gun

MINNEAPOLIS — Immigration officers with guns drawn arrested activists who were trailing their vehicles on Tuesday in Minneapolis, a sign that tensions have not eased since the departure last week of a high-profile commander.

At least one person who had an anti-ICE message on their clothing was handcuffed while face down on the ground. An Associated Press photographer witnessed the arrests.

Federal agents in the Twin Cities lately have been conducting more targeted immigration arrests at homes and neighborhoods, rather than staging in parking lots. The convoys have been harder to find and less aggressive. Alerts in activist group chats have been more about sightings than immigration-related detainments.

Several cars followed officers through south Minneapolis after there were reports of them knocking at homes. Officers stopped their vehicles and ordered activists out of a car at gunpoint. Agents told reporters at the scene to stay back and threatened to use pepper spray.

There was no immediate response to a request for comment from the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

A federal judge last month put limits on how officers treat motorists who are following them but not obstructing their operations. Safely following agents “at an appropriate distance does not, by itself, create reasonable suspicion to justify a vehicle stop,” the judge said. An appeals court, however, set the order aside.

Border Patrol commander Greg Bovino, who was leading an immigration crackdown in Minneapolis and other big U.S. cities, left town last week, shortly after the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti, the second local killing of a U.S. citizen in January.

Trump administration border czar Tom Homan was dispatched to Minnesota instead. He warned that protesters could face consequences if they interfere with officers.

Grand jury seeks communications, records

Meanwhile, Tuesday was the deadline for Minneapolis to produce information for a federal grand jury. It’s part of a U.S. Justice Department request for records of any effort to stifle the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. Officials have denounced it as a bullying tactic.

“We have done nothing wrong and have nothing to hide, but when the federal government weaponizes the criminal justice system against political opponents, it’s important to stand up and fight back,” said Ally Peters, spokesperson for Mayor Jacob Frey, a Democrat.

She said the city was complying, but she didn’t elaborate. Other state and local offices run by Democrats were given subpoenas, though it’s not known whether they had the same deadline. People familiar with the matter have told the AP that the subpoenas are related to an investigation into whether Minnesota officials obstructed enforcement through public statements.

No bond for man in Omar incident

Elsewhere, a man charged with squirting apple cider vinegar on Democratic U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar will remain in jail. U.S. Magistrate Judge David Schultz granted a federal prosecutor’s request to deny bond to Anthony Kazmierczak.

“We simply cannot have protesters and people — whatever side of the aisle they’re on — running up to representatives who are conducting official business, and holding town halls, and assaulting them,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Benjamin Bejar said Tuesday.

Defense attorney John Fossum said the vinegar posed a low risk to Omar. He said Kazmierczak’s health problems weren’t being properly addressed in jail and that his release would be appropriate.

Murphy, Raza and Karnowski write for the Associated Press. Raza reported from Sioux Falls, S.D. AP reporters Ed White in Detroit and Hannah Fingerhut in Des Moines, Iowa, contributed to this report.

For just $95, the acquisitive President Trump could have a replica of the iconic “The Buck Stops Here” sign that sat atop President Truman’s Oval Office desk, gift-boxed from the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library and Museum Store. But this gewgaw isn’t gold; it’s wood. And yet that’s not the reason it wouldn’t be at home on Trump’s desktop.

Here’s why: As far as Trump is concerned, the buck never stops with him.

That’s never been more evident than this month, in the president’s fly-above-it-all attitude toward his administration’s armed occupation of Minneapolis. Ostensibly a campaign against immigrants who lack legal status, the occupation has (at this writing) killed two U.S. citizens exercising their 1st Amendment rights to protest the anti-constitutional brutality of federal agents.

Trump couldn’t even be bothered to postpone his black-tie White House screening of Amazon’s $75-million gift documentary of his wife, “Melania,” on Saturday, just hours after 37-year-old VA nurse Alex Pretti died and as Minneapolis seethed. When the president did interject, he mostly just escalated tensions. Again.

