke with Hennepin County Sheriff Jeff Dawana Witt. That's the county that includes Minneapolis. She said she has had, quote, healthy conversations with Homen. She expects them to continue. She stressed that if ICE has a signed judicial warrant for someone in her jail, her officers do already honor those, like you said. But often ICE does not have that, and so Witt is required by law to release those people. Jail is pretrial detention, right? You can't hold those people indefinitely. She also said her office does not honor administrative detainers. That's when ICE asks a jail to hold someone but doesn't have that warrant signed by a judge. But Sheriff Witt told me she's considering changing that policy. If that were to change, and that's an if, right? You're going to have to show me how it's going to make Kennepan County residents safer, and you're going to have to actually act good on what you say. She said these are ongoing negotiations, and no one is going to get everything they want.

Okay, so she says she is open to a change in course. How are other local leaders responding to the new leadership, at least in Minnesota, from immigration authorities.

Right. So the consensus so far is that this drawdown is progress, but it's not enough. Minnesota attorney general, Keith Ellison, called it a step in the right direction, but that the surge needs to end. Minneapolis mayor Jacob Fry, also called for it to end, saying it's been catastrophic for residents and businesses. A coalition of Minnesota faith, labor, and other community groups dismissed the announcement. In a statement, they said there are still thousands of, quote, masked, unaccountable agents terrorizing the community. It is very much still an emergency here for many people. People who are not white are carrying their passports around. Immigrants are sheltering in place. Children are not going to school.

And Pierre's Meg Anderson in Minneapolis. Thanks for the update. Really appreciate it.

You're welcome.

65% of Americans, say immigration and customs enforcement has gone too far. That is, according to a poll released today by NPR, CBS News, and Marist.

This increased concern about ICE comes on the heels of the fatal shootings of two US citizens in Minnesota at the hands of federal immigration agents.

Npr senior political editor and correspondent Domenico Montanaro takes us through the numbers very often, and once again this morning. Domenico, good morning. Hey there. Two-thirds of Americans disagree with the administration. That sounds like a lot.

Yeah, I mean, that's jumped double digits from last summer on something that really used to be Trump's strongest issue here, immigration. So no surprise, we've seen changes from the Trump administration. Trump reassigned Greg Bovino, who was in charge of operations in Minnesota. The administration is now pulling 700 agents from the state as well. And There's been a different tone. Here's Trump yesterday with a decidedly different tone in an interview with NBC News after being asked what he learned from Minneapolis.

I learned that maybe we can use a little bit of a softer touch, but you still have to be tough.

We're dealing with really hard criminals.

So he's not completely backing down there from the tough rhetoric. I mean, despite neither American who has killed Renee Mclin-Good or Alex Freddie meeting Trump's description of criminals. And his vice President, JD Vance, yesterday refused to apologize to Freddie's family for amplifying claims, countered by video that Pretty was a quote, would be assassin. But Trump's tone is a definite adjustment, and it's pretty rare to hear him reflect and even give an iota of admitting a mistake.

Even if he effectively took it back in the next phrase. How are people viewing the President's job overall?

It's really low. I mean, his approval overall is just 39% with 30% of independents approving, and they're always key in those swing districts. His approval rating has now been below 40% in the Marist poll since November. On the economy, which is what got Trump reelected in the first place, 6 and 10 disapprove. Trump's tariffs are playing a big part in that. A majority think that they're hurting the economy, and far and away, people say Trump's top priority should be lowering prices. And yet what's gotten the most buzz and dominated the news and headlines over the past month, ICE, military action in Venezuela, and Trump's threats to take over Greenland.

Oh, I'm glad you mentioned that. How are people viewing the President's foreign policy threats on Greenland and everything else?

Only 37% are approving of his handling of foreign policy. When it comes to Venezuela and Greenland, a solid majority say the President should have to go to Congress before taking military action. Almost seven in 10 oppose the idea of taking over Greenland. That repeated threat was upsetting NATO allies and led to a decline in the stock market. Overall, when it comes to NATO, two-thirds in this poll say that the US has benefited from that alliance. With all of that, you can see maybe see why Trump backed off from those Greenland threats.

The President backed off but also said that taking over Greenland was a popular idea. Do they know something we don't?

