A Minneapolis couple said that ICE agents deployed tear gas and stun grenades around them and their six children — the youngest only 6 months old — as they tried to maneuver their car out of a tense protest on Wednesday night.
Shawn Jackson and his wife, Destiny, both 26, said they were driving home from a son’s basketball game when the family found themselves caught in a clash between protesters and federal agents in North Minneapolis.
The couple sensed the encounter could quickly spiral out of control, they said, but when they tried to turn their car around to exit the blocked-off street, they were surrounded by federal agents.
“From the side, the front and from behind me, it was nothing but ICE,” Mr. Jackson said in an interview on Thursday.
One agent told the couple that they needed to get out of the area. Ms. Jackson said she and her husband responded that they were trying to do exactly that, but their path was blocked by agents coming up the street.
Then, agents let loose on the crowd, the couple said.
The crowd-control grenades went off around them and one tear gas canister rolled beneath the car, Ms. Jackson said. A concussive blast — from the tear gas canister or another device, she wasn’t sure — rocked the vehicle, she said, setting off the airbags and trapping the family as acrid smoke billowed around.
“It felt like our lungs was burning,” Mr. Jackson said, noting that two of his children had severe asthma. “Water didn’t help. Nothing helped at that moment.”
The couple said they were able to get their children, ages 6 months through 11 years, out of the car only after Mr. Jackson kicked open a door. Ms. Jackson, blinded and unable to breathe, circled the vehicle pulling out as many of her children as she could, she said.
Bystanders arrived to usher the family into a nearby house, she said, while others set about removing the 6-month-old, who was briefly trapped in his car seat.
“My baby was completely unconscious, not breathing,” Ms. Jackson said. She recounted talking to emergency services over the phone, receiving instructions on how to perform CPR on her child, while bystanders doused her other children with milk to neutralize the tear gas.
Once the Jacksons’ youngest child came around, emergency medical services arrived and took the couple and the three children most affected by the tear gas to a hospital.
The family returned home Thursday, Mr. Jackson said. A day later, he still wasn’t sure exactly what prompted agents to deploy munitions against the family S.U.V. Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Chris Hippensteel is a reporter covering breaking news and a member of the 2025-26 Times Fellowship class, a program for journalists early in their careers.
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