After the earlier killing of Renee Good, Trump posted to Minnesotans: “The day of reckoning and retribution is coming!” and deployed an additional 1,000 armed, masked agents for a total of 3,000. Further mayhem was widely predicted. And on Saturday, after at least two of those agents pumped 10 shots point-blank at Pretti while he was pinned down, Trump’s first reaction was this escalatory, blame-the-victim post over a photo: “This is the gunman’s gun, loaded (with two additional full magazines!), and ready to go.”

Got that? According to the president, Pretti was the gunman in what I and many other Americans saw as his murder by Trump’s militia. The buck, and the bullets, stopped with Pretti.

Trump continued to blame the victim for days, including on Tuesday in Iowa, by repeatedly contending (over the angry opposition of his pals in the gun lobby) that Pretti “shouldn’t have been carrying a gun.” It was a holstered handgun that Pretti legally owned and carried, which he never “brandished” as the feds claimed and which was taken from him before he was shot.

Not once in the year since he loosed this militant deportation campaign in U.S. cities has Trump openly questioned the lawless tactics. Since Pretti’s killing, the president hasn’t publicly upbraided his Department of Homeland Security or his most senior advisors — Stephen Miller, the White House architect of Trump’s anti-immigrant policies; Kristi Noem, his puppy-killing Homeland Security secretary; and Gregory Bovino, his cruelly performative (former) Border Patrol commander in Minneapolis (after Los Angeles, Chicago and New Orleans) — for their immediate and repeated slanders of Pretti as a “domestic terrorist” and “an assassin” who aimed to “massacre law enforcement.”

Those were all lies, as the world soon saw thanks to the courageous protesters on the scene documenting the agents’ lawlessness with cellphone cameras. And now, even some (few) Republicans in Congress are assailing Noem, Miller and Bovino, calling for their resignation, firing or, in Noem’s case, impeachment.

Enough, however, with the focus on Noem, Miller, Bovino or others of Trump’s “best.” It’s good that Republicans are finally rousing to object to administration actions. But they should quit cloaking their complaints in language that absolves the boss. These Republicans would have us believe that Trump is faultless, ill-served and misled by his advisors.

Among the foremost modelers of this behavior is Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who grew a bit of spine in the summer after he announced that he wouldn’t seek reelection. Yet he still blames everyone around Trump, not Trump himself.

What Noem has done in Minnesota “should be disqualifying,” Tillis told reporters Tuesday. “It’s making the president look bad.” Later, he ranted about both Noem and Miller, lamenting that immigration used to be Trump’s and Republicans’ best issue until that duo “destroyed it through their incompetence.” Last week, he blamed Miller for “getting the president in a difficult circumstance” over Greenland, as if it wasn’t Trump himself who insanely demanded that Denmark and NATO allies hand over the island protectorate to the United States — because it’s “psychologically important for me.”

This is Trump’s paramilitary force at Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol. These advisors are his hires at the White House and in the Cabinet. And these are his policies.

The president is consistently the arsonist who attempts to take credit for putting out his own fires (like last week’s conflagration at Davos over Greenland) when they get out of control. Which is to say, when poll after poll confirms both the policies’ and Trump’s growing unpopularity.

Forget that he won’t accept the buck: It still should stop with him.

As Noem insisted in a statement to Axios on Tuesday: “Everything I’ve done, I’ve done at the direction of the president and Stephen [Miller].”

She and Bovino, heretofore so fond of cosplaying in getups that scream “I’m tough,” are now wearing tire tracks. With Trump’s dispatch of border advisor Tom Homan to Minneapolis, they’ve essentially been designated as scapegoats for the tragedies in Minnesota. But not Miller: “The president loves Stephen,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told Axios.

Of course he does. Miller is Trump’s Mini-Me. Which brings us back to: Blame Trump.

