Thursday | 29 January 2026
What happens now in Minnesota hinges on a familiar Trump-era question: Is the president confronting a genuine policy failure, or merely a messaging problem? At issue is whether Donald Trump views the crisis sparked by federal immigration enforcement in Minneapolis as a moment requiring substantive change, or whether he believes a modest tonal shift can blunt public outrage while leaving the machinery of deportation intact. The answer matters not just for Minnesota, but for how far this White House is willing to push one of the most controversial pillars of its political identity.
Trump on Wednesday was, in a narrow sense, as good as his word. He did move to de-escalate “a little bit” after the shooting of ICU nurse Alex Pretti by federal agents last weekend propelled Minneapolis — and the broader national conversation — toward a dangerous inflection point. The withdrawal of Border Patrol chief Greg Bovino and the decision to send border czar Tom Homan to manage the crisis signaled recognition inside the administration that the situation was spinning out of control.
But it was only a little bit. The underlying fault lines between an administration executing an aggressive, high-visibility deportation campaign and a Democratic state and city fundamentally opposed to its methods — and, in many cases, its ultimate objective — remain as wide as ever. The confrontation has merely shifted from open escalation to an uneasy standoff.
And Trump has already returned to a familiar habit: lashing out at local leaders who refuse to bend. His renewed attacks on Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey suggest that whatever tactical restraint followed Pretti’s killing may be fleeting.
Any de-escalation is likely to be temporary unless one of two politically costly things happens: Trump accepts a significant retreat from deportation practices that animate his base, or Democrats acquiesce to at least some level of federal enforcement activity they view as morally and constitutionally indefensible. Neither outcome appears imminent.
“I don’t want them spending a single second hunting down a father who just dropped his kids off at daycare, who’s about to go work a 12-hour shift, who happens to be from Ecuador,” Frey said at a CNN town hall on Wednesday. “That guy. He makes our city a better place. We’re proud to have him in Minneapolis.”
That sentiment captures why Minnesotans mourning two of their own citizens gunned down by federal agents are unlikely to accept a cosmetic agreement — a rhetorical cooling-off that leaves the same operations running under a different name. For many residents, this is no longer an abstract policy debate but a question of safety, accountability, and the limits of federal power.
Yet deportation sweeps are not a peripheral tactic for Trump; they are endemic to MAGA philosophy, central to his appeal, and bound up in his self-image as a strongman willing to use the full force of the state. The spectacle of enforcement is part of the point.
Political tensions remained acute on Wednesday amid fresh reverberations over Pretti’s killing, which came less than three weeks after Renee Good was shot dead. Some reports suggested that federal enforcement operations continued but were more targeted than in previous weeks — a subtle shift that may reflect internal recalibration without amounting to a strategic reversal.
Several developments underscored the fragility of the moment:
► Tom Homan, dispatched by Trump to oversee Operation Metro Surge — which sent 3,000 federal agents into Minnesota — held talks with local officials that a source described as “precarious” to CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez and Kristen Holmes.
► After a brief lull, Trump reignited tensions by warning Frey he was “playing with fire” if Minneapolis fails to enforce federal immigration law. Frey has refused to allow city cooperation with federal deportation efforts.
► The Department of Homeland Security said officers involved in Pretti’s shooting were placed on administrative leave, per standard procedure. But there has been no clarity about independent investigations or meaningful accountability — a vacuum that fuels mistrust among Minnesotans already skeptical of DHS oversight.
► New video surfaced showing Pretti in a physical confrontation with Customs and Border Protection agents more than a week before his death, complicating official narratives while raising further questions about escalation and use of force.
► Senate Democrats laid out demands to curb federal enforcement practices as they attempt to use their limited leverage in budget negotiations. Without an agreement by Friday, the government faces a partial shutdown.
► Republican discomfort with Pretti’s killing — and with the political toxicity of Trump’s hard-line approach — left GOP senators once again attempting to thread the needle. Senate Majority Leader John Thune broke with the administration by calling for an independent investigation. While many Republicans appeared uneasy with Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who maligned Pretti after his death, few were willing to openly defy Trump by calling for her removal. Democrats, meanwhile, have pledged to pursue impeachment if she is not fired.
