Category: Wires

President Donald Trump on Sunday insisted his proposed ballroom is a done deal — even as Justice Department lawyers in court present the plans as flexible and subject to federal reviews.

In a lengthy post to his Truth Social platform, Trump said the project could not realistically be reversed because key materials have been lined up, writing that “there is no practical or reasonable way to go back” and declaring: “IT IS TOO LATE!”

The president’s comments contrast with his administration’s position in federal court, where three days earlier Justice Department lawyers told a judge that the ballroom plans can be modified and that the White House intends to wait for two federal advisory panels to review the project before beginning aboveground construction in April. U.S. District Judge Richard Leon, an appointee of President George W. Bush, said he intends to rule in the coming weeks on whether the project may advance.

The White House did not immediately respond to questions about how Trump’s post about the ballroom aligned with his administration’s legal argument. Trump and his deputies have said that the ballroom project is personally important to him, and the president wrote Sunday that it is a national security matter.

“Stoppage of construction, at this late date, when so much has already been ordered and done, would be devastating to the White House, our Country, and all concerned,” Trump wrote in a late-morning note that published as much of the United States was under a weather alert connected to a significant winter storm. He also listed materials that he said had either been ordered or were “ready” to be obtained: “All of the Structural Steel, Windows, Doors, A.C./Heating Equipment, Marble, Stone, Precast Concrete, Bulletproof Windows and Glass, Anti-Drone Roofing, and much more.”

The roughly 450-word statement came in between two posts that referenced Minnesota, the site a day earlier of another fatal shooting connected to immigration enforcement that roiled domestic politics and raised the possibility of a government shutdown. Democrats pledged to block a funding package that must be approved by Friday to keep much of the government open, saying that they could not support continued funding for federal immigration enforcement without operational changes.

Trump in October rapidly demolished the White House’s East Wing annex to make way for his planned ballroom addition, prompting criticism from Democrats, watchdogs, and some conservatives who said the administration should have sought public comment before making such significant changes to a building long described as the “People’s House.” The White House has begun construction on the underground elements of the project, deploying workers, construction machinery, and a tower crane, with administration officials saying the work is necessary to protect the president.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a nonprofit group charged by Congress with helping to preserve historic buildings, sued the Trump administration in December, saying it failed to undergo legally required reviews or receive congressional authorization for the project. The group has asked Leon to pause construction until those reviews take place, arguing that every additional day of work locks the project into place.

“We are fully committed to upholding the interests of the American public and advocating for compliance with all legally required review and approval processes — and an opportunity for the American people to weigh in on a project that impacts one of the most historically significant buildings in our country,” the National Trust said in a statement Sunday following Trump’s post, which also took aim at the group.

The Justice Department has argued that Trump has significant authority to make changes to White House grounds. The department also submitted testimony from an engineer working on the ballroom project who said the planned building can still accommodate significant design changes. The National Trust has submitted testimony from architect William Bates, former president of the American Institute of Architects, who said in a sworn statement that a building’s subterranean infrastructure essentially predetermines critical aspects of what can be built aboveground.

“Altering these conditions after the fact would require major demolition and redesign,” Bates wrote last month.

Leon, who is hearing the case at the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., on Thursday, appeared skeptical of the administration’s arguments and pressed the Justice Department to explain how Trump had the legal right to fund the project using hundreds of millions of dollars in private donations. Publicly identified donors, such as Amazon, Google, and Lockheed Martin, collectively have billions of dollars in contracts before the administration. (Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post.)

The two federal panels set to review the ballroom project — the Commission of Fine Arts and the National Capital Planning Commission — are now led by Trump appointees after the president removed members named during the Biden administration. White House officials have said they hope to win approval from the panels by March, and the panels’ leaders have signaled support for ballroom construction.

“I know the President wants to get on with this, and we need to let him do his job,” Rodney Mims Cook Jr., the chairperson of the Commission of Fine Arts, said at a hearing last week.

In the 24 hours after an immigration officer fatally shot a protester in Minneapolis, the federal agencies that would typically be involved in investigating an officer-involved shooting have been on the sidelines.