The imperative to hold Trump accountable is why I’m cool to calls to impeach Noem. Democrats seeking her removal include House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and they’re joined by a few Republicans. It feels good to say it, and such calls are fine as a message of disgust, especially in a midterm election year. But Congress is Republican-controlled, remember, which is to say Trump-controlled.

For the same reason, Trump himself is insured — for now — against impeachment. But as he’s acknowledged, if Democrats take control after November, that would probably change. Forget that the Senate probably wouldn’t convict him, just as it declined to do twice after his impeachments in his first term. But at least, come 2027, he could be forced to take the buck.

Bluesky: @jackiecalmes
Threads: @jkcalmes
X: @jackiekcalmes

Ray J says his days are numbered — and the number he’s citing is 2027.

“Just almost died!! I’m alive because of your prayers and support!!” the singer wrote in an Instagram caption posted Sunday.

“I wanna thank everyone for praying for me. I was in the hospital,” he said in the accompanying video. “My heart is only beating like 25%, but as long as I stay focused and stay on the right path, then everything will be all right, so thank you for all your prayers.”

It was a different story in another livestream, however, captured in clips on the @Livebitez Instagram page.

“2027 is definitely a wrap for me,” the 45-year-old, real name William Ray Norwood Jr., said in one video posted Tuesday, making a “cut off” motion across his neck.

“No, don’t say that, brother,” a friend says off camera.

“That’s what the doctor says,” Ray J replied meekly, then seemingly grew frustrated as his friend talked loudly over him and insisted he was going to live long enough to see his children’s children.

In the next clip, the singer says, “It don’t matter if my days are counted. But guess what — my baby mama gonna be straight. My kids are gonna be straight. If they want to spend all the money they can spend it, but I did my part here.”

Then he looks up and tells his friend, “I shouldn’t have went this hard, bro. I shouldn’t have went hard. And then, when it’s all done, burn me, don’t bury me.”

In clips assembled on the next Livebitez post, Ray J admits heavy alcohol and drug use and says that messed up his heart “on the right side, here, it’s like, black. It’s like done.” He said he might go to Haiti to “do some voodoo” because he thinks “they got the cure.”

He also said he thought he was “bigger” and “had more weight” to put up against the onslaught of substances. “I thought I could handle all the alcohol, I could handle all the Adderall.”

Cut to the next clip where he says he thought he “could handle all the drugs, but I couldn’t. … And it curbed my time here.”

In a final collection of clips, Ray J mentions the criminal protective order put in place by the court after a run-in with the law in November. .

Ray J was arrested in Los Angeles on suspicion of making criminal threats, an LAPD spokesman told The Times in late November. The singer allegedly pointed a gun at ex-wife Princess Love during a heated argument that happened during a livestream at Thanksgiving.

Because of the protective order related to that incident, he isn’t allowed to see her or their kids, Melody, 7, and Epik, who turned 6 last month. He said in court documents reviewed by Page Six that he pointed the gun at her to keep her from driving the kids away from his house after a drunken family holiday.

In the final batch of clips, he says his parents were picking him up “tomorrow” for a doctor appointment. He mentions that sister Brandy had paid his bills “for the rest of the year. That’s crazy.”

Despite the singer-actor picking up his tab, Ray J says his kids have “at least $10 million” in their trust fund account.

The R&B singer was hospitalized in early January in Las Vegas, sidelined by heart pain and pneumonia, according to TMZ. Four years ago, he battled pneumonia as well.

Hollywood heavyweights are joining a mounting wave of resistance against Immigration and Customs Enforcement after federal agents on Saturday fatally shot intensive care nurse and U.S. citizen Alex Pretti.

The shooting occurred in Minneapolis, where protests erupted over the weekend after an ICE agent earlier this month shot and killed another Minnesota resident, Renee Nicole Good, 37, during an enforcement operation. Similar demonstrations started cropping up in weeks prior as the Department of Homeland Security launched a sweeping immigration crackdown in the Twin Cities.

