Alex Pretti (Aasma Shaukat/Veterans Affairs)
MINNEAPOLIS — Alex Pretti, the man fatally shot by Border Patrol on Saturday, was a passionate intensive care nurse who had recently become concerned about immigration enforcement efforts and begun attending protests, according to friends, family and co-workers.
“Alex was a kindhearted soul who cared deeply for his family and friends and also the American veterans whom he cared for as an ICU nurse at the Minneapolis VA hospital,” Pretti’s family said in a statement shared with The Washington Post. “Alex wanted to make a difference in this world.”
His friends and family said they were shocked by the fatal shooting. Pretti had previously been injured during interactions with federal immigration officials at a protest, two of his friends said. The Department of Homeland Security didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Pretti, 37, is the third person shot by federal immigration officials in recent weeks.
He was shot outside a popular doughnut shop about a mile-and-a-half from his home by U.S. Border Patrol, according to law enforcement officials. The shooting followed a scuffle between Pretti and Border Patrol agents. Pretti was in possession of a 9mm handgun, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
Authorities believe Pretti was “a lawful gun owner with a permit to carry,” Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara said during a news conference.
Video shows the fatal shooting of a man in Minneapolis on Jan. 24. Federal officials said the shooter was a U.S. Border Patrol agent. (Video: AP)
Trump officials, including Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem, called Pretti a “domestic terrorist.” Pretti “came with weapons and ammunition to stop a law enforcement operation of federal law enforcement officers,” Noem said.
In the statement, Pretti’s family called the administration’s description of the shooting “sickening lies” and “reprehensible and disgusting.” The family said Pretti was trying to protect a woman who had been pushed down by immigration agents.
“Alex is clearly not holding a gun when attacked by [President Donald] Trump’s murdering and cowardly ICE thugs,” the statement said. “Please get the truth out about our son. He was a good man.”
He was a U.S. citizen, and Minneapolis police said he didn’t have a criminal record.
The shooting sparked protests and clashes between demonstrators and authorities near the scene, which state investigators said they were barred from accessing Saturday by federal officials.
Protesters and federal agents clashed on the streets of Minneapolis on Jan. 24, after the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti sparked outrage. (Video: Naomi Schanen/The Washington Post)
Pretti had another physical encounter with immigration officers recently, according to a colleague, Joshua Green, who recalled him coming to work with a bandage on his eye. Pretti said he got a small cut after being struck by an immigration agent, Green recalled.
Pretti cared about human rights, Green said, and mentioned protesting in the wake of the shooting of Renée Good, who was shot by an ICE officer in Minneapolis earlier this month.
Green said Pretti was not easily provoked or angry. “He was a very calm, collected person and always had a good demeanor,” he said. “He always had a smile. This is quite the shock.”
Another colleague, Kaitlin McLean, said Pretti told her that he had recently been hurt during an altercation with federal immigration agents who he said had knelt on his back.
Lately, their talks during night-shift coffee breaks had changed course from poking fun at co-workers at the hospital who refused to drink coffee past midnight to discussing how to care for people now that federal agents had descended on their city. Over the past few weeks, McLean and Pretti had joined a growing group of health care workers who showed up to protests and offered help to those who were injured in clashes with authorities, she said.
The pair wondered, McLean said, how could they stay apolitical, as instructed by traditional medical teaching, while federal agents were detaining their neighbors and patients were skipping appointments, afraid to leave their homes for the hospital. It had started to feel impossible, she said.
“All of that is unjust, and all of that Alex hated,” McLean said. “And if you want to get to know Alex, get to know those stories and figure out why he was so upset by them.”
Pretti also participated in the wave of street protests following the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer in 2020, according to his ex-wife. “These kinds of things, you know, he felt the injustice to it,” said the ex-wife, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Family and friends said they were stunned by Pretti’s death and described him as a friendly and dedicated colleague who loved mountain biking. He was often seen with his Catahoula leopard named Joule.
