Day: January 26, 2026
West Virginia Librarian Charged With Recruiting People To Assassinate Trump
‘An active criminal investigation with documented and troubling concerns’
‘Horrifying situation’: Some Republicans retreat following Minneapolis shooting of anti-ICE agitator
Several Republican lawmakers are sounding the alarm following another shooting in Minnesota.
Anti-ICE agitator Alex Pretti was fatally shot by a federal agent in Minneapolis on Saturday, with the Department of Homeland Security saying he “violently resisted” when agents attempted to disarm him. This is the second fatal shooting of an anti-ICE agitator in Minnesota. Renee Good was shot earlier this month after turning her car and accelerating toward an agent.
‘The killing yesterday … should raise serious questions.’
Administration officials like DHS Secretary Kristi Noem and top adviser Stephen Miller have branded Pretti a “would-be assassin” who committed acts of “domestic terrorism.”
This comes after weeks of mob violence, theft, and property destruction in response to ICE presence in Minneapolis. These often coordinated acts are indiscriminately aimed at federal agents conducting lawful operations. The protesters are also threatening journalists simply exposing their violent tactics and even intimidating local churchgoers.
While the investigation continues, some Republican senators and representatives have made an effort to distance themselves from what they called a “horrifying situation.”
RELATED: Democrats threaten to shut down government over ICE funding: ‘We are not powerless’
Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
Several senators who are known to buck the Trump administration came out with critical statements following the shooting, citing claims that conflict with DHS’ narrative.
“The tragedy and chaos the country is witnessing in Minneapolis is shocking,” Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska said in a post on X. “The killing yesterday of Alex Pretti, a U.S. citizen, by ICE agents should raise serious questions within the administration about the adequacy of immigration-enforcement training and the instructions officers are given on carrying out their mission.”
“Lawfully carrying a firearm does not justify federal agents killing an American — especially, as video footage appears to show, after the victim had been disarmed,” Murkowski said. “A comprehensive, independent investigation of the shooting must be conducted in order to rebuild trust and Congressional committees need to hold hearings and do their oversight work. ICE agents do not have carte blanche in carrying out their duties.”
Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who is notably retiring, said officials jumping to conclusions could risk tarnishing President Donald Trump’s legacy.
“There must be a thorough and impartial investigation into yesterday’s Minneapolis shooting, which is the basic standard that law enforcement and the American people expect following any officer-involved shooting,” Tillis said in a post on X. “For this specific incident, that requires cooperation and transparency between federal, state, and local law enforcement. Any administration official who rushes to judgment and tries to shut down an investigation before it begins are doing an incredible disservice to the nation and to President Trump’s legacy.”
Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images
Other senators who have otherwise supported the administration also expressed skepticism after the shooting, calling for a thorough investigation.
“The nation witnessed a horrifying situation this weekend,” Republican Sen. Pete Ricketts of Nebraska said in a post on X. “My prayers are with the family of Alex Pretti.”
“My support for funding ICE remains the same. Enforcing our immigration laws makes our streets safer,” Ricketts clarified ahead of a major Senate vote on DHS funding. “It also protects our national security. But we must also maintain our core values as a nation, including the right to protest and assemble. I expect a prioritized, transparent investigation into this incident.”
Ricketts’ Republican colleague Sen. Dave McCormick of Pennsylvania echoed a criticism put forth by the National Rifle Association, saying Pretti was lawfully exercising his right to carry a firearm.
“As I have often said, I support the Border Patrol, ICE, and the critical work they do to enforce our laws,” McCormick said in a post on X. “Irresponsible rhetoric and a lack of cooperation from Minnesota’s politicians are fueling a dangerous situation. I also agree with the NRA and others — we need a full investigation into the tragedy in Minneapolis. We need all the facts. We must enforce our laws in a way that protects the public while maintaining its trust. This gives our law enforcement officers the best chance to succeed in their difficult mission.”
RELATED: Vance crushes false narrative about ICE ‘arresting’ 5-year-old boy
Photo by Nathan Posner/Anadolu via Getty Images
While several Republicans remained critical, others like Sen. Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma came in defense of the Trump administration, suggesting protesters had crossed the line into obstructing law enforcement.