Although government officials have claimed that Good and Pretti were both aggressors in their altercations, footage captured by bystanders appeared to contradict those claims.

Olivia Rodrigo, Pedro Pascal and other film, television and music industry notables condemned ICE on social media in the wake of its operations in Minnesota and across the country. (Likewise, attendees at the Sundance Film Festival, including Edward Norton and Olivia Wilde, criticized ICE’s actions and lauded the public for protesting them.)

Here is a list of celebrities who have spoken out.

Olivia Rodrigo

The pop rock singer slammed ICE in an Instagram story on Sunday, writing that the agency’s “actions are unconscionable, but we are not powerless.”

“Our actions matter,” Rodrigo continued. “I stand with Minnesota.”

The “Vampire” songstress also reposted a call to action by political commentator and digital creator Ben Sheehan, which called ICE a “murderous federal agency terrorizing an American city.”

“If you support this, you’re on the wrongest side of history you could possibly be on,” Sheehan wrote, urging social media users to call their senators and encourage them to filibuster an upcoming Homeland Security appropriations bill that would keep ICE funded at $10 billion for the rest of the fiscal year.

Pedro Pascal

“The Last of Us” star has shared several anti-ICE posts to his Instagram feed and stories. Earlier this month, Pascal described immigration enforcement activities as “unspeakable s— after unspeakable s—.”

Following Pretti’s shooting death, the actor wrote on Instagram, “Truth is a line of demarcation between a democratic government and authoritarian regime. Mr. Pretti and Rene Good are dead. The American people deserve to know what happened.”

Jamie Lee Curtis

The Academy Award winner has repeatedly condemned ICE’s actions in Minnesota, writing Saturday on Instagram, “Let the ICE storm of resistance ring loudly.”

Curtis also shared a statement from Pretti’s parents, which pleaded with readers to “get the truth out about our son.”

“The sickening lies told about our son by the administration are reprehensible and disgusting,” the statement said.

“Alex wanted to make a difference in this world. Unfortunately he will not be with us to see his impact.”

Katy Perry

The pop singer in a Monday Instagram post encouraged her followers to “turn anger into action” by calling their senators.

“The power is in your hands,” the post read, followed by a script encouraging senators to block the DHS funding bill.

Billie Eilish

The “Birds of a Feather” singer this week called out her industry peers’ silence on the immigration crackdown. Eilish herself has regularly reposted anti-ICE statements on her Instagram story.

“Hey my fellow celebrities u gonna speak up?” she wrote in an Instagram story Monday.

Eilish also shared a video from her brother and frequent collaborator, Finneas, in which he called the government hypocritical for allegedly shooting Pretti because he had a gun despite yearslong defense of gun owners’ rights.

“You’ve spent 30 years straight telling us that children have to die so that we’re allowed to legally carry weapons everywhere in the United States,” the artist-producer said. “This guy was being beaten to a pulp on the ground, he didn’t draw his weapon. He had a weapon on him legally.”

Eilish also spoke out against immigration enforcement earlier this month while receiving the 2026 MLK Jr. Beloved Community Environmental Justice Award.

“We’re seeing our neighbors being kidnapped, peaceful protesters being assaulted and murdered, our civil rights being stripped, resources to fight the climate crisis being cut for fossil fuels and animal agriculture destroying our planet, and people’s access to food and health care becoming a privilege for the wealthy instead of a new basic human right for all Americans,” the singer said.

“It is very clear that protecting our planet and our communities is not a priority for this administration,” she continued. “And it’s really hard to celebrate that when we no longer feel safe in our own homes or in our streets.”

Florence Pugh

The “Thunderbolts” star in a Monday Instagram story reshared a post from NBC News listing the people who have been fatally shot by DHS since September.

“1 person being murdered is harrowing enough. 12? Killed by masked people with guns,” Pugh wrote. “Morals. Even that seems too light a word to use when it’s actually ‘are you okay with people being killed or not’?”

