JD Vance Says Invoking Insurrection Act In Minnesota Unnecessary For Now

Vice President JD Vance doesn’t believe there’s a need to invoke the Insurrection Act in Minnesota for the time being, he told The Daily Wire on Thursday.

Vance touched down in Minneapolis, meeting with federal immigration officers to assess the chaos on the ground. For weeks following the fatal shooting of an ICE watch activist, left-wing agitators have followed federal agents arresting illegal immigrants across the Twin Cities trying to thwart their actions.

“I’ve tried to understand this as well as I possibly could, and my understanding is what invoking the Insurrection Act would allow the federal government to use the military for local law enforcement operations,” he told The Daily Wire’s Mary Margaret Olohan.

“Right now, we don’t think that we need that. Now, the president could change his mind, of course, things could get worse, but right now, we think that federal law enforcement officers can do the job of federal law enforcement. Now, what I do worry about … is if the chaos gets worse, if more and more ICE agents start getting assaulted, if other law enforcement officers start getting assaulted, that would be a real problem,” Vance said.

In response to the rising tensions, President Donald Trump floated using the Insurrection Act, which would allow him to deploy the military and federalize the National Guard, to stop “professional agitators and insurrectionists” from attacking federal agents. Talk of invoking the Insurrection Act came after a federal agent shot an illegal immigrant who hit the agent with a snow shovel and broom handle as he tried to evade arrest.

Last week, Trump said he didn’t “think there’s any reason right now” to use the 1807 law.

.@VP tells @MaryMargOlohan that he and @POTUS don’t believe the Insurrection Act is necessary at this point in Minneapolis:

“Right now, we don’t think that we need that. Now, the president could change his mind…but right now, we think that federal law enforcement officers… pic.twitter.com/f9sQzudwmc

— Daily Wire (@realDailyWire) January 22, 2026

Vance said the onus is on the Minneapolis Police Department, which he said has stand-down orders preventing local officers from assisting federal immigration agents.

“But, again, we have so much federal law enforcement resources here right now, we have so many people here that we do not wanna have here. I do not want so many ICE officers in Minneapolis right now. I mean, good lord, it’s really freaking cold outside, but they’re here not even to enforce immigration laws, but to protect the people from the rioters. That’s an absurd state of affairs and we wouldn’t need it if we had a little bit more cooperation from the Minneapolis Police Department,” he said.