ICE Narratives vs Reality & What Comes Next - Top 3 Takeaways January 26th, 2026
Takeaway #1: This doesn’t look right
Saturday’s ICE involved shooting of Alex Pretti resulting in his death in Minneapolis is extraordinarily unfortunate in numerous ways. It’s highly unfortunate that a 37-year-old ICU nurse, someone tasked with saving lives daily, evidently decided to become an armed ICE protestor/obstructionist. It’s highly unfortunate that there was a physical confrontation. It’s highly unfortunate that Alex was shot and killed during that confrontation. Let’s break this down starting with Alex deciding that what he did on Saturday was what he should have been doing on Saturday. It's illustrative of the effectiveness of the brainwashing and manipulation tactics by anarchists that continues to turn productive members of society into radicals that seek to undermine law enforcement for the purpose of super serving criminal illegal aliens. It’s a real issue and threat to our society, and its unclear how many people are potentially susceptible to this Marxist movement. According to the National Institutes of Health, over 23% of all adults now suffer with some form of mental illness. That radically high number, that’s greater than 3-fold higher than it was about four decades ago, might be a view of the possible here. As I’ve shared many times in recent years, since a 2018 Harvard Study illustrated the point, there’s a direct connection between practicing one’s faith and a corresponding belief in God, and mental wellbeing. As we’ve seen a belief in God and religious adherence decline...
Takeaway #2: We’ve seen a direct coloration to mental health issues. That’s the long-term answer for so many problems we face in society today that in part explains how we arrived here. Nevertheless, as misguided as Pretti was to evidently be armed and to be attempting to thwart ICE’s mission to arrest a criminal illegal immigrant, what we’ve seen doesn’t look right. There’s been the instant comparison between Saturday’s deadly ICE officer involved shooting and the Renee Good incident. From what we’ve seen, and for whatever the final verdict is determined to be, with both deadly incidents, the circumstances and the judgement calls are far different. Whether you feel Renee Good’s death was justified or not, the facts are clear about the underlying circumstances. Good had been obstructing justice. She refused to follow repeated instructions by officers to exit her vehicle, deciding instead to operate her vehicle which then led to her striking an officer with her vehicle. Whether the decision to fire on her by the officer struck was something you think was justified or not – it was a spilt second decision by an officer who’s already been hit, dragged and significantly injured by a previous anti-ICE domestic terrorist. For any objective observer of that situation, it’s understandable how and why that decision was made by the officer. That is not necessarily the case with what transpired with Pretti on Saturday. Video evidence that’s available shows Pretti with a phone, not a gun in hand preceding the physical altercation. During the altercation, an ICE officer can then be heard shouting – “he's got a gun”, which would seemingly suggest that they discovered the gun while attempting to restrain him – implying that he hadn’t been brandishing it. We then see an officer seemingly retrieve the gun from Alex’s body – running it away from the scuffle. Notably, the firearm seen in the officer’s hand appears to match the weapon shown by DHS as the retrieved weapon. Approximately a second later we hear the first of what sounded as though it could have been as many ten gunshots. There’s much that we don’t yet know but...it doesn’t look right. Now, here’s what we still don’t know. Is it possible that Pretti was attempting to reach for that weapon? Yes, though it looks like he may have been restrained that point it’s possible. Is it possible that he was attempting to reach for an officer’s firearm as his was being taken from him? Yes, it’s possible. Is it possible that in the volatile moment in question, the ICE officer who fired on Alex mistakenly thought the gun being retrieved was actually in Alex’s hand rather than the other ICE officer? That one seems less likely but again...maybe. But as it stands now, Saturday’s situation doesn’t look right from a judgement standpoint, including the apparent volume of rounds fired at point basically point-blank range. It’s easy for the rest of us who don’t put our lives on the line to protect communities and can’t ever truly appreciate what it must be like in violent and volatile situations where judgement calls are made...Monday morning quarterbacking is easy. What they do is as hard and stressful as it gets. But yeah – this one doesn’t seem right as of now. But here’s the thing, and it’s a particularly important thing in the dynamic of this larger conversation about ICE operations and whatever will become of all of this.
Takeaway #3: This is what happens with sanctuary states and cities.
Hundreds of criminal illegal immigrants have been released back into society in Minneapolis in recent months rather than handed back over to ICE through the detainer process as is required by federal law. If Minneapolis wants this to stop – they could stop it. If Minnesota wanted this to stop – they could stop it by complying with federal immigration law. They don’t, they won’t, and that’s why this has happened. That critical point can’t be lost in this. This is what government-sanctioned lawlessness brings. Tragedy. If the premise of anything is false, anything built on that false premise inevitably fails as well. What’s happened in Minneapolis this month is nothing more than a byproduct of this. The Left is quick to say that the answer is to defund ICE/end its operations, etc. Umm...no. That only invites more victims of the criminal illegal immigrants to be created. The answer is to reject the false premise and have state and local governments follow the law. The Supremacy Clause exists precisely for this reason.