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January 25, 2026 
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For his article on the spiraling conflict between federal immigration authorities and the people of Minneapolis, Charles Homans spent ten days in the city, where he grew up, observing the street clashes between residents and immigration agents that have resulted in the fatal shootings of two city residents by federal agents. He interviewed activists, immigrants hiding from the federal raids, and the city’s mayor, among others.
What he found was an increasingly literal fight for power in America, one that had spilled well out of the frame of politics and the law. “The agents had no capacity to maintain order or much apparent interest in doing so,” he writes. “Their presence was a vector of chaos, and controlling it was not in their job description.” The city’s citizens, meanwhile, were increasingly paranoid and confrontational. It is an explosive situation, with no clear end in sight as long as President Trump keeps his forces in a city that views them as an occupying army.
For this week’s cover story, C.J. Chivers on semiautonomous killer drones being used in Ukraine.
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| Illustration by Rob Farmer |
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