Federal law enforcement leaders in Minnesota haven’t made public statements or appearances. FBI agents and prosecutors in the state are confused about what — if anything — their involvement will be in the investigation, according to multiple people familiar with the U.S. attorney’s office in Minnesota, who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to fear of retaliation.

In the apparent absence so far of the Justice Department, Minnesota authorities have vowed to pursue an investigation under state laws into the shooting of Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse. That has set up a potential legal clash between state and federal authorities. Already, the state has sued the federal government, successfully asking a judge over the weekend to ensure that federal law enforcement officials do not destroy evidence.

The Justice Department’s apparent back seat in the investigation contrasts with how the agency has frequently handled similar fatal officer-involved shootings. Typically, federal investigators would take the lead, deploying FBI agents and Civil Rights Division prosecutors — the department’s experts in investigating use-of-force cases.

That typical federal deployment of resources has not occurred in this case, according to two people familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal decisions that have not been made public.

“This is extremely out of the norm,” said Bryna Godar, staff attorney for the State Democracy Research Initiative at the University of Wisconsin Law School, who has studied use-of-force investigations. “Typically, whether or not a shooting is ultimately found to be justified, these types of shootings are taken very seriously.”

Rather than the Justice Department, the Department of Homeland Security, of which the Border Patrol is a part, has taken the lead in the investigation, with the FBI assisting, according to a law enforcement official familiar with the matter.

That internal probe is at least in part examining whether Border Patrol agents adhered to protocol when Pretti was shot. Homeland Security doesn’t have independent authority to prosecute crimes, but if its examination finds evidence of criminal wrongdoing, DHS officials could refer the investigation to the Justice Department, the law enforcement official said.

That typical federal deployment of resources has not occurred after the most recent shooting, according to two people familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal decisions that have not been made public.

Justice Department officials have said in recent weeks that they only investigate police officers under the civil rights laws involving excessive force if they believe such a probe is warranted. The recent shootings by immigration officers do not necessitate federal criminal investigations, they have said.

Legal experts, however, have noted that while the threshold to charge a police officer is high, the only way to determine if a prosecution is warranted is for the Justice Department and FBI to conduct thorough investigations.

FBI Director Kash Patel, in an interview with Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures, said he trusted Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem and her agency to “do the right thing.”

“I don’t want to comment on their ongoing investigation,” he said.

In the shooting on Saturday, federal agents wrestled Pretti to the ground and secured a handgun he was carrying moments before Pretti was shot multiple times, according to a Washington Post analysis of videos that captured the incident from several angles.

It is not clear from the video whether all the agents realized Pretti had been disarmed. Local officials have said Pretti had a permit to carry the weapon, and Minnesota law allows the open carrying of firearms.

On the day after the shooting, Justice Department officials sought to shift blame for it onto state and local authorities, who they assert have egged on protesters, and deferred the responsibility to investigate to other agencies.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche appeared on Meet the Press Sunday and said the problem was that local police officers were not assisting federal law enforcement in the state.

“I’m very confused why the conversation is about what you’re talking about instead of focusing on what really matters, which is why in one city, in one place we have these problems,” Blanche told NBC’s Meet the Press, suggesting that Minnesota officials had contributed to the tensions that provoked Pretti’s shooting.

The immigration crackdown in the Minneapolis-St. Paul region began in early January, despite protests from state officials. The deployment of thousands of federal and immigration agents to the Twin Cities has transformed the region into a center of resistance to the administration’s deportation policies.

Those protests mounted after Jan. 7, when an Immigration Customs and Enforcement officer shot Renée Good while she was in her car. Good and her partner, who was outside the car at the time of the shooting, had been protesting the immigration crackdown.

The FBI briefly opened a civil rights investigation into the shooting of Good, but closed it and instead focused on investigating Good’s partner and protesters, the Washington Post reported last week. The handling of that investigation prompted about a half-dozen experienced federal prosecutors to leave the U.S. attorney’s office in Minnesota, leaving the office severely understaffed. The FBI agent who initially opened the investigation resigned, according to two people familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matter.

