Ahmed Kamel – Egypt Daily News
US President Donald Trump has agreed to pull back federal immigration agents from Minnesota and allow state authorities to conduct an independent investigation into the killing of a protester by federal agents, according to Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, marking a partial de-escalation after days of unrest in Minneapolis.
The agreement followed a phone call on Monday between Trump and Walz, held in the aftermath of the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care unit nurse, who was killed during protests against federal immigration operations in Minneapolis on Saturday. Pretti’s death has become the focal point of a widening political, legal, and public backlash against the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in the state.
In a statement, Walz’s office said the president agreed to speak with the Department of Homeland Security to ensure that the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension would be able to carry out an independent investigation, “as would ordinarily be the case.” Trump also agreed to consider reducing the number of federal agents deployed in Minnesota and to pursue more coordinated cooperation with state authorities, focusing immigration enforcement on violent offenders.
The shift in tone came after Trump publicly blamed Pretti’s death on what he called “Democrat-ensued chaos,” accusing Walz and local officials of allowing violent protests and threatening to deploy troops under the Insurrection Act. The president had argued that Minnesota’s leadership failed to protect federal agents and maintain order as demonstrations escalated.
Behind the scenes, however, reports indicate growing unease within the administration over how the operation was being handled. On Monday, Trump sidelined Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem from direct oversight of the Minnesota operation and ordered former acting ICE director Tom Homan to take charge. In a post on Truth Social, Trump said Homan would report directly to him, describing him as “tough but fair.”
The unrest intensified Sunday night, when protests erupted outside a Hilton hotel in Minneapolis believed to be housing ICE agents. Videos showed demonstrators smashing windows, spray-painting the building’s exterior, and chanting outside. The violence followed weeks of sporadic clashes linked to federal immigration operations, which had already sparked outrage after the January killing of Renee Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, during an earlier anti-ICE protest.
Federal officials initially cast Pretti as the aggressor. Noem said he “approached” immigration officers while armed and acted violently, while senior White House figures, including Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, referred to him as a “domestic terrorist.” Video footage from the scene, however, appears to show Pretti holding a phone during the confrontation, and he is not seen brandishing the 9mm handgun authorities say he was licensed to carry. The footage shows officers pushing him before several agents pile on, moments before he was shot.
The conflicting accounts have intensified demands for transparency and accountability, including from within Trump’s own party. Vermont Governor Phil Scott, a Republican, sharply criticized the federal operation, calling it a failure of coordination and leadership and warning that it risked intimidating and endangering American citizens.
“At best, these operations are a complete failure of acceptable public safety practices,” Scott wrote. “At worst, they amount to deliberate federal intimidation that is resulting in the killing of Americans.”
Republican Senator Pete Ricketts of Nebraska, a close Trump ally, called for a “prioritized, transparent investigation,” saying that support for ICE funding must be balanced with respect for constitutional rights, including the right to protest. Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt described the shooting as a “real tragedy” and said the administration needed to clarify its broader objective. “Nobody likes the feds coming to their states,” he told CNN. “What is the end game?”
Other Republicans were more blunt. Representative James Comer of Kentucky suggested the administration shift immigration enforcement elsewhere if local leaders were unwilling to cooperate, arguing that Minnesotans should decide the consequences of resisting federal action.
Democratic leaders at both the state and national level have called for federal agents to leave Minnesota entirely, accusing the administration of provoking unrest and bypassing normal law-enforcement coordination. Walz has said the presence of heavily armed federal agents has inflamed tensions rather than restored order.
The episode comes at a delicate political moment for Trump and the Republican Party as they head into a challenging midterm election cycle. While immigration has long been a political strength for the president, recent polling suggests public support is slipping. According to a January AP-NORC poll, just 38 percent of US adults approve of Trump’s handling of immigration, down sharply from earlier in the year.
As investigations proceed and federal operations are reassessed, the killing of Alex Pretti has exposed growing fractures within the Republican Party and raised broader questions about the limits of federal authority, the conduct of immigration enforcement, and the political costs of an increasingly confrontational approach to domestic security.