“No matter which way you voted, what you politically believe, is death truly the option that you support?” she wrote.

Mark Ruffalo

In a pair of Bluesky posts, Ruffalo called Pretti a “hero.”

“Cold blooded murder in the streets of the USA by an occupying military gang, creating havoc,” the actor-activist wrote. “We have fought wars in other countries for less than this.”

Lin-Manuel Miranda

The “Hamilton” creator on Sunday collaborated with his parents, Luz Towns-Miranda and Luis A. Miranda Jr., on an Instagram post translating Pretti’s parents’ statement into Spanish.

“This cowardly violence cannot remain silent. We share his parents’ words en español because they deserve to be understood by everyone. Alex was a hero. And we demand justice,” the caption reads.

Glenn Close

The veteran actor in a Sunday Instagram post said she is “outraged and sickened” by the Trump administration’s actions: “The sickening hypocrisy, the blatant manipulation of facts and now the cold-blooded murder of American citizens.”

“I have felt for a long time that there are thousands and thousands of American citizens with cellars full of guns,” Close said. “I fear that ICE is giving them the excuse to pull the trigger.”

The “Fatal Attraction” star said the country is “waking up” to the threats posed to American democracy: “Mark my words: there will be hell to pay.”

Kerry Washington

The “Scandal” alum in a Monday Instagram post encouraged viewers to call their senators as she modeled the behavior on camera.

“The time to take action is now,” Washington captioned her video. “Let’s do it together. Because if you think what’s happening in Minneapolis cannot happen in your city or your state, it can.”

Cynthia Nixon

The “Sex and the City” star on Saturday claimed that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was spreading “morally reprehensible and disgusting lies” about Pretti and his killing.

Nixon also shared the statement from Pretti’s parents and encouraged viewers to do the same.

Busy Philipps

Philipps in a Saturday Instagram post reshared statements demanding justice for Pretti as well as the defunding of ICE.

“They will just keep murdering people and lying as long as they can,” the “Girls5eva” actor said, encouraging her followers to “take to the streets” and “boycott the businesses and people that support this.”

Martha Stewart

The television personality shared Monday on Instagram that her 14-year-old granddaughter — who is “sensitive to what is going on in our country as we all should be” — over the weekend messaged her, “I’m not sure it’s excusable to not be speaking up right now.”

Stewart said she took the sentiment to heart, writing, “I am disheartened and sad each and every day that we cannot demonstrate our sympathy for the beleaguered, that we are told immigrants, which most of us are or descended from, are unwelcome, that we cannot show our frustration in peaceful demonstrations and that we can be attacked and even killed by federal troops.”

“Things must and have to change quickly and peacefully,” she wrote.

Hannah Einbinder

The “Hacks” star in a Tuesday Instagram story said, “I’ve been trying to put my finger on why I have such a deep seated resentment towards people who haven’t used their platform to speak up against ICE.”

“I think it’s because, as a Jewish American in the diaspora, my entire life has been in the shadow of the Holocaust. I was given an in-depth education of exactly how a thing like that happens,” Einbinder wrote.

“I am watching the beginning of what took place in Germany before the Holocaust here in America and I take it incredibly personally when I see people with massive platforms refrain from using their voice to organize and rally their followers to try and stop it,” she continued, encouraging her industry peers and followers alike to stand up for immigrants.

The Chicks

“It’s happening right in front of us. They are killing Americans, disappearing human beings, and breaking up families,” country band the Chicks captioned a photo of a protest sign referencing their song “Not Ready to Make Nice.” (The group penned the ballad after lead singer Natalie Maines was widely slammed for criticizing then-President George W. Bush during a concert.)

“We cannot stand by and watch democracy disintegrate,” the band wrote. “Human decency isn’t Republican or Democrat. It’s American.”