“Law-abiding citizens have every right to carry a firearm,” Mullin said in a post on X. “You DO NOT have a right to obstruct law enforcement activity, or commit another felony with one. This is not difficult.”
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
Video: Crooks plow car through jewelry store entrance in broad daylight smash-and-grab. But the suspects got sloppy.
Crooks crashed a car through a jewelry store entrance in a brazen, broad-daylight smash-and-grab heist caught on surveillance and cellphone video Friday afternoon in Southern California.
The Anaheim Police Department said officers responded to Classic Jewelers on East Santa Ana Canyon Road around 2:30 p.m., KTLA-TV reported.
‘My life flashed before my eyes.’
Employees told police that multiple suspects intentionally rammed a dark-colored Nissan Rogue into the front of the business to gain entry and steal jewelry, the station said.
“Eight to 10 guys run in with masks, trash cans, and crowbars, hammers, and smash every showcase,” the store owner told KTTV-TV.
The owner added to KABC-TV that he told the crooks “‘I have a gun. Get out. I have a gun.”
Well, they allegedly took the gun, too.
“My gun was on the table. They grabbed my gun, and at that point I thought I was going to get shot,” the owner recalled to KTTV.
“My life flashed before my eyes,” he added to KTLA.
The store owner said the group got away with about $1 million in gold and jewelry, as well as his gun, KTLA noted.
“They took everything within a matter of a minute,” he recounted to KTTV. “This is our livelihood.’
The suspects then fled in two Dodge Charger sedans, police told KTLA, adding that the Nissan used to plow through the store’s entrance — which was stolen — was driven from the scene.
But one thing ultimately worked in the jewelry store’s favor: An employee recorded cellphone video of the escaping vehicles — and their license plates were on the clip.
Subsequently, cops were on the lookout and soon caught up to the cars.
Police told KTLA one of the cars was involved in a multi-vehicle collision, and all four occupants — the driver and three passengers — fled but were soon located and arrested.
Then an Anaheim Police Department air unit located what was believed to be the second suspect vehicle — and that car also was involved in a multi-vehicle crash, police told KTLA. Immediately two males believed to be involved in the jewelry store heist were arrested, and a handgun was recovered at the scene, police added to the station.
Police found trays loaded with stolen jewelry in one of the cars, KTTV said.
Two additional males were arrested hours later in the rear yards of separate residences, police added to KTLA.
Police told KTLA a total of eight suspects — all of whom are under the age of 24 — were identified as:
- Jose Andres Martinez-Colindres, 24, of Inglewood
- Leontrey Gipson, 23, of Los Angeles
- Deondre Jones, 23, of Los Angeles
- Tylaind Brown, 20, of Compton
- Khilen Toles, 20, of Inglewood
- Khamari Toles, 20, of Inglewood
- Latrell Mathews, 19, of Los Angeles
A 17-year-old male from Los Angeles also was among the arrestees, KTLA said.
The seven adult suspects were booked on suspicion of multiple felonies, pending review by the Orange County District Attorney’s Office, police told KTLA, adding that the juvenile was released to a guardian pending further proceedings.
Several uninvolved motorists were hospitalized in the two vehicle crashes, KTLA reported, adding that their injuries were “non-life-threatening.”
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
‘Repulsive’: Critics blast Walz for invoking Anne Frank, comparing ICE enforcement to systematic genocide
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) has repeatedly turned to the 1930s in search of potential analogs for those people and actions today that he finds disagreeable.
Walz smeared, for example, Holocaust survivor Jerry Wartski and the tens of thousands of other Americans who attended a campaign event for President Donald Trump in October 2024, comparing them to the Nazis who rallied at the location in February 1939.
‘Her story has nothing to do with the illegal immigration, fraud, and lawlessness plaguing Minnesota today.’
Walz claimed on May 17, 2025, that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement — which was active during his former running mate’s tenure as vice president as well as during the Obama administration — was “Donald Trump’s modern-day Gestapo.”
