When I saw the cellphone videos of U.S. Border Patrol agents executing Alex Pretti on a snowy street in Minneapolis, the shameless brutality of the shooting reminded me of another execution 58 years earlier on a war-torn street in Saigon….
When civil rights protesters are killed, some deaths – generally those of white people – resonate more
Renee Good and Alex Pretti, two white Minneapolis residents killed in January 2026 by federal agents while protesting the Trump administration’s immigration policy, have become household names. National media outlets continue to focus on their deaths and the circumstances around them.
Peace ain’t what it’s cracked up to be
This past Jan. 15 — ironically, on the actual birthday of Martin Luther King Jr. — the 2025 Nobel laureate for peace, Maria Corina Machado, took her prize medal, encased in a gold (of course) and glass frame, to the…
Everyone has a part to play in the fight against ICE
I was in Minneapolis the week Alex Pretti was shot more than 10 times by Customs and Border Patrol Agents. I originally went to Minneapolis to write about the aftermath of Renee Good’s murder by an ICE agent. As I…
By Trump’s definition, Jesus ‘engaged in domestic terrorism’
There’s a lie that’s been rattling around my mind since federal agents murdered Alex Pretti Jan. 24. It’s the lie that Pretti, an intensive-care nurse at a Veterans’ Administration hospital, was “engaged in domestic terrorism.” Realistically, dozens of videos have…
Clergy protests against ICE turned to a classic – and powerful – American playlist
On Jan. 28, 2026, Bruce Springsteen released “Streets of Minneapolis,” a hard-hitting protest against the immigration enforcement surge in the city, including the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti.
Catholics must decide if they serve Donald Trump or the Gospel
In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus famously proclaimed, “No one can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other.”
As anger mounts, ICE director called to court appearance Friday
The chief federal judge in Minnesota is fed up with the Trump administration’s persistent violation of court orders and the rights of detainees amid increasingly aggressive immigration enforcement actions. As a result, Judge Patrick J. Schiltz has ordered the acting…
As religious leaders decry Pretti’s death, SBC president is silent
The president of the nation’s largest Protestant denomination apparently had nothing to say about the murder of a 37-year-old ICU nurse in Minneapolis last Saturday. But Clint Pressley had quite a lot to say a week earlier when a group…
Kristi Noem is a liar
Kristi Noem is a liar, but so is everyone else who keeps propping up the Liar in Chief. I have written extensively for years about the corrosive effects of Donald Trump’s lies and how they are infecting entire populations of…
The day after the public execution of Alex Pretti
I returned from Minneapolis to Dallas Friday night. I expected the next piece I’d write for Baptist News Global would be about my experience participating in the clergy actions on Friday. Those reflections will have to wait. When I saw…