Representative Randy Fine, a hard-right Republican from Florida, has regularly warned about the perils of federal government overreach during his decade-long career in government.
As a state legislator, he described federal Covid-19 vaccination mandates as “tyrannical.” As a member of Congress, he supported the elimination of the Department of Education, stating, “Federal bureaucrats shouldn’t dictate how our kids are taught.” In a 2022 social media post, Mr. Fine, memorably and menacingly, addressed President Joseph R. Biden Jr. over gun control, telling him, “try to take our guns and you’ll learn why the Second Amendment was written in the first place.”
But this weekend, Mr. Fine took to X.com to voice his approval that federal immigration officers in Minneapolis had killed Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old nurse whose filming of immigration officers on Saturday morning turned into a confrontation. The officers shot Mr. Pretti at least 10 times after one of them had removed a holstered gun that he was legally authorized to carry.
“An armed seditionist attacked federal law enforcement today as they were rounding up foreign invaders in Minneapolis,” Mr. Fine wrote on Saturday, without evidence that Mr. Pretti had been there to attack anyone. “The insurrectionist was put down. Well done.”
American conservatives have a long history of supporting gun rights and states’ rights, as well as calling for firm restraint on the federal government. And they have criticized the excessive use of federal power in a number of bloody confrontations with recalcitrant citizens, including a white separatist family in Ruby Ridge, Idaho, in 1992, and the Branch Davidians cult the following year in Waco, Texas, both by agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.
But in the case of the Minneapolis deployment, the Trump administration and some allies like Mr. Fine have taken positions that seem to contradict some of the bedrock principles of conservatism.
The deployment, called Operation Metro Surge, would seem like the definition of big-government action. Gov. Tim Walz and Mayor Jacob Frey, both Democrats, vehemently oppose federal intervention, as do many residents of largely liberal Minneapolis. Agents, wearing masks to hide their identities, have forced their way into homes without warrants. They have detained citizens and legal immigrants. And then, there are the killings of Mr. Pretti and Renee Good, the mother of three shot on Jan. 7 while driving her S.U.V.
Yet, many Republicans see Mr. Trump’s effort as a fundamentally conservative strategy — an effort to to rid the United States of all illegal immigrants, which they say upholds the rule of law and maintains national sovereignty.
The incongruity has set off a roiling series of debates about the very nature of conservatism, often within the sphere of conservatism itself, even as Mr. Trump softened his position on Monday and said that he was sending Tom Homan, his border czar, to Minneapolis and that Mr. Homan would work more closely with local officials. Mayor Frey said in a statement late Monday that some federal agents would leave the next day.
In a phone interview on Monday, Representative Fine argued that there was no disconnect between his support for Operation Metro Surge and his broader belief that the federal government should be reined in.
“Not at all,” he said. “The most fundamental responsibility of the federal government is to secure the border and to protect Americans. ICE is rounding up foreign invaders who have been instructed to leave the country and have refused.”
But other Republicans are voicing concerns. Former Vice President Mike Pence wrote on social media on Monday that the images of the shooting of Mr. Pretti were “deeply troubling,” adding that “a full and transparent investigation of this officer involved shooting must take place immediately.” Senators Ted Cruz, of Texas, and Jerry Moran, of Kansas, also called for an investigation.
“Our Constitution provides citizens protection from the government,” Mr. Moran wrote. “We have a right to free speech, to peaceably assemble and to bear arms. We also expect government to protect us from lawless behavior.”
In an interview this week, Erick Erickson, the conservative pundit and radio host from Georgia, said he supports the administration’s mass deportation goals. But he said he was “uncomfortable” with the recently disclosed guidance drafted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials stating that deportation officers are allowed to enter homes to arrest people without judicial warrants. And he described Mr. Trump’s recent threat to invoke the Insurrection Act and send troops to Minnesota as “overkill” and “too provocative.”
Mr. Erickson said that the current disagreements over the Minnesota surge are part of a broader debate about shifting definitions of conservatism in the Trump era, as the president has embraced once-taboo ideas like the imposition of tariffs and government investment in private companies.
Mr. Erickson was among a number of conservatives who took issue over the weekend with assertions by Trump officials and allies who criticized Mr. Pretti for bringing a gun to a protest. Among them was Scott Bessent, the Treasury secretary.
“I’ve been to a protest,” Mr. Bessent said in an interview with ABC’s Jonathan Karl. “Guess what? I didn’t bring a gun. I brought a billboard.”
“Bessent is wrong,” Mr. Erickson wrote on X.com “I know plenty of people who participate in political events, including protests, and have their guns. It is their right. While we can say the man should not have gotten in an altercation with agents, merely exercising his 2A right with his 1A right is irrelevant.”
Kevin Stitt, the Republican governor of Oklahoma and the chair of the National Governors Association, told CNN on Sunday that while Mr. Trump’s promise to close the border was popular, the killings of Mr. Pretti and Ms. Good were “causing deep concerns over federal tactics and accountability.”
He also suggested that the federal response was violating the principle that the political will of states should not be overrun by an overzealous federal government.
“We believe in federalism and state rights,” Mr. Still said. “And nobody likes feds coming into their state.”
Mr. Trump’s threat to invoke the Insurrection Act earlier this month has also become a delicate issue among Republicans, especially those vying for their party’s nomination in the upcoming Minnesota governor’s race. Earlier this month, The Minnesota Star Tribune reported that “several” G.O.P. candidates “would not explicitly say whether they would support President Donald Trump deploying the military to Minnesota to tamp down protests.”
One exception was Mike Lindell, the pro-Trump conspiracy theorist, MyPillow chief executive and Minnesota native. He said he would support “whatever it takes” to stop what he considered to be unlawful protest.
On the other side was Chris Madel, a Minneapolis lawyer who said he would not support invocation of the Insurrection Act.
Mr. Madel dropped out of the governor’s race on Monday and leveled harsh words against some fellow Republicans. “I cannot support the national Republicans stated retribution on the citizens of our state, nor can I count myself a member of a party that would do so,” he said.
Some of the most pointed criticism of the surge has, perhaps unsurprisingly, come from libertarians, many of whom have repeatedly chafed at Trump policies not deemed sufficiently in line with their small-government ethos. Walter Olson, a senior fellow at the Cato Institute, the libertarian think tank, has noted that protesters in Minnesota have been “repeatedly attacked” while filming or nonviolently protesting the enforcement actions, “in what looks very much like a practice that is being tolerated by policy.”
But even among libertarians, there is disagreement. Angela McArdle, a former chair of the Libertarian Party, argued this weekend that the nation was in crisis mode and that now was not a time for libertarians to stick so strictly to their ideology.
“The threat of mass migration is civilizational,” Ms. McArdle wrote on X on Sunday, adding: “It sucks that ICE shoots people sometimes. If we don’t deport illegal aliens and stop Democrat fraud, we will be Canada in less than 10 years.”
Richard Fausset, a Times reporter based in Atlanta, writes about the American South, focusing on politics, culture, race, poverty and criminal justice.
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