Two off-duty St. Paul police officers have been pulled over by federal agents during an immigration crackdown in Minnesota, the police chief said Tuesday.

The same happened to an off-duty Brooklyn Park police officer who was stopped at gunpoint.

“This isn’t just important because it happened to off-duty police officers, but … our officers know what the Constitution is,” said Brooklyn Park Police Chief Mark Bruley. “They know what right and wrong is, and they know when people are being targeted. … If it is happening to our officers, it pains me to think how many of our community members are falling victim to this every day.”

Bruley, St. Paul Police Chief Axel Henry and Hennepin County Sheriff Dawanna Witt, speaking in the Minnesota Capitol rotunda Tuesday with law enforcement leaders at their side, emphasized there is a need for immigration enforcement.

“We have to find common ground here,” Henry said. “… If American citizens are being grabbed or stopped or seized, this can’t happen. We have to make sure that everyone’s civil rights are intact. I truly want to believe that there isn’t anybody on either side of the political aisle that thinks that people’s civil rights aren’t important.”

Elected officials have been meeting with local law enforcement from around the state on the subject.

Law enforcement is not “suggesting that there isn’t a legitimate, lawful authority to operate here as federal agents,” Henry said. “But we are trying to come together to say, ‘Can we please find a pathway forward? Can we find a way to make sure that we can do these things without scaring the hell out of our community members?’”

Police chiefs are hearing from people who are “afraid to go outside,” Henry said, and it’s not because they’re in the U.S. illegally, but because they “know people that are getting stopped by the way that they looked, and they don’t want to take that risk.”

Bruley said he’s talked to federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Homeland Security Investigations agents about what’s happening.

“This is not widespread,” he said. “This is a small group of agents within the surge in the metro area that are performing or acting this way. … I’ve received phone calls from ICE agents and HSI agents indicating this is not how they act, this is not what they do.”

Bruley called for more supervision over the surge in immigration enforcement.

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