A US citizen has been shot and killed by immigration agents in Minneapolis, triggering fierce protests and condemnation from local leaders. This is the second such incident in the city this month.
Local authorities identified the man as 37-year-old Alex Pretti, a Minneapolis resident and intensive care nurse, Reuters reported.
The Department of Homeland Security described the incident as an attack, stating that a Border Patrol agent fired in self-defense after Pretti allegedly approached with a handgun and violently resisted attempts to disarm him.
However, bystander videos from the scene, reviewed and verified by Reuters, show Pretti holding a cellphone, not a gun, as he appears to assist other protesters who had been pushed to the ground by agents.
The shooting, which occurred two weeks after the fatal shooting of Renee Nicole Good by an immigration agent, has intensified protests and renewed calls from local leaders for federal agents to leave the city.
Pretti’s death drew hundreds of demonstrators to the neighborhood, confronting armed and masked agents who deployed tear gas and flashbang grenades. Protests also erupted in New York, Washington D.C., and San Francisco, among other cities.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem told reporters that the man killed had attacked agents during an immigration raid, though she did not specify whether he drew a weapon. Federal officials released an image of the gun they claim Pretti was carrying at the time of the shooting.
Earlier, US President Donald Trump deployed thousands of immigration enforcement officers to Minneapolis as part of what he has described as a campaign to combat crime.
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