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Brian Daitzman is the Editor of The Intellectualist [ [link removed] ]. Subscribe to his Substack. [ [link removed] ]
In broad daylight on a busy Minneapolis street, federal immigration agents killed a 37-year-old American citizen as bystanders filmed and chaos unfolded. Alex Pretti was a nurse, a protester, and a witness. The videos are public. The answers are not. What happened in those moments now hangs over the city—and far beyond it.
On Saturday morning, January 24, a 37-year-old American citizen was shot and killed in broad daylight on a Minneapolis street by federal immigration agents, according to the Associated Press and local authorities. His name was Alex Jeffrey Pretti. He was an intensive care unit nurse at the Minneapolis VA Health Care System, a licensed healthcare professional, and a U.S. citizen. Police later confirmed he was also a lawful gun owner. He is the second American citizen killed this month in Minneapolis during federal immigration enforcement operations, according to reporting by the Associated Press.
The killing occurred shortly before 9 a.m. in the Whittier neighborhood near Nicollet Avenue, a dense, mixed-use area known for restaurants, apartments, and heavy pedestrian traffic. Federal agents affiliated with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Border Patrol were conducting an operation in the area amid an intensified immigration crackdown.
Within minutes of the shooting, bystander videos began circulating online, showing a chaotic confrontation between armed federal agents and civilians, as documented by the Guardian and local outlets.
“Before mass leaders seize the power to fit reality to their lies, their propaganda is marked by its extreme contempt for facts as such, for in their opinion fact depends entirely on the power of man who can fabricate it”
― Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism
According to his family and colleagues, Pretti was in Minneapolis because he was deeply disturbed by what he saw as aggressive and destabilizing federal immigration actions. His father, Michael Pretti, told the Associated Press that his son believed showing up, witnessing events, and documenting them was a way to express care for others. He had participated in protests earlier this month following the killing of another U.S. citizen by an immigration officer, a fact confirmed by his family and reported by the Associated Press.
Colleagues described Pretti as a caregiver by instinct. He worked in the ICU caring for veterans, assisted with clinical research, and was known for stepping in when others needed help. “He wanted to help people,” said Dimitri Drekonja, chief of infectious diseases at the VA hospital, who worked with Pretti on a research project, according to the Guardian. Friends and coworkers described him as gentle, humorous, and deeply committed to his patients...

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