Minneapolis shooting latest: Obamas and Clinton speak out on Alex Pretti killing as Trump demands Minnesota cooperate with ICE

Minnesota Governor Tim Walz has urged ICE agents to pull out of Minneapolis.

In an impassioned speech, the governor spoke directly to Trump. The pair have a fractious relationship, with the now-president often criticizing Walz for campaigning alongside Kamala Harris in 2024.

Now, Trump has accused Walz of allowing an unprecedented level of immigration to his state from Somalia. The president has also suggested that ICE agents are needed to tackle fraud which has allegedly taken root during Walz’s tenure.

He did not, however, offer any sort of timeline for this.

“At some point we will leave. We’ve done, they’ve done a phenomenal job,” he said, despite ICE shooting several residents to death.

Even after ICE eventually withdraws, Trump has warned that some units could maintain a presence in the area.

“We’ll leave a different group of people there for the financial fraud,” he gloated. It’s the biggest fraud anyone has seen.”

The president was referencing allegations of fraud levied against daycare centers in the city, many of which are run by Somali immigrants.

But Trump says he believes the alleged fraud goes even further than Minneapolis.

“We actually think California is going to be much bigger,” he said, without providing evidence for his claim.

In a five-minute interview with The Wall Street Journal, Trump repeatedly refused to answer whether the officer who shot Alex Pretti had done the right thing.

“We’re looking, we’re reviewing everything and will come out with a determination,” he eventually said.

“I don’t like any shooting. I don’t like it,” the president added. “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.”

Trump also alleged that Pretti was armed with a “very dangerous gun, a dangerous and unpredictable gun.”

“It’s a gun that goes off when people don’t know it.”

The DHS has claimed that Pretti was wielding a 9mm semi-automatic handgun.

Alex Pretti was fatally shot by federal agents after video footage suggests one officer may have “negligently” fired his weapon.

Pretti, 37, is seen on the ground being restrained while an agent takes his 9mm pistol. A gunshot sounds as the officer flees with the weapon, which may have triggered other agents to fire at Pretti while he lay unarmed, reported the Telegraph.

The footage has sparked concern over the training and conduct of the 3,000 federal officers deployed in Minnesota. Critics argue it shows Pretti being “executed” in the street, challenging claims by senior Trump administration officials that he was a “terrorist” and the agents were victims.

Brian O’Hara, Minneapolis police chief, confirmed Pretti was legally permitted to carry a handgun. Rob Doar, president of the Minnesota Gun Owners Law Centre, said: “After analysing the videos, I believe it’s highly likely the first shot was a negligent discharge from the agent in the grey jacket.”

U.S. President Donald Trump says that his administration “is reviewing everything and will come out with a determination” about the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis.

Speaking to the Wall Street Journal, Trump also signaled a willingness to eventually withdraw immigration enforcement officials from the Minneapolis area.

“At some point we will leave. We’ve done, they’ve done a phenomenal job,” Trump told the Journal but did not offer a time frame for when agents might depart. “We’ll leave a different group of people there for the financial fraud.”

Saturday’s shooting was the second fatality this month involving federal immigration officers in Minneapolis.

The administration said Pretti assaulted officers, compelling them to fire in self‑defense, but video recordings show Pretti was shot multiple times while restrained on the ground by a group of officers.

Alex Pretti’s family said they were “heartbroken but also very angry” at the authorities, and particularly at federal officials’ description of the shooting.

“The sickening lies told about our son by the administration are reprehensible and disgusting.

“Alex is clearly not holding a gun when attacked by Trump’s murdering and cowardly ICE thugs. He has his phone in his right hand, and his empty left hand is raised above his head while trying to protect the woman ICE just pushed down all while being pepper sprayed,” the family statement said.

“Please get the truth out about our son.”

A 2024 video posted to social media showed Pretti reading a salute for veteran Terrance Lee Randolph, who died at the VA hospital where Pretti worked.

“Today we remember that freedom is not free,” Pretti, wearing navy blue scrubs, says in the video. “We have to work for it, nurture it, protect it, and even sacrifice for it.”

