Was This a Murder Too Far?

The execution of Alex Pretti has made even some MAGA loyalists waver

In just a little over two weeks federal agents in Minneapolis have killed two innocent people in broad daylight. Contrary to the Trump administration’s lies, these were unjustified murders, pure and simple. But while both killings sickened and horrified many Americans, the killing of Alex Pretti is evoking a far stronger reaction than the killing of Renee Good.

When Good was killed on January 7th, the Trump administration circled the wagons, insisting that Jonathan Ross, the ICE agent who shot her, was defending himself as she tried to run him down. A close look at the videos showed that this was a lie: Ross leaned into the car to shoot her at close range through the windshield, not something you would do if you thought a car was about to run you over. He then shot her twice more through the side window as the car rolled by in front of him, one of those shots being fatal.

But the MAGA faithful closed ranks, echoing the party line that she was a militant terrorist, albeit one with a dog in the back of the car, who smiled and said soothing words to her killer. Per usual, business remained silent as Good’s character was slandered. And so it looked as if the Trumpists would just bull through with impunity as they had many times before.

But this time, after the killing of Alex Pretti, feels different. Media coverage has been much clearer than the coverage after Good’s death. As I was writing this, the Wall Street Journal headline read “Videos Contradict U.S. Account of Minneapolis Shooting”. After some initial equivocation, the New York Times is calling out administration lies and featuring a chilling moment-by-moment analysis of videos showing what really happened.

Big corporations based in Minnesota, after staying completely silent, have finally said something, even if it’s just an anodyne call for “de-escalation of tensions.”

Centrist Democrats, who have spent weeks trying to ignore Minneapolis so they could talk about the price of eggs, are finally taking a stand and appear ready to vote against another round of DHS funding. And several Republicans are now speaking out.

The NRA and other gun groups are now calling for a full investigation of Pretti’s murder, angry that the DHS justifies the execution of Pretti because he was, entirely legally, in possession of a gun. Even Fox News’ s Maria Bartiromo, a tireless Trump cheerleader, sounded patently skeptical when questioning Kash Patel about DHS’s outlandish claims.

The first post-Pretti execution poll, from YouGov, shows that ICE’s brownshirt tactics are evoking a wave of anger, shame and revulsion across America. People who have seen videos of the shooting overwhelmingly say that it was unjustified. Calls to abolish ICE have gone from the fringe to the center, with a plurality of Americans supporting them.

Does this mark a tipping point? Or will the revulsion simply fade away, as it did after Good was killed? I think that this time is different, for several reasons.

First, views of the Pretti murder aren’t distorted by misogyny and anti-LGBTQ bigotry. I believe that a significant number of people brushed aside the murder of Renee Good because she was a woman — at a time when right-wingers are still dismissing opponents of fascism as “gangs of wine moms” — in a same-sex relationship.

Second, while the video evidence on Good’s killing was clear if examined closely, it did need close examination to reveal that she was simply murdered. The videos of Pretti’s killing don’t need close examination. That sound you heard Saturday was millions of Americans, myself included, crying out in horror as we watched agents repeatedly shoot a man who was already restrained. And the contrast between the damning videos and the blatant lies from Kristi Noem, Stephen Miller and Gregory Bovino was too much even for many people who were still, for some reason, inclined to trust this administration.

Finally, it matters that this was the second broad-daylight murder, and that it came after weeks of horror stories about kidnapped children, citizens pepper-sprayed in the face, and more. I already knew, and most readers of this newsletter probably also knew, that the people besieging Minneapolis were lying, brutal thugs. But most Americans don’t follow the news closely and tended until recently to give the government the benefit of the doubt.

The murder of Alex Pretti may be a tipping point, the moment at which skepticism about Trump’s attacks on immigrants and those who protect them turns into horror and disgust. But such a tipping point is only possible because Trump and his officials have spent a year betraying the public’s trust, again and again. This has taken a huge toll on Trump’s credibility, as Nate Silver points out:

Now, the bottom may be about to drop out. But that might not have happened if ICE had murdered Pretti a couple of months ago.

But if the American people turn overwhelmingly against ICE, DHS, and the Trump administration’s immigration policy, then what?

One thing I can safely predict is that Trump and his people won’t admit error. They won’t concede that Pretti was murdered, and that their initial claims about what happened were false. They won’t discipline the ICE agents responsible. They probably won’t call off the siege of Minneapolis, although they have silently backed down elsewhere, notably in Los Angeles and Chicago.

Why will the brutality continue? Because these people are malignant narcissists, whose lives are all about displaying dominance. The sheer horror of what they’ve already done makes it impossible for them to change course, because climbing down after you’ve murdered people and lied about it would be humiliating — and humiliation is their greatest fear.

The big question is what happens when the administration’s determination to keep terrorizing the American people collides with public outrage. One safe prediction is that Trump will try to subvert the November elections: in a clear example of a shakedown, Bondi has demanded that Governor Tim Waltz hand over the Minnesota voter rolls.

Many Americans are grieving over the murder of Alex Pretti, who was simply trying to defend a woman being assaulted by federal officers when he was executed. Beyond the horror of the moment, however, we’re at an existential fork in the road. Let us hope that this country wakes up to the full magnitude of what is happening before more martyrs are offered up as sacrifice.

MUSICAL CODA

Worse this time