At stake is the ability to govern without violent resistance. I’ve spent the past 48 hours doing mostly two things: shoveling far more snow than I’d planned to, and tracking the steady stream of new information coming out of Minneapolis. I remember the Black Lives Matter riots. There were moments when the unrest reached Washington, and images showed streets on fire and President Trump going into the White House bunker. It was an unnerving moment. I think it felt especially unnerving because what we want from the government is simple: peace and predictability, upheld through law and order — rules we agree to as a society, enforced consistently, until we decide together that it’s time to change them. What happened during the BLM summer of 2020 — and what’s happening now in Minnesota — is a violent insurgency against the democratically chosen direction this country has taken. It is violent, coordinated, and engineered to produce the outcomes we’re now seeing: deaths among “protesters,” the ensuing demonization of the Trump administration and its supporters, and — ultimately — a halt to the enforcement of federal law, particularly immigration law. As in 2020, much of the media now appears determined to side with a coordinated and well-funded insurgency. The average American — particularly those left of center — may find themselves sympathizing with these protesters, rioters, or insurgents, whatever term one prefers. This is not because they share the same end goals or vision of governance. These actors are committed progressives, often rooted in anarchic and Marxist ideology. The broader public supports them largely because the media obscures their tactics, their objectives, and their motives — details that, in my view, most Americans would find deeply troubling if fully understood. The last time the country reached a moment like this, in 2020, President Trump failed to restore order through law enforcement. The unrest eventually subsided not because it was resolved, but because the federal government effectively abdicated its responsibility to address it. And since the start of Trump’s second term, it is difficult to argue that he has fully reasserted control over these same elements. For that reason, how the administration chooses to proceed now will determine not only its ability to implement domestic policy over the next two years, but also how emboldened and confident these insurgent forces will feel in their campaign to violently disrupt policies and administrations that the majority of Americans vote for. The following piece is written to assemble all of the moving parts and events of the past week, and to be shared with those tuned into media sources who may not be fully seeing or hearing what is unfolding across the country. _THE WELL-COORDINATED INSURGENCY_ Over the weekend, an investigative reporter on the ground in Minneapolis infiltrated Signal group chats used by a large network of activists focused on tracking Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and obstructing its operations. One reason these groups have been so difficult to identify and disrupt is that they are highly organized. They operate like a military-style insurgency, using tools and methods designed to maintain a secure and tightly controlled structure. For example, each group is capped at 1,000 members, and there are many such groups, organized by region across the country. On a regular schedule, these chats are deleted and then recreated, with new passwords and links shared only through word of mouth. Within the groups, members are assigned specific roles. Some patrol areas where ICE is active. Others verify license plates reported by those patrols. Others are responsible for dispatching teams to interfere with ICE once agents are identified. There are mobile patrols, foot patrols, medics, and aftercare providers. The entire operation is planned and coordinated to a military level. All members operate anonymously, using code names. New members go through training. Maps of the region are shared, with each region broken into zones for easier coordination. There is always an active dispatch call where members can join and share on-the-ground information related to ICE operations. The mobile patrols go out on the road and tail targets — either reporters they believe are hostile to their intentions, or, for their stated purpose, to track ICE. (It is likely that Renee Good, who was killed after she hit an ICE officer with her vehicle, was part of these efforts.) These groups use specific methods to identify ICE units, track their size, monitor their activity, note their uniforms, and even locate where they may be staying. In the chats, they share license plates, and through what appears to be — shockingly — coordination with local police, they are able to track those plates and bring local police in to interfere with ICE. There are even members in the network with close ties to Minnesota Governor Tim Walz (D). After these groups were infiltrated and reported on, new chats were formed, as they are every day. As should be clear by now, these groups are extremely coordinated and highly sophisticated. Members on the ground sometimes appear in military-style gear with weapons, as in the case of Alex Pretti, which we will get to next. _THE ALEX PRETTI INCIDENT_ Over the weekend, ICE fatally shot Alex Jeffrey Pretti, 37, in Minneapolis while agents were carrying out deportation operations. Pretti was dressed in military-style clothing — a uniform, black hat, and glasses — and was filming agents at close range as they worked. At one point, an agent pushed a woman who was likely another “protester” agitating the operation. Pretti then stepped in to block the agents. He was pepper-sprayed, and a struggle with multiple ICE agents followed as they attempted to bring him to the ground. Throughout the encounter, Pretti was acting as an agitator and was armed with a concealed carry handgun. An ICE agent can be heard yelling that Pretti had a gun. Video analysis suggests he may have been disarmed, though a shot rang out, leading some to believe his gun may have accidentally discharged. Immediately after that shot, an ICE agent fired multiple rounds at Pretti. The entire incident unfolded in under 30 seconds. During the confrontation, outside agitators were blowing whistles, shouting at agents, and creating chaos that prevented ICE from operating in a normal environment. For the most part, the media has downplayed the fact that Pretti was armed throughout the encounter. It has also largely ignored reporting on the organized group chats Pretti was allegedly involved in — suggesting he was deliberately present, armed, and aiming to interfere with ICE agents who have repeatedly been targeted and violently attacked. A neighbor of Pretti’s claimed that he was, unsurprisingly, part of those group chats. After the death of Renee Good, the media — along with key politicians and former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama — released statements portraying Alex Pretti as the latest martyr: an American protesting an immoral deportation effort who was killed by a tyrannical administration for doing so. But we know that Pretti arrived at the scene as part of an organized effort to obstruct the federal government, that he was armed, and that he directly interfered with ICE agents as they carried out their work. From the agents’ perspective, once they saw the gun and heard a shot, it was entirely reasonable to believe they were facing another agitator who intended to kill or assassinate them. That is how the administration has described the incident, and it is difficult to imagine the agents interpreting the situation any other way....
