Police Investigate Anonymous Letter to Sonoma County GOP Threatening Violence Against ICE

Santa Rosa police are investigating the origins of a graphic 12-page letter that was mailed to the Sonoma County Republican Party headquarters with threats of violence against Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers.

Party chair Debbie LeBoy said she found a stamped manila envelope on Jan. 20 in the mailbox of the party’s offices on Guerneville Road in Santa Rosa. The letter inside, which KQED reviewed, called for a “war” to be brought against ICE and its agents amid the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown roiling American cities.

The screed — titled “A Real American Response to Foreign Terrorist Invasions” — and mocks “low-IQ” federal agents for “living out their Call of Duty fantasy army roles, only with real assault weapons,” and argues that agents should be sent home “in body bags.”

A section of the letter also contains diagrams with detailed instructions for building homemade explosive devices to launch at federal agents, “shredding body parts and terrorizing domestic ICE terrorists.”

Beyond the printed address on the envelope’s label, there was no other mention of the Sonoma County GOP. LeBoy said while the party’s offices have been broken into and received anonymous hate mail in the past, the letter has made the party feel like a target.

“Our board met last night and we’ve been working on some security measures,” she said Thursday. “They chose to mail this to us, but we don’t know what the next step might be.”

Santa Rosa Police Sgt. Patricia Seffens confirmed to KQED that the letter mailed to the North Bay Republicans was related to a separate one sent to “an out-of-state private organization that has some association with ICE.”

LeBoy said on Jan. 27, she received a call from Geo Group, a global private prison company based in Florida that operates immigration detention facilities, alerting her that the letter sent to the company had the Sonoma County Republican Party offices listed as the return address.

While Santa Rosa police have not identified the person or organization that sent the manifesto, officers from the department’s Violent Crimes Investigations Team are working with the United States Postal Inspector to track its source.

“We are also examining that letter for any forensic evidence, such as trace DNA that may have been left on the envelope or paper, anything like that,” Seffens said.

In Minneapolis, “Operation Metro Surge” has drawn broad condemnation for excessive force used by federal agents, who fatally shot two protesters in January, and spurred calls across the aisle for more accountability and funding restrictions for the Department of Homeland Security.

KQED’s Sara Hossaini contributed to this report.