White House needs to step up in response to shootings in Minnesota
By: Mike Kelly
Columnist
USA Today Network
..... Four weeks ago, 02/01/2026] it was Venezuela and the promise that America would "run" it now that its president was sitting in a New York jail cell. then came the renewed threat to seize control of Greenland.
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Now the battle is Minneapolis. There are moments in every American presidency when the nation needs to pay attention. This is one of them. Our president likes to think he can handle events in other countries. But when it comes to America - and just one city - he has created a mess. What has taken place in just the last few weeks, with squads of masked immigration police behaving like tugs on the streets of Minneapolis, is the truest statement that we have seen of what Trump has brought to the White House. His message is not good governance. this is a message of hate.
..... Forget Trump's silly claim about Venezuela. Or Greenland. Or even the threat to increase tariffs on French wine by 200%. Or the renaming of the Kennedy Center. Or, before that, the renaming of the Gulf of Mexico. those are distractions invented by a master marketeer who has a history of masking his mistakes and his true motives with bombastic pronouncements.
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And that's kid's stuff compared with what is taking pace now. In Minneapolis, Trump's immigration cops are killing fellow Americans.
..... This is what happens when we elect president who speaks in hateful terms about his fellow citizens and really does not know how to lead a nation as diverse as America. And this is what happens when we allow the alleged leaders of our nation to turn cultural debates over issues such as immigration into cultural wars. Simply put: Trump has given permission to a large number of Americans to hate - and even harm - anyone who disagrees with them. that's not presidential. That's sick.
..... In wars, there are casualties. And in Minneapolis last month, [01/2026] we had a front-row seat on our screens of what happens when we allow decades-old national policy disagreements over immigration to turn into street fights.
..... It needs to be said here - and clearly - the Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti did not deserve to die.
..... Yes, Good tried to drive away from federal immigration officers when they ordered her to get out of her car. And yes, Pretti, who was licensed to carry a concealed handgun, actually had a pistol in a holster when he stepped from his car in Minneapolis on January 24 [2026] and approached a team of federal immigration cops.
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Such decisions by Good and Pretti certainly are questionable in hindsight and deserve scrutiny, especially if they provoked and possibly angered federal agents. that much needs to be acknowledged, especially by the self-righteous progressives who, like their Trumpian MAGA adversaries, seem to trumpet only the facts and story lines that fit their agendas. good chose not to obey an officer's order: Pretti brought a gun to a street protest. Progressives should be asking why they did that.
..... Yet another video surfaced last week [01/29/2026] that showed Pretti at a previous protest kicking out the taillight of an immigration police car. The video also showed Pretti with his handgun in a holster as he scuffled with immigration police. Certainly this kind of behavior needs to be explored.
..... But something else needs to be pointed out here: While questionable, the decisions that Good and Pretti made were not capital offenses. Good and Pretti did not deserve to be shot. So why did immigration cops shoot them? that question also needs to be asked by the trump crowd.
Good and Pretti should not have died because of deadly force
..... This columnist has spent a fair amount of time studying deadly force - when cops should use it and when they should not. I've even taken a deadly force test that police recruits were required to pass at the Bergen County Police Academy in North Jersey before they could become officers. (I flunked, by the way.)
..... At the heart of every lesson for police on deadly force is a basic command:don't fire your gun unless you think your life or someone else's life is endangered.
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That may seem simple, It's not. One officer's fear of danger might barely raise the tension level of another officer. We're all human - especially cops. It's important to remember that.
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But two other rules are also important to consider here - especially amid the debate over the deaths of Good and Pretti.
..... First, cops are taught they they should not shoot at a moving car - as an immigration officer did in killing Good. Second, a suspect's mere possession of a gun - as was the case with Pretti - is not reason enough to kill him.
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Those are not easy rules to follow. Cops don't have time to consult a training manual before they pull the trigger. In their most candid moments, many cops will concede that they would rather be safe than take an extra split second before pulling the trigger.
..... Certainly, the videos of the killings of Good and Pretti offer a glimpse into the difficulties that police face when deciding on deadly force, But those videos also raise questions about why the mitigation offices fired their weapons and whether those officers were properly trained. Municipal police officers often some six months or more in a training academy before they become officers. then many new cops spend time accompanying an experience officer on assignments.
..... America's current crop of immigration police reportedly have a much shorter training regimen - perhaps as little as two months. Then, they are thrown into the emotional cauldron of America's immigration disputes.
..... In Good's case, an immigration officer, perhaps fearing that he might be struck, appeared to jump out of the way of her car. At least one video indicated that Good's car was so close to the officer that it might have brushed him.
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The officer fired a shot through the windshield of Good's car. But then, as the car passed him - and he seemed safely out of the way - he fired other shots through the side window, a possible violations of deadly force rules.
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With Good dying at the wheel, the care rolled down the street and struck a parked car. suppose it hit a mother pushing a stroller or a kid on a bike or even just an innocent bystander who wanted to watch?
Why isn't the administration asking these questions?
..... No one in Trump world is asking that kind of question right no. Someone should. One reason why police are told not to shoot at moving cares is that a car does not stop moving when its driver is killed. It could kill an innocent bystander. Municipal cops learn that kind of truth in their training. Did America's immigration police learn that?
..... Pretti's case is equally troubling. Minneapolis police says he had a license to carry a concealed handgun. And while legitimate questions ought to be raised about why Pretti was carrying a gun to a protest in the first place, it needs to be pointed out that he never removed his gun from its holster.
..... So how was he a danger to anyone?
..... Pretti appeared to be helping a woman protester who confronted immigration police. while it could be argued that Pretti interfered with he police and perhaps made nasty and provocative statements, that's not reason enough to shoot him. In America, we're not suppose to be killing people for speaking their minds.
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The video of Pretti's last moments showed several officers pushing him to the pavement. He was face down. an officer appeared to remove Pretti's gun from its holster. Then another officer stepped back, drew his own gun and shot Pretti as if he was a rabid dog. Other shots fired by at least one other officer.
..... Why did those officers think they were in danger?
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That question needs to be asked - and soon. This incident should not take another year to investigate.
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The problem with Trump's White House - and, indeed, inside Trump world - is that few are asking these questions. It's as if one side of America resents the other side for questioning anything that it does.
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If you doubt this, just tune in and listen to the daily idiot winds that come from the mouths of such key Trump aides was Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. Homeland Security adviser Stephen Miller and Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt. this trio of chaos talks as if Minneapolis is a hotbed of domestic terrorism, with protesters hoping to commit mass murder.
..... Those are the voices on America's right wing that have turned cultural debates into culture wars. Sadly, America's progressive side has far too many provocative voices that offer little room for common ground. In other words, America's most extreme sides are controlling this culture war.
..... So what about America's middle?
..... I recent days, the Problem, Solvers Caucus, a group of congressional Republicans and Democrats who try to find ways to work together, sent a letter to Trump asking for a meeting to discuss "a bipartisan solution to our country's immigration and border security challenges."
..... The Problem Solvers are not holding their collective breath waiting for an answer.
..... The White House website, meanwhile, was proclaiming "Welcome to the Golden Age."
..... This is the message form Donald Trump's public relations machine as Americans fight each other on the streets of Minneapolis. It's a distraction from the brutality in Minneapolis from a master of marketing.
..... It's time the rest of America said: "Enough."
..... Email kellym@northjersey.com