President Donald Trump has sent White House border czar Tom Homan to Minneapolis after Department of Homeland Security Kristi Noem responded poorly to another unfortunate shooting death of an anti-ICE activist. Minnesota Democrats should work with Homan to ensure federal officials can safely enforce immigration laws, but judging by the false statements of national Democratic Party leaders, it appears unlikely that they will do so.
The most recent fatal shooting occurred Saturday after Border Patrol agents tried to arrest an illegal immigrant wanted for violent assault. The alien was able to avoid arrest and escaped into a nearby doughnut shop. People inside the shop locked the door, preventing Border Patrol agents from coming in and carrying out the arrest. (It is extraordinary that citizens protect violent criminals, but presumably it is due to both reflexive opposition to the Trump administration and a vague notion that anyone in the country illegally must be among the oppressed masses.)
Border Patrol agents called for backup but were swarmed by activists shouting epithets at them and blowing whistles. Agents were heavily outnumbered and one of them became involved in a physical altercation with a female activist. That is when Alex Pretti intervened, grabbing the woman’s coat in an attempt to pull her away from the agent. Agents then tackled Pretti, a scuffle ensued, one agent can be heard shouting “he’s got a gun,” a shot is fired, and then Pretti is shot repeatedly.
White House Deputy chief of staff for policy Stephen Miller called Pretti a “domestic terrorist,” and Noem asserted that he “arrived at the scene to inflict maximum damage on individuals and to kill law enforcement.” Border Patrol Commander-at-Large Gregory Bovino said Pretti “wanted to do maximum damage and massacre law enforcement.”
None of these statements was true. Their deliberate falseness is an insult to the public and undercuts the Trump administration’s credibility on immigration enforcement. It now appears that Noem and Bovino have, in consequence, been benched in favor of Homan, who we hope will bring a cooler and wiser head to the dangerous situation in Minneapolis.
But if Homan is to succeed, he will need honesty and cooperation from Democrats, and so far, they are offering neither. As evidence, see statements put out by former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama about the Pretti shooting.
Clinton calls Renee Good and Pretti “peaceful protesters” who were only “exercising their constitutional right to observe and document law enforcement” when they were “shot and killed.” This is flatly false. Good was obstructing ICE movements with her car, she was not simply observing. Pretti interjected himself into a Border Patrol physical altercation; he was interfering to prevent federal agents from doing their duty. Agents did not randomly pick him out from among dozens of activists filming events and start shooting for no reason. There is a well-funded and well-organized effort not just to document federal immigration law enforcement but also to obstruct and impede it. Democrats’ continued failure to acknowledge this, and not use local law enforcement to thwart these illegal activities, is a major cause of the violence in Minneapolis.
In his statement, Obama admits that “federal law enforcement and immigration agents have a tough job,” but he goes on to say they should “work with, rather than against, state and local officials to ensure public safety.” He’s right, they should. But who is to blame for the fact that they do not work together? It is the fault of the local authorities, not the feds. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Democratic Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey have declared their jurisdictions to be “sanctuaries” and have forbidden state and local law enforcement from working with Border Patrol and ICE. Obama knows this but pretends not to. In Republican controlled states across the country federal law enforcement is working closely with state and local law enforcement and there is none of the violence we are seeing in Minneapolis. The violence arises from Democratic and leftist obstruction. Federal agents clearly do not want their work constantly complicated by obstruction and violence; that is, this is not the way they choose to have events play out, it is a choice by the leftist-Democratic opposition.
CITIES CAN’T AFFORD TO KEEP LOSING FAMILIES
As much as Clinton, Obama, Walz, and Frey dislike the facts, Trump won reelection in 2024. Ending former President Joe Biden’s open border policies was one of his signature issues. He specifically campaigned on deporting millions of illegal immigrants and voters chose Trump and deportations over Vice President Kamala Harris and unending equivocations.
That doesn’t give Kristi Noem or Stephen Miller the right to make false pronouncements about activists who get shot while impeding federal law enforcement, and those incidents should be investigated. But deportations have always been messy. There is no such thing as an immaculate deportation. Instead of lying and defaming hard-working federal law enforcement officials, Democrats should change course and work with them instead.
