Donald Trump is sending his hardline 'border czar' to Minnesota amid growing outrage over the second fatal shooting of a US citizen by immigration agents in Minneapolis in less than three weeks. The move comes as new bystander footage appears to contradict official accounts and raises fresh questions over how force is being used in the president's high‑profile immigration crackdown.
The White House is scrambling to contain the political and public fall‑out after the death of 37-year-old nurse Alex Pretti on Saturday, following the earlier killing of 37-year-old Renee Good on 7 January. Both were US citizens. In each case, federal officials initially characterised the incidents as attacks on officers – and in each case, video filmed at the scene has suggested a very different story.
Trump announced on Monday that he was dispatching Tom Homan, his long‑time immigration enforcer, to take direct control on the ground. 'Tom is tough but fair, and will report directly to me,' the president wrote in a social media post, signalling that he wants a loyal fixer in place as pressure mounts over the conduct of federal agents.
White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said on X that Homan would manage Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations in Minnesota, effectively putting him in charge of a deployment that has already put the city at the centre of a national row over immigration, policing and civil liberties.
Trump Border Czar Sent To Minnesota As Shooting Videos Undercut DHS Narrative
The appointment of the Trump border czar as a kind of crisis manager follows the killing of Pretti during protests in Minneapolis. US immigration agents shot and killed the 37-year-old on Saturday. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) quickly characterised the incident as an attack, but images emerging from the scene paint a starkly different picture.
Bystander videos, verified and reviewed by Reuters, show Pretti holding a phone in his hand, not a gun, as he tries to help other protesters who had been pushed to the ground by agents. In the footage, officers can be seen using force against demonstrators before Pretti is wrestled to the ground and shots are heard.
The gap between that imagery and the initial DHS narrative has fuelled anger in Minneapolis and beyond, adding to a sense that the administration is leaning on aggressive tactics while downplaying their human cost. For local communities, the arrival of the Trump border czar in Minnesota is likely to be seen as a sign that the White House intends to double down rather than step back.
On Sunday, Trump told the Wall Street Journal that his administration was reviewing the latest shooting and, in a rare nod to criticism, signalled a willingness to eventually withdraw immigration enforcement officials from the Minneapolis area. 'At some point we will leave. We've done, they've done a phenomenal job,' he said, without offering any detailed timeline.
Trump Border Czar Move Follows Earlier Killing Of Renee Good
Pretti's death is not an isolated incident. On 7 January, a federal immigration agent fatally shot US citizen Renee Good after approaching her in her parked vehicle. Trump officials said she was trying to ram the agent with the vehicle, describing the incident in stark terms. But again, other observers say bystander video suggests she was attempting to steer away from the officer who shot her.
Taken together, the two cases have raised serious doubts about whether agents are being adequately trained, supervised and held to account as Trump pushes for a show of force on immigration. For critics, sending the Trump border czar to Minnesota is not a sign of contrition, but a bid to keep tight political control over an operation that is beginning to alarm even some of the president's usual allies.
Homan, a former acting director of ICE, is a well‑known figure in US immigration politics – praised by Trump supporters as uncompromising, and denounced by opponents as emblematic of a punitive approach. His brief now is to 'manage ICE operations in the state', according to Leavitt, while reporting 'directly' to the president.
Yet for the families of those killed, and for residents who have watched their streets turn into the backdrop for viral videos of shootings, those internal reporting lines will matter less than whether the investigations are transparent, independent and credible.
Trump has insisted that agents have done a 'phenomenal job'. The images from Minneapolis tell a more complicated story: a man with a phone, not a weapon, and a woman in a parked car, both dead after encounters with federal officers. As the Trump border czar flies into Minnesota, the central question is no longer just how immigration laws are enforced – but who is allowed to decide what really happened when the government's version and the public's videos collide.