Jonathan Van Ness

The “Queer Eye” star in a Saturday post on Threads wrote, “They charged tax payers $85 BILLION for ice to terrorize America. Tear gassing, beating, detaining innocent protestors / people, and they just killed another human being.”

Kristen Schaal

In an X post thanking fans for birthday well wishes, the comedian and “Bob’s Burgers” voice actor wrote, “I will remember this birthday as the day that Alex Pretti was held down on the street by 6 ICE agents and murdered. Shot to death. After he was sprayed in the face.”

Schaal continued: “I will remember @realDonaldTrump & everyone who works for & worships him saying this didn’t happen.”

Matt Rogers

The “Las Culturistas” co-host in a Monday Instagram story called for the abolishment of ICE: “This is too much collective pain for us to handle. It must stop.”

“Stop the terror and violence now,” Rogers wrote.

Kate Berlant

Berlant, who has previously spoken against ICE action in her native L.A., in a Tuesday Instagram story encouraged her followers to boycott the federal agency’s corporate collaborators, including Amazon, Whole Foods and Palantir.

Walton Goggins

“The White Lotus” star shared several anti-ICE posts over the weekend, writing in one Instagram story, “Alex Pretti was murdered. Renee Good was MURDERED. This isn’t about what political party any of us are affiliated with. This is about Humanity… this is … wrong.”

Mandy Moore

The “This Is Us” actor reshared media coverage of the events in Minnesota, writing, “We have eyeballs. We’ve seen the video. They executed someone else. I’m not sure how this ends. This is terrifying territory.”

Others including Ariana Grande, Jennifer Aniston, Amanda Seyfried, Hilary Swank and Justin Theroux have reshared anti-ICE content and resources for protesters on social media.

Prominent Republicans and gun rights advocates helped elicit a White House turnabout this week after bristling over the administration’s characterization of Alex Pretti, the second person killed this month by a federal officer in Minneapolis, as being responsible for his own death because he lawfully possessed a weapon.

The death produced no clear shifts in U.S. gun politics or policies, even as President Trump shuffles the lieutenants in charge of his militarized immigration crackdown. But important voices in Trump’s coalition have called for a thorough investigation of Pretti’s death while also criticizing inconsistencies in some Republicans’ 2nd Amendment stances.

If the dynamic persists, it could give Republicans problems as Trump heads into a midterm election year with voters already growing skeptical of his overall immigration approach. The concern is acute enough that Trump’s top spokeswoman sought Monday to reassert his brand as a staunch gun rights supporter.

“The president supports the 2nd Amendment rights of law-abiding American citizens, absolutely,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters.

Leavitt qualified that “when you are bearing arms and confronted by law enforcement, you are raising … the risk of force being used against you.”

Videos contradict early statements from administration

That still marked a retreat from the administration’s previous messages about the shooting of Pretti. It came the same day the president dispatched border advisor Tom Homan to Minnesota, seemingly elevating him over Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Border Patrol chief Greg Bovino, who had been in charge in Minneapolis.

Within hours of Pretti’s death on Saturday, Bovino suggested Pretti “wanted to … massacre law enforcement,” and Noem said Pretti was “brandishing” a weapon and acted “violently” toward officers.

“I don’t know of any peaceful protester that shows up with a gun and ammunition rather than a sign,” Noem said.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, an architect of Trump’s mass deportation effort, went further on X, declaring Pretti “an assassin.”

Bystander videos contradicted each claim, instead showing Pretti holding a cellphone and helping a woman who had been pepper-sprayed by a federal officer. Within seconds, Pretti was sprayed too and taken to the ground by multiple officers. No video disclosed thus far has shown him unholstering his concealed weapon, which he had a Minnesota permit to carry. It appeared that one officer took Pretti’s gun and walked away with it just before shots began.

As multiple videos went viral online and on television, Vice President JD Vance reposted Miller’s assessment, while Trump shared an alleged photo of “the gunman’s gun, loaded (with two additional full magazines!).”

