Judge Menendez Dismisses Tincher v. Mullin Observer-Rights Suit Without Prejudice for Lack of Standing After Operation Metro Surge Ends

On September 18, 2026 (order date), Judge Katherine M. Menendez of the District of Minnesota granted the government’s motion to dismiss the amended complaint in Tincher v. Mullin (formerly Tincher v. Noem; the RECAP docket is captioned Doxsey v. Mullin), the suit brought by people who observed, recorded and protested immigration enforcement during Operation Metro Surge. All named plaintiffs were dismissed without prejudice for lack of jurisdiction, and the motion for jurisdictional discovery was denied.

The ground was standing, not mootness. Plaintiffs seek only prospective injunctive relief. The court measured standing as of the February 13, 2026 filing of the amended complaint, one day after the February 12 announcement that the surge was ending, and held that the drawdown and the shift to jail-based arrests removed the “ongoing, persistent pattern” on which the January 16, 2026 preliminary injunction had rested. The court did not decide mootness, but noted in a footnote that the case is “moot in the ordinary sense” and that the government offered none of the assurances the voluntary-cessation exception requires, quoting Homan: “If we need to come back, we’ll come back.”

What bears on observer rights. The order does not reach the merits. The preliminary injunction was dissolved as moot on April 8, 2026 after the surge ended. The standing holding rests on the operation having ended, so a renewed at-large enforcement operation would present a different record. The court tied the plaintiffs’ follow-and-observe practice to at-large arrests: Plaintiffs would not continue to engage in the protest strategies central to the case without them.

Ryan Doxsey, the one surviving thread. Mr. Doxsey alleges he was told by immigration agents on January 27, 2026 that he would be added to a list of domestic terrorists. That allegation was unaffected by the end of the surge, but he alleged no concrete harm from the designation, and the court said it could not conjure up unpled allegations to save his standing. He was given leave to file a Second Amended Complaint within 21 days, or to sue separately.