► The volatility of the political climate was underscored when a man sprayed a foul-smelling substance, believed to be apple cider vinegar, on Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar Tuesday night. Trump’s flippant reaction further dimmed hopes that he would use the moment to call for restraint.
The gaping divide over immigration
The killing of Pretti forced Trump’s hand. National outrage compelled the White House to pull Bovino from Minnesota and temporarily sideline Noem, replacing her public presence with Homan’s reputation for discipline and negotiation. Senior officials briefly softened their rhetoric. But these moves addressed symptoms, not causes.
At the heart of the Minneapolis crisis is a fundamental political divide. The administration believes that highly visible, aggressive tactics — even when they verge on the draconian — can deter migration by encouraging self-deportation and discouraging future arrivals. Democratic jurisdictions see those same tactics as unconstitutional, destabilizing, and inhumane.
The White House accuses Minnesota and Minneapolis of refusing to cooperate with federal law enforcement and of actively undermining operations through political rhetoric that encourages protests. From Trump’s perspective, backing down would validate what he casts as “sanctuary” defiance — something his base demands he crush, not accommodate.
This posture is a cornerstone of Trump’s domestic agenda, even if it polls poorly outside his core supporters. That reality makes compromise extraordinarily difficult.
“Trump ran and won on fixing this,” Missouri Sen. Eric Schmitt said Wednesday. “It wasn’t some minor footnote in his platform. It was one of the fundamental, defining policies of his 2024 campaign.”
Other Republicans see a narrow window to enact changes they’ve pursued for years.
“This is something that has to be accomplished,” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said on Fox News. “If it can’t be accomplished with President Trump’s presidency, then are we ever going to be able to get it done?”
Public anger could still force Trump toward moderation. But it is equally possible that this administration — heavily influenced by immigration hardliners like Stephen Miller — is willing to absorb collapsing approval ratings and GOP anxiety ahead of the midterms in order to secure what it views as a generational victory.
Democrats believe the politics favor them. Many Americans support tougher border security but recoil at blanket deportations, militarized raids, and the detention of long-settled families. That belief underpins the refusal by Minneapolis and other Democratic cities to allow police cooperation with ICE.
And the administration has stretched far beyond its stated goal of targeting undocumented migrants with violent records. Law-abiding residents without legal status have been swept up, US citizens mistakenly detained, and masked agents have demanded papers in scenes that many Americans find deeply un-American.
“Legally, the actions that have taken place in our streets are unconstitutional,” Frey said. “You can’t randomly yank a person off the street because they look Somali or Latino.”
Democrats argue that Pretti’s death flows directly from these choices. “He was killed by two CBP agents,” Rep. James Walkinshaw said at a vigil. “But he was actually killed by the Trump administration.”
The human cost is also eroding public support. Few images have resonated more than that of 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos, arrested with his father and sent to detention in Texas. After meeting the child, Rep. Joaquin Castro said Liam was “very depressed” — a detail that crystallizes Democratic claims of cruelty.
A “little bit” of de-escalation will not satisfy Gov. Tim Walz. “I’m not so interested in shifted tone,” he said Wednesday. “We just need them out of here and we need accountability.”
Trump lashes out again
If anything, the administration’s tone suggests retrenchment, not retreat.
Trump warned Frey on Truth Social that he was “PLAYING WITH FIRE.” Attorney General Pam Bondi vowed that “nothing will stop us” from enforcement. Vice President JD Vance accused the mayor of endangering federal officers.
Sometimes harsh rhetoric masks a quiet climbdown. This does not sound like that.
Clarity may come when Homan holds a press conference Thursday. CNN reports that potential compromises include narrower targeting of migrants with criminal records and shifting Border Patrol agents into support roles rather than leading broad sweeps.
Senate Democrats want far more. Chuck Schumer has demanded tighter warrant requirements, enforceable codes of conduct, unmasked agents, and body cameras — conditions that would significantly constrain ICE.
Even then, Democrats face a familiar problem: DHS and ICE are flush with funding after Trump’s “big beautiful bill.” Republicans may simply wait out a shutdown, as they have before.
But a shutdown would force the central question into the open. Is Trump willing to make real concessions on deportation policy — or does he believe that a change in optics, not substance, will be enough to move on from Minnesota?
