Civil Discourse â Alex Pretti â Joyce Vance
Civil Discourse with Joyce Vance
Alex Pretti
Add his name to Renee Goodâs.
By Joyce Vance, Jan 26, 2026
After a long, difficult weekend, following the murder of Alex Pretti on Saturday in Minneapolis, which followed the murder of Renee Good earlier in the month, there is more evidence that when we protest against this administration and stay the course, we prevail. We cannot give up, and Americans donât look like they intend to. Instead, with a lot of grit, they are staying the course.
There is more I want to write about the death of Alex Pretti once I finish processing everything that happened this weekend. I think weâre all still processing, but also, itâs a moment that demands action, so we have to be able to do both of those things at once. We saw the shameless, untrue, demeaning propaganda DHS spouted about Pretti. There is the failure to acknowledge a tragic mistake, to show empathy for his family, to take steps to take the temperature downâall things this administration must be held accountable for at the highest levels. But today, I want to write about the little bit of light shining through the dark.
Trump is backing down.
His Attorney General Pam Bondiâs offensive offerâgive us your voter files, she said to Minnesota, and ICE will leaveâwas called into question by Judges in Oregon and Minnesota. It was clear the judges had questions, but they werenât alone.
In the wake of the administrationâs lies about Pretti, protests erupted across the country. Americans called for an unbiased investigation after reporting emerged that ICE refused to let state and local investigators onto the scene at first, and then abandoned it without securing it, which compromised other agenciesâ ability to gather evidence. With protests ongoing across the country, the administration is slowly backing away.
On the Sunday shows, in addition to Democrats, Oklahomaâs Republican Kevin Stitt said Trump needed to answer questions about pulling ICE out of Minnesota and opined âHeâs getting bad advice right now.â On Monday, Texas Governor Greg Abbot said on a local radio show that âThey, being the White House, need to recalibrate on what needs to be done to make sure that respect is going to be reinstilled,â and that they had a plan to do that. Congressional Republicans, including Representative Michael McCaul of Texas and Senators Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, called, in varying degrees, for more investigation. Thatâs about as much backbone as weâve seen from Republicans in the past year.
It was clear to Republicans that Americans had no intention of letting this go.
Tonight, it appears that the days of Gregory Bovino strutting around Minneapolis streets in his greatcoat may be over. The Atlantic reported earlier tonight, âGreg Bovino Loses His Job.â They wrote that he had âbeen removed from his role as Border Patrol âcommander at largeâ and will return to his former job in El Centro, California, where he is expected to retire soon, according to a DHS official and two people with knowledge of the change.â
DHS is denying that the report is true.
But as Adam Klasfeld of All Rise News posted, âNothing in this carefully worded statement by DHS denies the crux of the reporting that Bovino was demoted to his previous job, lost social media access, will leave Minnesota and may retire soon.â
Of course, removing Bovino alone is not the answer, but itâs a start. And we the people did that. We cannot let up, we have to keep going. As I wrote to you last week on Martin Luther King Day, peaceful protest is the answer. âBull Connorâs ghost is walking the streets of America in the guise of Donald Trump and others around him, Kristi Noem and Thomas Homan, people who reject country and Constitution. People who have no appreciation for our system of government or our rule of law, but who think only of themselves. We donât talk enough about how not-normal this is. We all know it, itâs become an accepted truth. Letâs honor the legacy of peaceful protest by speaking that truth to power. Because we love our country. And we intend to take it back in this election year.â
This week, Americans did just that: we spoke truth to power.
In the immediate wake of Prettiâs death, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem and others, including the President, tried to demean his character and call him a terrorist. But it quickly became apparent that Pretti was holding a phone, not a gun, and was trying to save another protestor, a woman, who was being attacked by an agent. He wasnât there to massacre law enforcement. He was a VA ICU nurse. He was there to help. As Connecticut Senator Chris Murphy tweeted, âIt should freak the American people out that Trump, Noem and Bovino lie so enthusiastically. He wasnât âbrandishing a weaponâ. He wasnât attending a âriotâ or âinterfering in a crime sceneâ. He was an ICU nurse exercising his constitutional rights.â
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