On Tuesday, Trump was asked whether he agreed with Miller’s comment describing Pretti as an “assassin” and answered “no.” But he added that protesters “can’t have guns” and said he wants the death investigated.

“You can’t walk in with guns, you just can’t,” Trump told reporters on the White House lawn before departing for a trip to Iowa.

Swift reactions from gun rights advocates

The National Rifle Assn., which has backed Trump three times, released a statement that began by casting blame on Minnesota Democrats it accused of stoking protests. But the group lashed out after a federal prosecutor in California said on X, “If you approach law enforcement with a gun, there is a high likelihood they will be legally justified in shooting you.”

That analysis, the NRA said, is “dangerous and wrong.”

FBI Director Kash Patel magnified the blowback Sunday on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures With Maria Bartiromo.” No one, Patel said, can “bring a firearm, loaded, with multiple magazines to any sort of protest that you want. It’s that simple.”

Erich Pratt, vice president of Gun Owners of America, was incredulous.

“I have attended protest rallies while armed, and no one got injured,” he said on CNN.

Conservative officials around the country made the same connection between the 1st and 2nd amendments.

“Showing up at a protest is very American. Showing up with a weapon is very American,” state Rep. Jeremy Faison, who leads the GOP caucus in Tennessee, said on X.

Trump’s first-term vice president, Mike Pence, called for a “full and transparent investigation of this officer involved shooting.”

A different response from the past

Liberals, conservatives and nonpartisan experts noted how the administration’s response differed from past conservative positions involving protests and weapons.

Multiple Trump supporters were found to have weapons during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Trump issued blanket pardons to all of them.

Republicans were critical in 2020 when Mark and Patricia McCloskey had to pay fines after pointing guns at protesters who marched through their St. Louis neighborhood after the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. And then there’s Kyle Rittenhouse, a counterprotester acquitted after fatally shooting two men and injuring a third in Kenosha, Wis., during the post-Floyd protests.

“You remember Kyle Rittenhouse and how he was made a hero on the right,” Trey Gowdy, a Republican former congressman and attorney for Trump during one of his first-term impeachments. “Alex Pretti’s firearm was being lawfully carried. … He never brandished it.”

Adam Winkler, a UCLA law professor who has studied the history of the gun debate, said the fallout “shows how tribal we’ve become.” Republicans spent years talking about the 2nd Amendment as a means to fight government tyranny, he said.

“The moment someone who’s thought to be from the left, they abandon that principled stance,” Winkler said.

Meanwhile, Democrats who have criticized open and concealed carry laws for years, Winkler added, are not amplifying that position after Pretti’s death.

Uncertain effects in an election year

The blowback against the administration from core Trump supporters comes as Republicans are trying to protect their threadbare majority in the U.S. House and face several competitive Senate races.

Perhaps reflecting the stakes, GOP staff and campaign aides were hesitant Monday to talk about the issue at all.

The House Republican campaign chairman, Rep. Richard Hudson of North Carolina, is sponsoring the GOP’s most significant gun legislation of this congressional term, a proposal to make state concealed-carry permits reciprocal across all states.

The bill cleared the House Judiciary Committee in the fall. Asked Monday whether Pretti’s death and the Minneapolis protests might affect debate, an aide to Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) did not offer any update on the bill’s prospects.

Gun rights advocates have notched many legislative victories in Republican-controlled statehouses in recent decades, including rolling back gun-free zones around schools and churches and expanding gun possession rights in schools, on university campuses and in other public spaces.

William Sack, legal director of the Second Amendment Foundation, said he was surprised and disappointed by the administration’s initial statements after the Pretti shooting. Trump’s vacillating, he said, is “very likely to cost them dearly with the core of a constituency they count on.”

Barrow and Riccardi write for the Associated Press. AP writers Josh Boak in Washington and Kimberlee Kruesi in Providence, R.I., contributed to this report.