In the days since, the department has focused its resources on investigating state and local leaders, challenging what Attorney General Pam Bondi has described as “unprecedented judicial activism” in court, and arresting demonstrators, including protesters who interrupted a Jan. 18 church service in St. Paul.

State and local officials have vowed to conduct their own investigation of both the Good and Pretti shootings, but said they’ve been stymied by federal agents denying them access to the scenes.

Late Saturday evening, a U.S. district judge, acting on a request from the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office, barred the Department of Homeland Security, the Justice Department, or the FBI from “destroying or altering evidence” related to the shooting.

Drew Evans, superintendent of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, said his agency took the unusual step Saturday of obtaining a search warrant from a state court to access the shooting scene after initial efforts to respond were rebuffed. Federal agents ignored the warrant and continued to deny access to state investigators, he said.

“In my 20-plus years at the BCA, prior to 2026, I had never encountered a situation in which federal authorities blocked BCA access to an incident where there is concurrent federal and state jurisdiction,” he wrote in a declaration filed with the court Saturday night. Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty took to social media urging anyone to submit footage they’d filmed at the scene.

Hurdles for possible prosecution

If state authorities determine the shooting was unlawful, they could seek to prosecute agents involved. But any attempt to do so would face stiff legal hurdles.

Any agent charged with state crimes would probably seek to move the case to federal court and claim federal immunity from prosecution.

Officers are shielded from prosecution for many actions taken in the line of duty. Federal officers facing state prosecution can claim immunity based on the constitutional doctrine of federal supremacy. Those protections only apply, however, if a judge deems the agents’ actions to have been authorized by federal law and “necessary and proper” in fulfilling their federal duties.

Local authorities do sometimes move ahead with cases against federal agents, including a recent instance in Virginia that underscores the extent to which such attempts can get bogged down in litigation spanning years.

In 2020, after the Justice Department declined to file charges, state authorities in Virginia secured involuntary manslaughter indictments against two U.S. Park Police officers who fatally shot an unarmed motorist in Fairfax County in 2017.

The case was tied up in litigation over the immunity question for years, and the charges at one point were dismissed by a federal judge. Local authorities were pursuing an appeal of that decision in 2021 when Republican Jason Miyares was elected attorney general. Miyares abandoned the effort in 2022.

The killing of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis has scrambled America’s gun debate, another reflection of the bitterness and polarization that have engulfed the dispute over the national crackdown on immigration by federal agents.

Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse, was carrying a gun in or near his waistband when he was killed on Saturday, but videos show he had not drawn it and was disarmed before being shot multiple times. Local authorities believe he had a permit to carry the gun.

With Americans split between those supporting the Trump administration and those backing anti-ICE protesters, multiple conservatives — including those strongly supportive of gun rights in the past — have justified Pretti’s shooting on the grounds that his carrying of a holstered gun showed he had violent intentions.

Asked if Pretti ever brandished his gun, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem said Saturday, “I don’t know of any peaceful protester that shows up with a gun and ammunition rather than a sign. This is a violent riot when you have someone showing up with weapons and are using them to assault law enforcement officers.”

Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R., Okla.) told Fox News, “A deranged individual who came in to cause massive damage with a loaded pistol, with an extra mag that was completely loaded, was shot and killed. How much more does it have to go on before the Democrat leaders there take responsibility for their words?”

Those positions are at odds with the usual stance of many gun rights supporters, who often defend the rights of Americans to carry firearms in almost all situations.

In 2020, Kyle Rittenhouse, a conservative 17-year-old from the Chicago suburbs, brought an AR-15 to a racial justice protest in Wisconsin, killing two people and injuring another. Liberals said he was obviously looking for trouble, but Rittenhouse, arguing he had acted in self-defense, became a hero to many conservatives and was later acquitted of murder.

In another episode that year, Mark and Patricia McCloskey waved guns at Black Lives Matter protesters, albeit from their front yard. They were celebrated by gun rights backers and invited to speak at the Republican National Convention.