In the wake of 37-year-old Alex Pretti’s fatal shooting by a federal immigration agent on Saturday, Walz once again went in search of a damning reference. This time, he likened Minnesota children whose streets are being cleared of violent criminal noncitizens to Jews in the Nazi-occupied Netherlands who were faced with systematized mass murder.
After further vilifying federal immigration agents and reiterating his demand that ICE leave the Gopher State, Walz said during a press conference on Sunday, “We have got children in Minnesota hiding in their houses, afraid to go outside. Many of us grew up reading that story of Anne Frank.”
“Somebody’s going to write that children’s story about Minnesota,” added Walz. “And there’s one person who can end this now.”
Photographer: Jack Califano/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Anne Frank was a Jewish German girl whose family attempted to hide from Nazi forces in the secret annex of an Amsterdam residence. After two years of hiding, the family was captured after the Sicherheitspolizei raided the location in concert with Dutch police. Frank was taken to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in 1945, where she and her sister died in 1945. Her father, Otto, survived Auschwitz, then later saw to the publication of Anne Frank’s diary.
Critics have suggested Walz’s comparison is indefensible.
Rabbi Yehuda Kaploun, the U.S. State Department’s special envoy to monitor and combat anti-Semitism, tweeted, “Ignorance like this cheapens the horror of the Holocaust. Anne Frank was in Amsterdam legally and abided by Dutch law. She was hauled off to a death camp because of her race and religion. Her story has nothing to do with the illegal immigration, fraud, and lawlessness plaguing Minnesota today.”
“Our brave law enforcement should be commended, not tarred with this historically illiterate and antisemitic comparison,” added the rabbi.
Republican Rep. Randy Fine (Fla.) said that “comparing the removal of illegal immigrants to the Holocaust is antisemitic and repulsive.”
Shabbos Kestenbaum, a Jewish American activist and political commentator at PragerU, wrote, “One million Jewish children were killed during the Holocaust. Illegal immigrants are offered thousands of dollars to take a free flight home. Tim Walz is an evil retard.”
The White House’s rapid response account said that Walz is a “truly disturbed, unstable individual.”
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
Former Vikings player says ‘demonic’ Minnesota Democrats are upset ICE is ‘deporting their voters’
The enforcement of immigration law is ruining the Democratic Party’s “plan,” according to a former Minnesota Vikings player.
Jack Brewer is an ex-NFL player who spent three years at the University of Minnesota before playing two seasons for the Vikings in the early 2000s.
As Immigration and Customs Enforcement faces near-daily violent resistance in Minnesota, Brewer presented a theory as to why he believes residents are “attacking” law enforcement.
‘There is something wrong in Minneapolis. We need a city-wide behavioral health assessment.’
“We’re deporting their voters,” Brewer stated. “That’s part of what’s happening, and it’s blowing up their whole plan,” he said in remarks to Fox News Digital.
The 47-year-old said his work in third-world countries has taught him that immigration policy must be enforced because of different cultural values present worldwide.
“You can’t allow people to come into your country who don’t carry the same morals and values that you do. That’s what’s happening. Minneapolis is protecting these thugs. It’s unbelievable. These people are demonic.”
“The values are not the same,” Brewer went on. “You cannot let people come into the United States who come from cultures like that, because they bring their culture with them.”
RELATED: ‘Weak, emasculated leader’: Ex-Vikings player blames Tim Walz for Minnesota killings
Photo Courtesy of the Committee on Arrangements for the 2020 Republican National Committee via Getty Images
Brewer also took shots at residents of Minneapolis, where he once played, saying, “There is something wrong in Minneapolis. We need a city-wide behavioral health assessment. People have completely lost reality.”
The Texas native said that he hopes President Trump will send the National Guard into the state, calling for curfews and “real consequences” for “attacking law enforcement.”
Brewer also commented on Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey (D), saying his governance has been “absolutely ridiculous.”
The football player received a key to the city from Frey back in 2018 but now says he wishes he could “lock” the mayor out.