The victim of the shooting was identified as Alex Pretti, 37. He was near 26th Street and Nicollet Avenue in Minneapolis on Saturday morning, filming DHS agents during an operation.

Open-sourced video capturing the incident shows Pretti moving to assist a pair of individuals on the sidewalk near the agents, who then began pepper-spraying the group.

Read our full separate report here:

In dueling news conferences, federal and state officials offered starkly different messages on Sunday about the immigration crackdown that has swept across Minneapolis and surrounding cities, with both claiming the moral high ground after another shooting death by federal agents.

“Which side do you want to be on?” Governor Tim Walz asked the public.

“The side of an all-powerful federal government that could kill, injure, menace and kidnap its citizens off the streets, or on the side of a nurse at the VA hospital who died bearing witness to such government?” – a reference to Saturday’s shooting of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis.

In a federal office building about 20 miles away, Border Patrol senior official Greg Bovino, the public face of the crackdown, again blamed the shooting on Pretti.

“When someone makes the choice to come into an active law enforcement scene, interfere, obstruct, delay or assault law enforcement officer and – and they bring a weapon to do that. That is a choice that that individual made,” he told reporters.

The competing comments emerged as local leaders and Democrats across the country demanded federal immigration officers leave Minnesota after Pretti’s shooting, which set off clashes with protesters in a city already shaken by another shooting death weeks earlier.

A federal judge will hear arguments on Monday on whether she should at least temporarily halt the immigration crackdown in Minnesota that has led to the fatal shootings of two people by government officers.

The state of Minnesota and the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul sued the Department of Homeland Security earlier this month, five days after Renee Good was shot by an Immigration and Customs officer.

Saturday’s shooting by a Border Patrol officer of Alex Pretti has only added urgency to the case.

Since the original filing, the state and cities have substantially added to their original request. They’re trying to restore the state of affairs that existed before the Trump administration launched Operation Metro Surge on 1 December.

The hearing is set for Monday morning in federal court in Minneapolis. Democratic Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said he plans to personally attend.

They’re asking that U.S. District Judge Kathleen Menendez order federal law enforcement agencies to reduce the numbers of officers and agents in Minnesota to levels before the surge, while allowing them to continue to enforce immigration laws within a long list of proposed limits.

Justice Department attorneys have called the lawsuit “legally frivolous” and said “Minnesota wants a veto over federal law enforcement”.

They asked the judge to reject the request or at least stay her order pending an anticipated appeal.

Ellison said at a news conference Sunday that he and the cities filed their lawsuit because of “the unprecedented nature of this of this surge. It is a novel abuse of the Constitution that we’re looking at right now. No one can remember a time when we’ve seen something like this.

“It wasn’t clear ahead of the hearing when the judge might rule.

None of the half-dozen bystander videos shows Pretti brandishing his gun. Rather, the videos showed Pretti’s hands were only holding his mobile phone as a masked Border Patrol officer opened fire.

In videos of the scuffle, “gun, gun” is heard, and an officer appears to pull a handgun from Pretti’s waist area and begins moving away. As that happens, a first shot is fired by a Border Patrol officer. There’s a slight pause, and then the same officer fires several more times into Pretti’s back.

Several use-of-force experts said that unenhanced video clips alone would neither exonerate nor support prosecution of the officers, underscoring the need for a thorough investigation.

A key piece of evidence will likely be the video from the phone Pretti was holding when he was killed. Federal officials have not yet released that footage or shared it with state investigators.

“The evaluation of the reasonableness of this shooting will entirely depend on when the pistol became visible and how, if at all, it was being displayed or used,” said Charles “Joe” Key, a former police lieutenant and longtime use-of-force expert.

Ian Adams, an assistant professor of criminal justice at the University of South Carolina, described the federal government’s response as “amateur hour.”

“Jumping to the end result of this investigation, or what’s supposed to be an investigation, is somewhat embarrassing for policing professionals nationwide,” Mr Adams said. “It’s clear that professionals in policing are observing what’s going on and not liking what they’re seeing.”