Donald Trump’s efforts to deploy militarized immigration agents in US cities may finally be reaching a reckoning as he faces widespread opposition across the US, dissenting lawmakers in his own party, and impending court rulings after the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti by federal officers in Minneapolis.
Trump said on Monday that his administration is reviewing the shooting of Pretti in Minneapolis by a federal officer, and that he will send border czar Tom Homan to Minnesota.
“Tom is tough but fair, and will report directly to me,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post on Monday. In the same post the president said Congress and the justice department were “looking” at Ilhan Omar, the Democratic Minnesota congresswoman who has been the target of much of Trump’s ire in his recent crackdown on the state.
The Trump administration is contending with the fallout from the surge of federal immigration officers to Minnesota and the death of two American citizens in confrontations with federal agents. Lawsuits from state and local officials seeking an end to the federal surge will be heard on Monday in federal court, where a judge will consider a novel legal question: are the thousands of arrests, three shootings and two deaths in the surge so disruptive to civil order that it violates the 10th amendment rights of state sovereignty?
Trump told the Wall Street Journal in a short interview that immigration enforcement officers would leave the Minneapolis area “at some point”. The publication said Trump did not directly answer when asked twice whether the officer who shot Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care nurse, had done the right thing.
In the same interview, Trump criticised Pretti for carrying a gun during protest activity. “I don’t like any shooting. I don’t like it,” Trump told the publication. “But I don’t like it when somebody goes into a protest and he’s got a very powerful, fully loaded gun with two magazines loaded up with bullets also. That doesn’t play good either.”
The Trump administration is facing criticism from all sides over the shootings and upscaled enforcement. The NRA attacked the suggestion by a Trump-appointed federal prosecutor that armed protest creates “a high likelihood” that federal agents “will be legally justified” to shoot them. The Minnesota governor, Tim Walz, described comments from the homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem, border patrol senior leader Greg Bovino and other officials about the shooting as “lies”.
Trump and Walz spoke this morning, Trump wrote on Truth Social, offering conciliatory words about the governor after weeks of vitriol.
“It was a very good call, and we, actually, seemed to be on a similar wavelength,” Trump wrote. “I told Governor Walz that I would have Tom Homan call him, and that what we are looking for are any and all Criminals that they have in their possession. The Governor, very respectfully, understood that, and I will be speaking to him in the near future.”
In Minneapolis, Pretti’s death resonated with the thousands of people now helping with rapid response and community aid. Outrage over his killing drew some to protest, with a demonstration at a hotel overnight on Sunday bringing federal agents out of their rooms to shoot chemicals at protesters. A memorial for Pretti, filled with flowers, notes, and candles, continues to grow on the site where he was gunned down.
The mark of the federal government’s occupation can be seen and heard throughout Minneapolis and its suburbs. Signs and spray paint call for “ICE OUT.” After moments of silence for Pretti at sporting events this weekend, crowds chanted against US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Residents are not deterred by the violence, though they’re shaken. They’re still getting into their cars to follow and document ICE’s activities, and gathering food and supplies to distribute to the families sheltering at home in fear of deportation.
“Perhaps they want to make an example out of us. Perhaps they’re trying to break our spirit. Perhaps they’re just dug in,” Minneapolis city council member Aisha Chughtai told the Guardian on Sunday. “This is a city that has this long history of resistance and of standing up for ourselves and each other. I think we will weather this.”
The widespread outrage is registering in Washington as well, as a growing number of Republicans are pressing for a deeper investigation into federal immigration tactics in Minnesota after Pretti’s fatal shooting – a sign that the Trump administration’s accounting of events may face bipartisan scrutiny.
The Republican chair of the House homeland security committee, Andrew Garbarino, has sought testimony from leaders at ICE, Customs and Border Protection and US Citizenship and Immigration Services, saying “my top priority remains keeping Americans safe”, according to the Associated Press.
Other congressional Republicans have pressed for more information, including the Texas representative Michael McCaul and the senators Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. Their statements, in addition to concern expressed from several Republican governors, reflects a party struggling with how to respond to federal agents’ killing of Pretti.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) almost immediately alleged Pretti had “violently resisted” officers, saying they fired “defensive shots”. Video evidence contradicts that account. Trump also shared an image of the pistol allegedly found on Pretti in a Truth Social post, writing: “This is the gunman’s gun, loaded (with two additional full magazines!) and ready to go.”
Pretti was reportedly legally permitted to carry a gun. Widely circulated video of his shooting death does not appear to depict him holding a gun; it does show an officer reaching to Pretti’s lower back and stepping away with what appeared to be a pistol – and Pretti being subsequently shot to death.
The National Rifle Association, the nation’s largest pro-gun group, also responded after Bill Essayli – who was appointed by Trump to temporarily serve as a US attorney in California in 2025 – posted on social media: “If you approach law enforcement with a gun, there is a high likelihood they will be legally justified in shooting you.”
The NRA posted: “This sentiment … is dangerous and wrong. Responsible public voices should be awaiting a full investigation, not making generalizations and demonizing law-abiding citizens.”
Marjorie Taylor Greene, the former House Republican from Georgia, posted in support of law enforcement, but defended the right to legally carry firearms. “I unapologetically believe in border security and deporting criminal illegal aliens and I support law enforcement. However, I also unapologetically support the 2nd amendment,” Greene wrote. “Legally carrying a firearm is not the same as brandishing a firearm.
She added: “I support American’s 1st and 4th amendment rights. There is nothing wrong with legally peacefully protesting and videoing.”
Democrats have vowed to withhold further funding from DHS unless a bill soon to come before the Senate is amended to include reforms that would restrict federal agents’ actions in their deportation surge.
Chuck Schumer, the Senate minority leader, said Democrats would not provide the necessary votes if DHS funding remained in the measure. A spokesperson for the Senate majority leader, John Thune, said DHS and other government funds would be voted on as a single package. Without a compromise, the government faces a partial shutdown at the end of January.
The Connecticut Democratic senator Chris Murphy told CNN’s State of the Union that Democrats “can’t vote to fund this lawless Department of Homeland Security … that is murdering American citizens, that is traumatizing little boys and girls all across the country, in violation of the law.”
Meanwhile, Homan has been the subject of controversy and is unlikely to de-escalate the situation in Minnesota. Undercover FBI agents recorded him accepting $50,000 in cash in 2024 in exchange for promising future government contract help. Trump’s justice department closed the bribery investigation last year, citing insufficient evidence, which Democratic leaders have described as a cover-up.