Pretti is being framed very differently by many supporters of the Second Amendment.

“Don’t let the left kid you with this, that this is just a normal protest where people are peacefully protesting. No it’s not,” Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R., N.J.) told Fox News. “Peaceful protesters don’t have 9-millimeter weapons with two extra magazines.”

Liberals, including gun control supporters, in contrast emphasize that Pretti’s legal possession of a weapon in no way reflects on his intentions at the protest, and certainly cannot justify his killing at the hands of federal agents.

The divide underlines how much American politics in the Trump era has departed from a debate over principles — to the extent that it was ever that — and has settled firmly into a battle of us-versus-them, where actions are lauded or vilified depending on who is behind them.

Rosa Brooks, a law professor at Georgetown University who specializes in national security, said there is a certain consistency to people insisting their “side” is always right, even if that involves shifting positions on some issues.

“If your vision of the America you want to protect is ‘My tribe wins,’ then it’s not hypocritical,” said Brooks, who has served as a reserve D.C. police officer. “Some would say ‘I support the police when they are doing the right thing,’ which some people define really tribally.”

Even so, some Democrats predicted that the unusually tough tactics of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol agents in Minneapolis and elsewhere will ultimately trigger a backlash against the Trump administration’s tactics among conservatives. There are some signs that process has haltingly begun.

A faction of the conservative movement has long been suspicious of federal law enforcement, seeing it as a way for the government to oppress ordinary citizens. The recent emergence of an ICE memo instructing agents that they can enter homes without a judicial warrant, and now the killing of two protesters, could fuel that backlash, some Democrats said.

“There is considerable blowback even among a lot of right-leaning folks at the image of federal agents in masks without cause or control, patrolling the streets of American cities and suburbs and pulling people out of their homes and cars more or less at random,” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D., R.I.) told reporters recently.

Robert Spitzer, a professor emeritus and expert on criminal law and gun control at the State University of New York at Cortland, said the Minneapolis shooting highlights contradictions in the reality of the Second Amendment — specifically the argument that an “armed society is a safe society.”

“This is another instance where slogans and ideology run smack-dab against reality,” Spitzer said.

While the U.S. Supreme Court has affirmed the right of people to carry a firearm, Spitzer said there are virtually no instances where an armed citizen using a gun against the federal government would be viewed in court as lawful.

“One reason some people acquire guns is in case they need to ‘confront the tyrannical government.’ But there’s a wealth of problems with that whole notion, not the least of which being that as soon as you’re talking in that realm, you’re brushing up against the edge of lawbreaking,” Spitzer said. “That’s because the whole idea of the American system is that it’s designed and structured to resolve disputes peacefully, not through arms.”

Some Second Amendment activists did express concern about Pretti’s shooting, and especially the use of his gun possession as a justification.

When Bill Essayli, an assistant U.S. attorney in California, posted a message on social media appearing to broadly justify the shooting, he received pushback from unusual quarters. “If you approach law enforcement with a gun, there is a high likelihood they will be legally justified in shooting you,” Essayli posted on Saturday. “Don’t do it!”

The National Rifle Association hit back hard.

“This sentiment from the First Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California is dangerous and wrong,” the organization said. “Responsible public voices should be awaiting a full investigation, not making generalizations and demonizing law-abiding citizens.”

That statement was all the more notable because the NRA earlier Saturday seemed to join others on the right in blaming Democratic leaders for the violence, saying their demonization of immigration agents had predictably violent results.

“Unsurprisingly, these calls to dangerously interject oneself into legitimate law enforcement activities have ended in violence, tragically resulting in injuries and fatalities,” the NRA said in its earlier statement about the Pretti shooting.

The NRA is not the only gun rights organization to challenge the rush by some Republicans to portray Pretti as a gun-toting firebrand agitator who, if he did not deserve what he got, at least had a hand in provoking it.

The Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus cautioned that an independent investigation has yet to be conducted, but it added that so far no evidence has surfaced that Pretti intended to harm the officers.

