A few important things have happened in Minneapolis recently.
Since the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has entered Minneapolis, Minn., they have managed to have a few viral moments. None of them make the agency look good.
Some of the more notable moments have been ICE agents detaining a five-year-old boy in a blue bunny hat with a Spiderman backpack and seven ICE agents disarming, tackling and shooting a nurse named Alex Pretti outside of a hospital.
You can watch the videos yourself. It would be impossible for anyone to justify what ICE has done. Yet the administration tries.
After the detainment of the preschooler, Vice President JD Vance flew out to Minneapolis for a press briefing. The language Vance used in the briefing was calculated and used with the intention of creating a separation between “us” and “them.”
He begins by describing the boy’s father as an “illegal alien.” Specifically, he said “His dad was an illegal alien, and when they went to arrest his illegal alien father, the father ran.”
In less than ten seconds, Vance calls the boy’s father an alien twice, establishing this inherent difference between what the administration sees as human and subhuman.
This was no mistake or classic case of repetition. This speech was written, proofread and read out to the nation by the vice president. It is clear that this is the type of language they want to see Americans using. It’s hard to tolerate ICE kidnapping and detaining two people, one of them a minor, who came from Ecuador, used a U.S. port of entry and had an open asylum case. It’s much easier when you see them as aliens.
A few seconds later, Vance throws up his hands and says, “The story is ICE detained a five-year-old. Well what were they supposed to do?” Not only does this minimize the severity of what ICE agents have done, it openly condones it.
A point to remember: ICE agents should not have arrested the boy and his father in the first place.
The conservative idea around immigration policy is if people use the proper protocols to come into the country, they can stay. These people did exactly that and still managed to be kidnapped and detained.
What were they supposed to do? They shouldn’t have detained them. That’s what they were supposed to do.
Later, when a video of seven ICE agents tackling and shooting Alex Pretti surfaced, the administration not only defended the agents, but did so aggressively. Their belief is that Pretti injected himself into the situation with a weapon.
There is no evidence that Pretti took out this weapon, which he legally had the right to own and carry. What there is evidence of, however, is the agents taking the gun from Pretti before killing him.
Carrying a gun does not give federal law enforcement the right to kill you, owning a weapon with a permit is your constitutional right. Protesting is also your constitutional right, both of which Pretti was doing at the time of his death.
ICE agents are violating the law in broad daylight. The administration is defending it. They are turning their back against the people they are sworn to protect. This is crucial to know and understand now, because the day is approaching when they won’t need excuses and they can kill or detain anyone without a reason. Anyone could be next.
