The United States sends ICE agents to the Winter Olympics, angering Italy

The US immigration agency, whose officers were involved in two deadly shootings in Minneapolis, said it was sending agents to help support US security operations during the Winter Olympics, which begin in Italy on February 6.

Confirmation of the agency’s role came from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), after the reports sparked concern and anger in Italy.

“This is a militia that kills… of course they are not welcome in Milan,” the city’s mayor, Beppe Sala, told Italian radio on Tuesday.

An Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesperson stressed that “all security operations remain under Italian authority.”

Sources at the US Embassy in Rome had already explained to Italian media that different federal agencies had worked at previous Games in the past, although it was not clear whether the Customs and Enforcement Agency itself had participated.

“ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) supports the U.S. Department of State’s Diplomatic Security Service and the host nation to examine and mitigate risks posed by transnational criminal organizations,” the agency’s statement on Tuesday explained.

She added that it was “obvious” that she would not conduct immigration enforcement operations outside the United States.

Italian Interior Minister Matteo Pantedossi initially seemed unaware that US immigration officials would be coming to the Milan-Cortina Olympics and said that even if they did foreign delegations could choose their own security, saying: “I don’t see what the problem is and that’s completely normal.”

But as shock over the images emerging from Minneapolis grew, protests also grew in Italy over the possibility of officers from the same US federal agency appearing on Italian streets.

In the wake of the shooting of Alex Preti on the streets of Minneapolis by federal agents on Saturday morning, two journalists working for Italian public broadcaster RAI were threatened by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials as the reporters drove around the city to cover the agency’s work.

The Rai TV report showed that one of the agents warned the crew that if they continued filming the agents, their car window would be smashed.

The governor of the Lombardy region, Attilio Fontana, sought to calm the situation, proposing the deployment of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Italy to protect US Vice President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

Political opponents of right-wing Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, such as Five-Star Senator Barbara Floridia, warned that the government’s continued silence on the issue would provide “further evidence of cowardice and subservience towards Donald Trump.”

The Interior Minister has since taken a stronger stance, stressing on Monday that “the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency will certainly not operate on Italian national territory.”

He added that the United States did not send a list of names of security personnel, and that the Italian state guarantees security.

The center-left mayor of Milan was not impressed.

“I believe [ICE agents]“They should not come to Italy because they do not guarantee that they are compatible with our democratic way of ensuring security,” Beppe Sala told RTL radio.