After top officials described Pretti as an “assassin” who had assaulted the agents, Pretti’s parents issued a statement Saturday condemning the administration’s “sickening lies” about their son.
With tensions high, protesters gathered Sunday in Minneapolis, denouncing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). One person held a cardboard sign that read: “Be Pretti, be Good.”
The double tragedies have stirred outrage, including from two of Trump’s Democratic presidential predecessors. Barack and Michelle Obama on Sunday said in a statement that Pretti’s shooting should be a “wake-up call” that core US values “are increasingly under assault”.
Hours later, Bill Clinton delivered a fierce indictment of the current administration, saying peaceful protesters “have been arrested, beaten, teargassed, and most searingly, in the cases of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, shot and killed”.
“All of this is unacceptable,” Clinton said in a statement as he urged Americans to “stand up, speak out”.
“If we give our freedoms away after 250 years, we might never get them back.”