I like to say that you don't have to believe the polls. Watch what politicians do. For someone like Trump, who usually caters to his base and rarely dials things back, these shifts are pretty significant. It shows the reality that aside from Republicans who've steadfastly stood by Trump, these policies and actions over the past month have been wildly unpopular. What has been revealed here that underneath all the lies and boasts and threats to sue the Polsters, President's actions tell us that he, in the White House see that he's in a real vulnerable position here.

Npr's Domenico Montenaro. Thanks so much.

You're welcome.

The last nuclear arms control agreement between the United States and Russia expires today.

The Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, known as New Start, It's put limits on the nuclear arsenals of the former Cold War superpowers, and its demise has raised fears of a new global arms race.

Npr's Russia correspondent, Charles Mains, is on the line from Moscow. Hey there, Charles.

Morning.

What did Start actually do.

Well, you know, New Start was signed in 2010 by President Obama at a time when his message of hope and change included resetting relations with Moscow. This was also a period when Vladimir Putin had at least nominally given up the Russian presidency to his Prime Minister, Dimitri Medvedev, who was then seen as something of a liberal modernizer. The treaty itself, it capped nuclear warheads for both Russia and the US at 1,550 a piece. It also critically allowed for each country to carry out regular onsite inspections of each other's nuclear facilities. It really was built on the same trust but verify formula that was baked into earlier arms control agreements with Russia and the USSR, none of which now exist. The new start was the last.

Okay, so each country still had enough weapons ready to incinerate the planet if necessary, but they were trying to make things regular, trying to make things transparent, a little bit more calm. How are people responding where you are in Moscow to this treaty going away?

Well, officially, Russia was trying to keep the treaty alive until the last minute. Russian President Vladimir Putin offered to de facto continue to observe the limits of the treaty for a year. That was if Washington agreed to do the same. The idea being that it would allow negotiators to work out a new agreement. But President Trump didn't seem all that interested. A The White House official told NPR, Trump had his own timeline when it came to nuclear security. The Kremlin, meanwhile, is warning that without New Start, we're entering into a more dangerous world. And many arms control experts agree. Dimitri Stefanowitch of the Primikow Institute here in Moscow tells me that an arms race won't start tomorrow, but without a new start, it's coming. Both countries will plan for the worst-case scenario. And the worst-case scenario is always your adversary is capable of magic tricks, and you need tenfold of what you have right now to somehow hedge against such a possibility. This is where we are heading.

Other than hearing that the President of the United States was not that interested in the treaty, I don't understand where things went wrong here.

Well, there were always accusations that one side or the other wasn't living by the letter of the agreement, particularly as both the US and Russia developed next-generation conventional weapons that could be retrofitted as nuclear capable. The COVID pandemic, frankly, didn't help. It saw the suspension of inspections. But Steve, the real nail in the coffin was Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. With the clock ticking on new start, Russia refused to engage the then Biden administration on arms control negotiations because the US was supporting Ukraine militarily. In fact, Putin suspended Russia's participation in the treaty as a result in 2023.

Oh, that's helpful context. What is the US proposing now?

Well, Trump says he wants limits on nuclear weapons, but that new start is just outdated, particularly in a world where you have new emerging nuclear powers like China. So Trump's looking for a better deal in his words. But even there, Moscow's view is, well, then, okay, let's talk about caps on the arsenals of other nuclear powers like the UK or France. Meanwhile, we have Pakistan, India, and North Korea. So this gets unwieldy very quickly. And meanwhile, the fact is that Russia and the US have close to 90% of the world's nuclear weapons, so their leadership or lack thereof on this issue, really matters.

Charles Mains in Moscow. Thanks so much. Thank you. And that's Up First for this Thursday, February fifth. I'm Steve Inskeep.

And I'm Leila Fadel. Today's episode of Up First was edited by Eric Westerveld, Dana Farrington, Robbie Griffitz, Mohamed Al-Berdici, and Alice Wolfley. It was produced by Zyad Butch and Nia Dumas. Our director is Christopher Thomas. We get engineering support from Stacey Abbott, and our technical director is Carly Strange. Our Deputy Executive Producer is Kelly Dickens. Join us again tomorrow.

Are you on tomorrow, Leila?

I am. Are you on?

Then And I will join you.

Okay, good, good, good, good.

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