Fact-checking Trump’s claim that anti-ICE protesters are ‘paid instigators and insurrectionists’

This article originally appeared on PolitiFact.

As crowds of people in Minnesota protest increased immigration enforcement passed by the Trump administration, President Donald Trump and some of his allies have repeatedly described the protesters as hired guns.

He watches: Thousands brave the bitter cold at an “ICE Out” protest in the Twin Cities

“The thugs who are protesting include many highly paid professional agitators and anarchists,” he said on January 18 on Truth Social.

“They are instigators and paid insurgents,” Trump said in a press conference on January 20.

The next day, in Davos, Switzerland, Trump said the “fake” protests were “carried out by professional instigators and insurrectionists…they are professional rioters.”

“We’re very much looking at the money as well in Minnesota and elsewhere,” he added.

We asked the White House for Trump’s evidence about “paid” protesters and received no response. Although some people on social media provided what they said was evidence of such activity, we found none of the claims to stand up to scrutiny.

However, Trump’s claim has become a point of discussion among his leaders and supporters. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said on CBS’ “Face the Nation” that Minneapolis is different from other cities, where she said officials have not seen “funded protesters.”

“When someone throws a brick at an ICE agent or someone tries to run over an ICE agent, who paid for the brick?” Vice President J.D. Vance asked at a White House news conference on January 8. (The bricks are often mischaracterized as evidence of organized, paid protests.)

In a Jan. 13 interview on CNN’s “The Source” about the fatal shooting of Rene Judd by an ICE officer, Sen. Markwayne Mullen, R-Oklahoma, called for an investigation into “protesters who are paid and paid to obstruct federal officers from doing their jobs.”

Minnesotans have responded to the presence of immigration agents in their communities for weeks. The protests have been widely covered and there is no evidence that they were organized. None of these politicians explained who they believed was supporting the protests.

Experts told us that the majority of protesters are local residents who have expressed their opposition. We found a large volunteer protest movement in the Twin Cities.

“Most of the protesters are state residents who are concerned not only about the presence of ICE in the state but also the president’s usurpation of power,” Yohuru Williams, a historian and director of the Racial Justice Initiative at the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota, told PolitiFact in an email.

How Minnesotans Protest Immigration Actions

The Twin Cities have a long tradition of community organizing among civic groups and institutions. Labor unions, religious groups, and immigrant organizations played roles in resisting the federal immigration process in Minnesota. The groups organized high school walkouts, marches and demonstrations waving signs.

The “Singing Resistance” group holds peaceful vigils with singing. Volunteers donated to food drives and delivered groceries to families afraid to leave their homes. Smitten Kitten, a store in Minnesota that sells sex products, collected food, diapers and other necessities for the homebound migrants. The St. Paul Mischief Toy Store distributed free whistles to people to alert others to ICE activity. Restaurants offered special menu items like “f— ICE Cold Brew” to raise money for an immigrant rights group.

Read more: “We are being intimidated.” What Mainers see when ICE launches operations in the state

Gillian Hiscock, owner of her own women’s sports-themed bar, told PolitiFact that protesters were not paid.

“We’ve had people from literally all walks of life stop by to make stickers and grab whistles — families with young children, rounding up seniors with walking sticks, helping us create a pendant for their sign so they don’t have to hold on to anything, and everything in between,” Hiscock said in an email.

Hiscock said she has heard many people protesting now say they took no action in the past, and that the label “paid protesters” is intended to undermine their voices.

“I really think trying to downplay the amount of movement here on Earth is a made-up sentiment,” Hiscock said.

Neighbors joined Signal chats to alert each other about nearby immigration enforcement actions and take action. The Monarca Movement has organized “resilience” training sessions to teach people how to video record immigration agents or how to respond if agents leave behind a child or abandon a car during an arrest.

On January 23, thousands of people marched through downtown Minneapolis in subzero temperatures before gathering at Target Center. Earlier in the day, about 100 clerics were arrested at a protest at the airport. Hundreds of businesses closed their doors on Jan. 23 for an ICE Truth and Freedom Day event outside of Minnesota.

Describing the weather that day on the air, Minnesota Vikings radio broadcaster Paul Allen joked about protesters receiving “hazard pay.” Three days later, he apologized after the backlash, calling it a “cheap one-liner” and “insensitive and poorly timed” and saying he would take a few days off.

He watches: Trump accuses some protesters in Los Angeles of being “paid rebels”

Danielle K said: “There is no evidence of philanthropic efforts to fund expanded civil protest efforts,” Brown, a journalism professor at Michigan State University who previously worked at the University of Minnesota, told PolitiFact in an email.

Professional community organizers participated in the protests, which is normal for all protests, Brown said. Groups with different ideologies routinely speak out at such events.

However, Brown said, “the majority of protesters remain local residents who are not paid to participate in acts of protest and resistance.”

In general, it is not uncommon for groups to distribute signs.

Community residents were protesting “what they view as unlawful misconduct by ICE agents,” said Timothy Zeck, a First Amendment expert and law professor at William and Mary University. He said the Trump administration’s description of paid protesters is “baseless” and aims to belittle and dismiss opposition.

Critics of the 2024 campus protests in Israel and Gaza and the 2025 anti-Trump “Hands Up” protests in Washington, D.C. have also used the term “outsider agitators” or other terms, but our reporting found these claims to lack merit. Zick previously told PolitiFact that this description has been used throughout history to discredit large historical movements, no matter how peaceful.

These videos are not proof that protesters are paid

Social media users have amplified claims that professional protesters or agitators are in Minnesota to make money. When we reviewed their post guides, we found that they were created using AI or recycled content from years ago.

In one example, an AI-generated video shared on TikTok claimed to show conservative influencer Nick Shirley interviewing a protester in Minneapolis, who says he is unemployed but gets paid $20 an hour to protest. The video contains a watermark of Sora, OpenAI’s video creation platform. It came from an account that shared several other AI-generated videos.

A screenshot of a TikTok post showing Sora’s watermark.

In another example, an X post shared photos of documents it said were contract papers for paid protesters. “This is 100% proof that none of the Democrats’ protests are organic,” the January 20 post said. “They can all be ignored because they are fake.”

The same images have been shared in previous years, including in a 2018 blog post that claims to provide evidence that protesters were paid to plan the 2015 Baltimore riots; in 2020 to claim that people protesting the killing of George Floyd were following a lead; and in 2024 by Shirley for falsely claiming that paid protesters were marching outside the Democratic National Convention to demand a ceasefire in Gaza.

Screenshot of a fake contract page for paid protesters.

A video on Fox News was widely shared as if it showed one protester admitting she was paid. In the video, Fox News anchor Laura Ingraham stood in the streets of Minneapolis questioning a protester who was shouting: “Shame! Shame! Shame!” In front of the camera. “Do you have a job?” Ingraham asked the woman whose face was partially covered by the scarf. “I’m getting paid now,” the protester replied. Ingraham pointed his thumb at the camera. PolitiFact was unable to confirm the identity or motive of the protester and we found no other reports of the incident.

Our rule

Trump said that demonstrators against the federal anti-immigration campaign in Minnesota are carrying out “fake protests carried out by professional agitators and insurrectionists. They are professional rioters.”

Minnesotans have been protesting immigration agents in their communities for weeks. Some professional community organizers participate in the protests but evidence shows a large volunteer protest movement in the Twin Cities. The accusation that protesters are “being paid” is a frequent talking point to reject the legitimacy of grassroots activism and criticism of the government.

The social media posts we found that claimed to show evidence of paid protesters were either AI-generated, recycled, or baseless conspiracy theories.

We rate this statement false.