Aasma Shaukat said she hired Pretti for a research position at the Minneapolis VA Health Care System about a decade ago. “Alex was the sweetest, kindest, gentlest soul you ever met,” said Shaukat, now a physician and clinical researcher at the Manhattan VA Medical Center.
“He was very bright-eyed, bushy-tailed. He wanted to get into the health care field, work with patients and be a nurse,” she recalled. “He did wonderful. Did his work really well, was a team player.”
After finishing nursing school, Pretti returned to the Minneapolis VA as an intensive care nurse, she said.
“He wanted to serve the veterans, just had a high sense of duty and thought they were a vulnerable group in the country who needed our help,” she said.
Dimitri Drekonja, an infectious diseases physician at the Minneapolis VA Health Care System, said he was impressed when Pretti secured a job in the ICU fresh out of nursing school. “It is a testament to his abilities that he felt ready for it, that he was up for that challenge and wanted to help,” said Drekonja, who worked with Pretti.
Pretti always greeted him by name, Drekonja recalled, and stood out from other nurses for his distinctive beard. They both loved mountain biking and often rode the same trails, he said.
They never spoke about immigration operations or politics at work, Drekonja said.
“He was really someone that helped,” Drekonja said. “It’s just impossible to imagine a negative interaction with him. And the fact that he was killed on city streets — as an employee of the U.S. government, by the U.S. government — it’s blowing my mind.”
Pretti was a member of a local nurses’ union, and its sister union, AFGE Council 238, issued a statement that called his shooting “appalling.”
“The murder of our union brother Alex Pretti is an unconscionable act of violence and a betrayal of the values federal workers are sworn to uphold,” AFGE Council 238 President Justin Chen said in a statement.
Pretti was excited about his future, said Shaukat. “Being an ICU nurse is tough — it’s pretty intense. But he was looking forward to getting a place, a car,” Shaukat said.
The shooting “feels so wrong,” she said. “Knowing Alex, he was probably trying to protect or help or shield somebody from the agents. He had not a single mean bone in his body; always spoke about doing the right thing.”
His father, Michael Pretti, told the Associated Press that he had warned his son to be careful. “We had this discussion with him two weeks ago or so, you know, that go ahead and protest, but do not engage, do not do anything stupid, basically,” Michael Pretti said. “And he said he knows that. He knew that.”
Pretti graduated from high school in Green Bay, Wisconsin, in 2006, and was listed on the honor roll in a local newspaper. He attended the University of Minnesota’s College of Liberal Arts and graduated in 2011, a university spokeswoman said.
Pretti lived in a quiet, tree-lined South Minneapolis neighborhood of single-family homes and small apartment buildings, where neighbors gather in the street on lawn chairs with food during the warmer months.
Jeanne Wiener was Pretti’s next-door neighbor. She said he moved into the condominium next to hers in the Lyndale neighborhood of Minneapolis five years ago. Wiener said they would have casual talks over their adjoining fence.
“I didn’t know what his politics were. I just know that he was a very friendly, very gentle person,” she said.
Pretti was dedicated to his dog, who recently died, she said. “He just drooled over that dog. That was one of the things that kind of drew me to talk to him, because he was always there with his dog and making sure he was all right, and all of that,” she said.
Chris Gray, 41, a special education math teacher, lives in an apartment building near Pretti’s. Gray — who has been patrolling the streets as one of many local volunteers monitoring the federal immigration crackdown — said that while he did not know Pretti well, the shooting felt personal.
“It feels like [these killings] are just what happens now,” Gray said. “That could have been me or anyone. I’ve rarely felt that way, until today.”
Hennessy-Fiske reported from Houston; Somasundaram and Gupta reported from Washington. Meryl Kornfield, Razzan Nakhlawi and Aaron Schaffer in Washington and Lori Rozsa in West Palm Beach, Florida, contributed to this report.