“I wish I could lock the doors on that city and not let him back in if I had the power,” Brewer said. “He tap-dances for Somalis. He does anything to go against the culture of America and Christianity for them.”
RELATED: Former NFL player says bringing God into schools is the only way to solve racism, economic division
Photo by Al Messerschmidt/Getty Images
Brewer called Minnesota the “capital of chaos in America” in June 2025 and hammered Gov. Tim Walz (D) on Father’s Day.
“Tim Walz is the example of a weak, emasculated leader. That is not what God made fathers to be. It’s pathetic,” he claimed.
The defensive back also said at the time that Democrats had gone “so far left” that they attack anyone within their party who does not agree with their principles.
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
‘F**k off’ and ‘Get ICE the hell out of Minnesota’: Democrats rattle sabers after Bondi demands voter rolls
Attorney General Pam Bondi demanded that Minnesota leaders share detailed records on the state’s federally funded welfare programs, repeal its sanctuary policies, and grant access to voter rolls. The Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party responded with a sharp, dismissive rejection.
On Saturday, Bondi sent a letter to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (DFL) describing how the Trump administration’s efforts to enforce immigration laws have been hindered by local leaders. She noted that Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and agents are facing a 1,300% increase in violence, including a 3,200% increase in vehicular attacks.
‘Donald Trump and Pam Bondi are demanding access to Minnesotans’ voter rolls in exchange for relieving us from the federal siege we are under.’
“The lawlessness in the streets is matched by the unprecedented financial fraud occurring on your watch,” Bondi told Walz. “And the out of control fraud in your state also implicates election security.”
Bondi made three requests.
First she demanded that Walz provide the federal government with all of the state’s records on Medicaid and Food and Nutrition Service programs to allow for an investigation.
She pressed Walz to repeal Minnesota’s sanctuary policies, blaming them for an increase in crime and violence by preventing the state’s detention facilities from cooperating with ICE.
“I urge you to reach an agreement with ICE that allows them to remove illegal aliens in custody of Minnesota’s prisons and jails and avoids pushing these interactions into your streets,” Bondi wrote.
RELATED: Rioter bit off part of federal agent’s finger amid Minneapolis ‘rampant assault,’ DHS says
Photographer: Jack Califano/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Lastly she demanded that Walz allow the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division to access the state’s voter rolls to confirm they comply with federal law.
“Do not obstruct federal immigration enforcement; do not allow rioters to take over the streets and houses of worship; do not hinder federal officials from investigating financial fraud and violations of election laws,” Bondi stated. “Whether state and local politicians stand in the way or not, we will work every day to protect Americans and make Minnesota Safe Again. I request that you join us in that effort.”
The DFL Party issued a statement on Sunday responding to Bondi, accusing the attorney general and President Donald Trump of attempting to “extort our state voter rolls.”
“Donald Trump and Pam Bondi are demanding access to Minnesotans’ voter rolls in exchange for relieving us from the federal siege we are under,” DFL Party Chair Richard Carlbom said.
“Let us be direct: F**k off,” Carlbom remarked.
RELATED: Democrats threaten to shut down government over ICE funding: ‘We are not powerless’
Ken Martin. Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images
In a separate statement, the DFL Party accused Trump and Bondi of trying to “threaten and intimidate us with violence,” following a deadly shooting involving federal immigration agents and Illinois native Alex Pretti, 37.
The DFL Party shared a statement from Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin.
“Last night, following the heinous murder of U.S. citizen Alex Pretti at the hands of a federal immigration agent, Pam Bondi drafted and sent a threatening letter to Minnesota Governor Tim Walz attempting to extort the state into handing over its voter rolls as part of an ongoing campaign to undermine local elections and build a national database for Trump’s political revenge and retribution,” Martin stated.
He vowed that the DNC would “stand with local elected officials and fight like hell, including in the courts.”
“For Donald Trump, Pam Bondi, Kristi Noem, and Greg Bovino, we have one message for you: Get ICE the hell out of Minnesota. Now,” Martin concluded.
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
