If you still believe what Trump and the Republicans tell you, here is what you believe:
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- It was all Alex Pretti’s own fault for carrying a gun
- “The president supports the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding American citizens, absolutely,”
- “When you are bearing arms and confronted by law enforcement, you are raising … the risk of force being used against you.”
- Pretti was “brandishing a weapon,” “acted violently,” and ““wanted to … massacre law enforcement.”
- Peaceful protesters don’t “show up with a gun.”
- Pretti was “an assassin.”
- “Protesters can’t have guns.
- “If you approach law enforcement with a gun, there is a high likelihood they will be legally justified in shooting you.” That analysis, the NRA said, is “dangerous and wrong.”
- “No one can “bring a firearm, loaded, with multiple magazines to any sort of protest that you want. It’s that simple.”
- “Showing up at a protest is very American. Showing up with a weapon is very American,”
Florida Sun-Sentinel WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 28, 2026
Minnesota shooting twists gun debate
Some backers of GOP reject blaming victim for carrying firearm
By Bill Barrow and Nicholas Riccardi
Prominent Republicans and gun rights advocates helped elicit a White House turnabout this week after bristling over the administration’s characterization of Alex Pretti, the second person killed this month by federal officers in Minneapolis, as responsible for his own death because he lawfully possessed a weapon.
The concern is acute enough that Trump’s top spokeswoman sought Monday to reassert his brand as a staunch gun rights supporter.
“The president supports the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding American citizens, absolutely,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters.
Leavitt qualified that “when you are bearing arms and confronted by law enforcement, you
are raising … the risk of force being used against you.”
Within hours of Pretti’s death Saturday, Border Patrol chief Greg Bovino suggested Pretti “wanted to … massacre law enforcement,” and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Pretti was “brandishing” a weapon and acted “violently” toward officers.
“I don’t know of any peaceful protester that shows up with a gun and ammunition rather than a sign,” Noem said.
White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, an architect of Trump’s mass deportation effort, went further on X, declaring Pretti “an assassin.”
Bystander videos contradicted each claim, instead showing Pretti holding a cellphone and helping a woman who had been shoved to the ground and pepper-sprayed by a federal officer.
Within seconds, Pretti was sprayed, too, and taken to the ground by multiple officers. No video disclosed thus far has shown him unholstering his concealed weapon, which he had a permit to carry in Minnesota. It appeared that one officer took Pretti’s gun and walked away with it just before shots began.
As multiple videos went viral online and on television, Vice President JD Vance reposted Miller’s assessment, while Trump shared an alleged photo of “the gunman’s gun, loaded (with two additional full magazines!).”
On Tuesday, Trump was asked if he agreed with Miller’s comment describing Pretti as an “assassin” and answered “no.” But he added that protesters “can’t have guns” and said he wants the death investigated.
“You can’t walk in with guns, you just can’t,” Trump told reporters on the White House lawn before departing for a trip to Iowa, adding that Pretti’s death was “a very unfortunate incident.”
The National Rifle Association, which has backed Trump three times, released a statement that began by casting blame on Minnesota Democrats it accused of stoking protests. But the group lashed out after a federal prosecutor in California said on X that, “If you approach law enforcement with a gun, there is a high likelihood they will be legally justified in shooting you.” That analysis, the NRA said, is “dangerous and wrong.”
FBI Director Kash Patel magnified the blowback Sunday on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures With Maria Martiromo.” No one, Patel said, can “bring a firearm, loaded, with multiple magazines to any sort of protest that you want. It’s that simple.”
Erich Pratt, vice president of Gun Owners of America, was incredulous. “I have attended protest rallies while armed, and no one got injured,” he said on CNN. Conservative officials around the country made the same connection between the First and Second amendments.
“Showing up at a protest is very American. Showing up with a weapon is very American, state Rep. Jeremy Faison, who leads the GOP caucus in Tennessee, said on X.
Multiple Trump supporters were found to have weapons during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Trump issued blanket pardons to all of them.
And then there’s Kyle Rittenhouse, a counterprotester acquitted after fatally shooting two men and injuring another in Kenosha, Wisconsin, during the George Floyd protests in 2020. Rittenhouse has emerged as a hero to many on the conservative right.
In short, if you are a MAGA, you believe people should legally be able to carry guns, but not loaded, and not to a protest, especially if the gun has been taken away from you, and you are lying face-down on the ground being beaten, while a masked Trump goon pumps ten shots into your back.
I know, because Trump, Patel, Faison, Pratt, Miller, Noem, Vance, Leavitt, Bovino, the NRA, and a few other right-wing crazies told me in many, many, many different ways.
But if you break the law and attempt to overthrow the government, Trump will pardon you.
Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
Twitter: @rodgermitchell
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