“Every peaceable Minnesotan has the right to keep and bear arms — including while attending protests, acting as observers, or exercising their First Amendment rights,” the Gun Owners Caucus said. “These rights do not disappear when someone is lawfully armed, and they must be respected and protected at all times.”

For now, the deployment of federal agents into major American cities, including Minneapolis, Portland, Chicago, and Los Angeles, has produced open hostility between these largely Democratic strongholds and the Trump administration, with mayors and governors begging the federal agents to withdraw.

Gil Kerlikowske, a former commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, said the federal agents are acting in unprecedented ways.

“It’s completely unheard of,” said Kerlikowske, a former police chief in Seattle and Buffalo. “They have jumped into these cities with no coordination, no communication, no joint command post. They are marching to rock music, wearing masks. … Their deployment has been horrific. And it’s been unsuccessful.”

Federal agents who were wrestling a man to the ground in Minneapolis early Saturday secured a handgun he was carrying moments before shooting him multiple times, according to a Washington Post analysis of videos that captured the incident from several angles.

As many as eight agents were attempting to detain Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse, videos show. One emerged from the scrum holding Pretti’s gun, and less than a second later, the first of what appear to be 10 shots was fired. It is not clear from the video whether the other agents realized Pretti — who local authorities believe had a permit to carry the weapon — had been disarmed.

Pretti was the third person in recent weeks to be shot, and the second to be killed, by federal agents in Minneapolis, the epicenter of nationwide upheaval sparked by the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.

Department of Homeland Security officials have said agents were on Nicollet Street conducting a “targeted operation” against another person when they encountered the man later identified as Pretti. DHS posted to X that “an individual approached US Border Patrol officers with a 9 mm semi-automatic handgun.” The statement said it appeared the man wanted to “massacre” law enforcement.

“The officers attempted to disarm this individual, but the armed suspect reacted violently,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem said at a news conference. “Fearing for his life and for the lives of his fellow officers around him, an agent fired defensive shots.”

Although it is not clear exactly how Pretti’s interaction with federal agents began, bystander footage reviewed by the Post raises questions about that account. A DHS spokesperson did not respond to messages seeking comment.

Early Saturday morning, bystanders gathered to protest the DHS operation, some blowing whistles to warn residents of the agents’ presence and others recording. One video, filmed from a passing car, shows Pretti in the street, speaking to officers and filming them with his phone. He is not holding a gun in either hand. An officer moves him back toward the sidewalk. It is not clear how the interaction began or what words were exchanged.

A second video, filmed a short time later, shows Pretti on the same block. He walks toward the officers, still appearing to film with his phone in his right hand and not holding a gun. The audio does not pick up what was said between Pretti and the officer. One of the officers pushes a person who appears to be a bystander or protester down onto the sidewalk.

Pretti steps between them, and the officer pepper sprays him. Pretti begins to interact with the person who was pushed, an exchange that is inaudible in the footage. An officer appears to try to pull him away and is joined by other agents who attempt to force him to the ground.

Over roughly the next 10 seconds, Pretti never appears to be fully prone on the ground or to yield fully. At times, his knees are tucked under his body, agents holding him down, their hands on his back.

As at least four agents attempt to subdue Pretti, an officer wearing a gray jacket approaches. His gloved hands are empty, video shows.

The agent in the gray jacket crouches down, reaches toward Pretti, and lifts a gun from his back near his waistband, according to videos taken from multiple angles. The agent turns and begins to walk away while holding the weapon, pointing it toward the ground.

Another agent, standing beside the agent in the gray jacket, unholsters his gun at virtually the same moment and points it at Pretti’s back at close range. At least two agents are attempting to hold him down. A split second later comes the crack of the first gunshot, though the videos do not clearly show which agent fired. Pretti gets up on one knee and falls over as the agent who had unholstered his weapon fires in rapid succession.

The agent in the gray coat retreats. The gun, with an optical attachment, is clearly visible in his hand. It appears to match an image that the Department of Homeland Security posted of what it said was the handgun agents recovered from Pretti.