“This is the attacker's weapon, loaded (with two extra full magazines!) and ready to go. What is this all about? Where are the local police? Why aren't they allowed to defend the ICE officers [służby ds. imigracji i egzekwowania ceł]? Did the mayor and governor dismiss them? The claim is that many of these officers couldn't do their jobs, that ICE had to defend themselves – “It's not easy!” Trump wrote on his own social media platform, Truth Social, posting a photo of the gun.
What happened in Minneapolis?
Who was shot in the shooting?
How did Donald Trump comment on the situation?
What social tensions exist in Minneapolis?
Trump defends the services
He said Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey were “inciteting insurrection.” He called them “sanctimonious political idiots.”
“LET OUR ICE PATRIOTS DO THEIR JOB! 12,000 illegal immigrant criminals, many of them violent, were arrested and taken out of Minnesota. If they were still there, you would have seen something much worse than what you are witnessing today!” – he added.
He also claimed, without providing any evidence, that the events were a “cover” for theft and fraud in the state. Trump adviser Stephen Miller wrote on X that the man who died in the shooting was a “domestic terrorist.”
The 37-year-old man shot was nurse Alex Pretti. The family of the deceased informed about it. The police, in turn, informed that the man had a permit to possess a weapon.
As CNN noted, there is no evidence that Walz and Frey refused local assistance to federal agents. Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O'Hara told CNN that federal officers tried to prevent local police from accessing the scene.
Tensions are rising in Minneapolis
In mid-January, Trump threatened to use the Insurrection Act in Minnesota. This act allows the use of the army to pacify riots.
Social tension in Minneapolis intensified after the death of a 37-year-old woman shot by an ICE agent in early January. This became a catalyst for protests and criticism of the presence of federal services in the city.
On Saturday, there was another shooting there with the participation of federal agents, in which a man was killed. Protesters gather at the scene. Clashes break out with officers and the police use tear gas.
The Department of Homeland Security said that the agent who fatally shot a man in Minneapolis that day fired the shots in self-defense and fearing for his life and that of other officers.
