The Trump administration on Wednesday announced criminal charges against 16 people in Minneapolis whom it accused of assaulting officers or interfering with federal immigration enforcement operations as tensions in the city continue to escalate.
Attorney General Pam Bondi announced the Justice Department prosecutions in a social media post, naming those who were charged and indicating she expects more arrests.
“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: NOTHING will stop President Trump and this Department of Justice from enforcing the law,” Bondi wrote on X, adding that she was in Minneapolis.
Already this month, federal prosecutors had charged 17 people in Minneapolis with crimes tied to protests or related to the administration’s surge in immigration enforcement.
Bondi’s defiant posture came despite what appeared to be a shift in tone from President Donald Trump and other senior aides amid widespread outrage over immigration officers’ fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in the city this month. Authorities said the two federal agents who fired at Alex Pretti, 37, on Saturday have been placed on administrative leave, per standard agency protocol.
Those developments came a day after the Department of Homeland Security provided the first official timeline of the deadly encounter in a statement sent to some members of Congress. The document, which was based on preliminary review, made no mention of Pretti brandishing a weapon, contradicting Trump administration comments in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, when senior officials described Pretti as a direct threat to federal agents and officers.
The Trump administration has begun to back away from some of its inflammatory rhetoric about the shooting and replaced Greg Bovino, the Border Patrol commander who was overseeing the Minneapolis operation, with border czar Tom Homan.
“I think the whole thing is terrible,” Trump said Tuesday in an interview with Fox News when asked about events in Minnesota over the past week and Pretti’s killing. “I don’t like the fact that he was carrying a gun that was fully loaded. … Bottom line, it was terrible.”
The news that two immigration agents involved in Pretti’s shooting are on leave undercuts Bovino’s previous claim that “all agents that were involved in that scene are working, not in Minneapolis, but in other locations.”
The broader shift in the White House’s tone on Pretti’s killing comes as a growing number of Republicans challenge the Trump administration’s handling of the shooting and become more critical of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem. It also reflects concern that without a significant course correction, Republicans are likely to lose control of Congress in November’s midterm elections.
Stephen Miller, Trump’s White House deputy chief of staff, called Pretti an “assassin” in the immediate aftermath of his killing. On Tuesday, Miller said the administration was evaluating whether Customs and Border Protection “may not have been following” official protocol before the shooting.
Noem also initially portrayed the circumstances surrounding the fatal shootings of both Pretti and Renée Good in Minneapolis as assaults on federal law enforcement, despite video evidence to the contrary.
A woman who said she filmed Pretti’s shooting rebutted DHS’s initial claims that Pretti had brandished a weapon or was acting in a threatening manner.
Speaking to CNN’s Anderson Cooper on Tuesday, Stella Carlson, who estimated she was no more than 10 feet from Pretti when he was shot, said he was filming immigration enforcement personnel and trying to direct traffic.
Carlson said she got out of her car and started filming Pretti, whom she had never met, as he directed traffic. She said that Pretti was acting “calm” and “definitely without threat,” and that she did not see him brandish a weapon. “If I had, I maybe wouldn’t have stayed so close” to him, she said.
Pretti’s death has prompted bipartisan calls for an independent investigation. Top Justice Department officials said previously that they saw no basis for a civil rights investigation into Good’s Jan. 7 shooting. The department, however, has sought to pursue an investigation into Good’s partner, The Washington Post has reported.
On Tuesday, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minnesota), a frequent target of the Trump administration, was attacked during a town hall meeting and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents tried to enter the Ecuadorian Consulate before being turned away.
A man used a syringe to spray an unknown liquid in Omar’s direction, police said, shortly after Omar called on Noem to “resign or face impeachment.” The man, later identified as 55-year-old Anthony Kazmierczak, was immediately tackled and arrested, and Omar later said she was “ok.”
Jeremy Roebuck contributed to this report.
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