Change of tone. Faced with the avalanche of criticism received, the White House this Monday changed its strategy for the deployment of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Service (ICE) in the State of Minnesota after the 37-year-old nurse who received a volley of bullets from a group of immigration agents in Minneapolis when he helped a woman during a protest. The president of the United States, Donald Trump, has announced the dispatch of his border czar, Tom Homan, a man whom he has defined as “tough, but fair” and who will now take charge of ICE operations on the ground. According to several national media, the man until now in charge of the deployment, the head of the Border Patrol, Gregory Bovino, will leave Minnesota this Tuesday along with part of his men, to return to their previous destinations.
Trump has also spoken by phone with the governor of the State, Tim Walz, while in an interview with The Wall Street Journal points out that “at some point we will withdraw” from the city that has become the nucleus of the demonstrations against the policies of the Republican Administration.
The ferocity of public outrage in an angry country appears to have caught the White House off guard. At the same time that usually pro-republican organizations, such as the National Rifle Association, joined the statements of condemnation, the US Government closed ranks around the immigration police and, as it did three weeks ago after the death of the , also due to the shooting of a federal agent. Democratic lawmakers were threatening to trigger a partial government shutdown to deny funding to ICE, and to open an impeachment trial against Homeland Security Secretary Kristy Noem. Meanwhile, Trump dedicated his weekend to participating in the viewing of a documentary about his wife, Melania, and posting messages on his social networks about the demolition of the East Room of the presidential residence.
A survey carried out by Ipsos for the Reuters agency and published this Monday finds that the popularity of Trump’s immigration policy is at the lowest levels of his mandate: only 39% of American voters approve of it, compared to 41% who agreed with these measures at the beginning of January. 53% disapprove of them. In February of last year, when Trump had just been sworn into office, 50% approved of this White House’s immigration policy, and 41% dissented.
In a message on his social media, Trump announced that he had spoken with Walz, and described their conversation with surprisingly warm words. “The governor called me to ask for collaboration about Minnesota. It was a very good call and, honestly, it seems that we are on the same wavelength,” the president noted. In the past, every time he has referred to Walz, the Democratic candidate for vice president in the 2024 elections, it has been to cover him with insults. Even on Saturday he accused him and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey of “inciting insurrection with their pompous, dangerous and arrogant rhetoric.”
Now the tone was very different. “I told him that Tom Homan will call him, and that what we want is any criminal they can get their hands on. The governor understood this very respectfully and I will speak with him again in the near future,” added the tenant of the White House. Hours later, a similar call took place with Frey.
Shortly before, and also on social networks, he announced the sending of Homan to Minnesota this Monday. Homan’s mission will be to take the reins of the operation, replacing the head of the Border Patrol, Gregory Bovino, who has become the visible face of all the excesses perpetrated in the deployment of the immigration police. The expectation is that the zar, a more political man than the director of the Border Patrol, focus less on large-scale raid operations and abandon confrontation with peaceful protesters and activists.
Bovino had already accumulated criticism after criticism for his management of the Minnesota deployment – where he has personally launched tear gas -, his eagerness to blame Renee Good for the incident in which an ICE agent fired three shots at her almost at point-blank range inside her vehicle and, even earlier, for his harsh tactics in other cities, such as Chicago, where the White House sent immigration police.
This weekend the senior official was quick to also blame Pretti for his death, characterizing him as a terrorist who had attempted to “inflict maximum damage and massacre” ICE agents with the weapon he was carrying. It is a version that contradicts all the recordings that have been released of the event, in which it can be seen that the emergency nurse is on his knees and unarmed when an agent fires the first of several shots at him.
Homan “has not been involved in that area, but knows and likes many people there. Tom is tough, but fair, and will report directly to me,” Trump wrote. He will focus on directing ICE operations in Minnesota and managing investigations into a massive fraud case that has led to “the theft of billions of taxpayer dollars,” according to White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt. These accusations of fraud were the original argument used by the US Government to order the deployment of thousands of ICE agents in Minneapolis, which have also been joined by Border Patrol officers, under the command of Bovino.
has stated that this is “good news for peace, security and accountability” in the city. “I have worked closely with Tom over the last year and he has been a fundamental asset to our team,” he said.
In her weekly press conference, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt assured that Trump does not want to see people injured or dead on the streets of the United States, and Pretti’s death at the hands of federal agents is a tragedy.
Leavitt’s appearance represented, in itself, a departure from the presidential office’s response after the first death in Minneapolis, that of Good. Then, Vice President JD Vance was the one who answered the questions at the press conference, to justify the agent who killed the activist.
But the spokesperson made it clear that the White House’s position, although it has softened in form for the moment, maintains its underlying hardness, and does not consider major changes. The Trump Administration will not relent in its efforts to deport “illegal criminal aliens,” he stressed.
There is also no question of authorizing an independent investigation into Pretti’s death, as it did not do in the Good case. The spokesperson has confirmed that the investigation into what happened will be led by the Department of Homeland Security, whose officials have attacked the nurse.
“Let us be clear about the circumstances that led to that moment on Saturday. The tragedy occurred as a result of deliberate and hostile resistance by Democratic leaders in Minnesota for weeks,” Leavitt insisted.
In the interview granted to The Wall Street Journal On Sunday, Trump noted: “I don’t like any type of shooting… but I also don’t like it when someone goes to a protest and carries a very powerful loaded gun and two loaded holsters. That’s not good either.”
But the president appeared, for the first time, open to the withdrawal of border agents from Minnesota, although without setting any deadlines. “At some point we will leave. We have done, have done, a phenomenal job.” Asked if the departure would happen soon, he responded by praising what has been achieved so far in the State and added: “We will leave a different group of people there for the issue of financial fraud.”
