EXCLUSIVE: ICE Sending False Tips to Cops of Being "Stalked" By Activists

"ICE is scared by the accountability and spotlight we’re putting them under," Joe Boman says after being arrested by Minnesota police. His crime? Legally following ICE agents to track their activities

Status Coup has exclusively learned of the arrest of an American citizen in Minneapolis after federal ICE agents falsely reported him to police for “stalking” agents.

Joseph Boman, whose partner described him as “a nice, white guy with a chemical engineering degree,” was arrested on December 26 by Hennepin County sheriffs, and held in the county jail for hours after Christmas, for undertaking the constitutionally protected activity of monitoring federal immigration agents.

Boman was released after public outcry applied maximum pressure. Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office did not respond to Status Coup’s request for comment on why Boman was arrested and what role ICE agents played in the arrest.

Concerned over the escalating violence and aggression perpetrated by ICE in Minneapolis, Boman spent part of his Christmas, and the day after, monitoring federal agents from his blue Mini Cooper. The car “sticks out like a sore thumb,” he told Status Coup, amid the many SUVs and trucks on the snowy Minnesota roads. “They knew for sure that I was following them, and I stuck out, which is probably why I ended up being targeted.”

Like residents and activists in other parts of the country Status Coup has covered, Minneapolis and St. Paul residents have formed large Signal group chats where they share information about ICE and other federal agents’ activity. The digital hub serves as an effort to document the government’s abuses—and warn neighbors about potential raids. Some volunteers watch the Henry Bishop Federal Building, the base from which the Department of Homeland Security is staging many operations, to track the comings and goings of vehicles driven by federal agents. Other volunteers driving in their vehicles then attempt to follow the government cars to warn neighborhoods in the agents’ path.

Across the two days, Boman followed agents for a combined 40 minutes as they left and returned to the Whipple Building.

On the morning of Dec. 26, Boman left his home in his blue Mini Cooper to observe immigration agents. He noticed a black Nissan truck with two “ICE agents” following him. He stopped for gas, and the agents pulled up closer to him and filmed him with a phone while he filled his tank. The agents “peeled out and left before I could get a chance to really do anything,” Boman said.

Later that day, he followed a few government vehicles as they returned to the Whipple Building. After the vehicles turned into federal property, Boman entered a private parking lot across the street where a Hennepin County squad car stopped him. Soon, more deputies arrived, and he was arrested.

This past November, Border Patrol agents threatened Status Coup’s own Jon Farina with arrest for following them as he was documenting their actions.

At the time, Weston Rowland, an attorney involved with a lawsuit against the LAPD for its attacks on journalists covering anti-ICE protests earlier in 2025, blasted Border Patrol’s actions for violating the constitution—which also applies to the arrest of Boman.

“The First Amendment protects the right of the press—and the public—to observe and record government officials in public, without retaliation. And when officers use a traffic stop with no valid basis to shut down that coverage, they also risk violating the Fourth Amendment’s ban on unreasonable seizures. This isn’t just heavy-handed; it’s unconstitutional.”

After some initial confusion about why he was being detained, Boman said deputies finally explained:“They said that they had reports of reckless driving and they said that I had caused multiple accidents.”

Deputies claimed they had eyewitnesses and traffic camera evidence against him.

But Boman did no such thing; his nerves quickly calmed knowing the accusations were bogus. He also realized this wasn’t some on-off; ICE agents had been calling in false tips to local county law enforcement to quash dissidence—by arresting those trying to legally follow their activities. In fact, he had learned of a similar incident the night before in which county deputies had responded to false reports, presumably provided by federal agents, of an anti-ICE activist driving a car on train tracks near the federal building.

“They have to get other law enforcement agencies involved, and the Hennepin County Sheriff’s [Office] is one of the departments in the area that is willing to work with ICE because Minneapolis police, they’re hands-off,” Boman said. “They’re not touching anything that ICE is trying to get them to do. So they (federal immigration agents) have to rely on the sheriff’s [office].”

Deputies took Boman’s phone and car as evidence, which they continue to hold.

As activists gathered to protest his arrest, deputies moved Boman into the Whipple Building’s parking lot, a move his partner said was at least partially designed to intimidate. Deputies took statements from federal agents and then told Boman he would be arrested on charges of stalking and harassment.

He was hauled off to the Hennepin County Jail. Within a couple of hours, he met with a lawyer who told him that because it was a Friday afternoon, if he was not released within the next few hours, he would likely be held until Monday.

His partner and other activists immediately got to work, organizing many phone calls to local leaders, including the Minneapolis mayor and the sheriff’s office. After around eight hours in custody, he was released.

Boman does not know if he will be charged for stalking, but feels confident about his innocence and chances. He is using the attention to call out the blatant hypocrisy of his situation, the power imbalance, and the fear the Department of Homeland Security is showing by targeting him.

“They’re in like full baliclavas,” Boman said about the federal immigration agents he monitored. “I don’t know what their face looks like. I have no idea where they live, which they know all of that about me, and have used that to follow me around when I am just a private citizen conducting my own personal affairs.”

“The way that I’m looking at it is it does show that what we’re doing is making a difference, and ICE is scared by the accountability and the spotlight that we’re putting them under.”

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