The Blowback Begins

You could feel the prevailing public sentiment turn in real time.

Outrage over the killing of Alex Pretti reached athletes and influencers that ordinarily might try to steer away from politics. Dissections of the video were everywhere on cable news. The NRA said “Responsible public voices should be awaiting a full investigation, not making generalizations and demonizing law-abiding citizens.”

You know it’s bad when you’ve lost the NRA.

ICE killed the wrong human being. Alex Pretti has proven very difficult to caricature or villainize. Millions of Americans saw the video and concluded that he was an upstanding person trying to help another before being unjustly executed.

All of the more principled Republicans started making statements. Bill Cassidy claimed, “The credibility of ICE and DHS are at stake.” David McCormick stated, “We need a full investigation into the tragedy in Minneapolis. We need all the facts.” John Curtis wrote, “I disagree with Secretary Noem’s premature DHS response, which came before all the facts were known and weakened confidence.” Lisa Murkowski said, “The tragedy and chaos the country is witnessing in Minneapolis is shocking . . . a comprehensive, independent investigation of the shooting must be conducted . . . “ This is the crew you look to to see if Trump is losing with moderate Republicans.

Trump has gotten the message. The first official to be scapegoated was Greg Bovino; the Border Patrol chief lost his commander-at-large role and left Minneapolis. Democrats have their sights set on DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, who doesn’t have a lot of friends in Washington. What happens to the actual agent who shot Alex Pretti will take some time.

Trump called Tim Walz and Jacob Frey and posted a more conciliatory message on Truth Social. He dispatched Border Czar Tom Homan to run the operation in Minneapolis, presumably to tone down the approach.

He’s going to need to do a lot more than that to calm the anger. Democrats are looking at the end-of-January shutdown as a real opportunity now to extract demands from Republicans who are quickly sinking in the public’s estimation of how they are handling immigration, an issue they had a massive advantage on. There’s also talk of impeaching Kristi Noem.

In my mind, the major flashpoint upcoming is whether Noem keeps her job. Trump will be loathe to show that much weakness by axing his DHS Secretary who has been a dogged messenger. On the other hand, Noem has rubbed various people in the administration the wrong way and is the most visible scapegoat given her reflexive defenses of ICE actions. Of Pretti, she said that he “committed an act of domestic terrorism” and “approached” agents while “brandishing” a 9mm semi-automatic handgun and was carrying “dozens of rounds of ammunition [to] inflict maximum damage on individuals and to kill law enforcement.”

Anyone who saw the video knows that all of this is nonsense. We all know who Alex Pretti was – a selfless nurse who died trying to help others. The administration is losing on this one because people will still believe their own eyes.

To turn down the temperature in our country, check out Forward, which is trying to reduce polarization. To reduce your screen time, which can contribute to polarization in our own lives, check out Noble Mobile. Character still matters in the world, and that’s a wonderful thing.