In a bid to ease tensions in Minneapolis on Wednesday, a troubling incident occurred at a town hall meeting where Minnesota Congresswoman Ilhan Omar was addressing the crowd. A man unexpectedly approached Omar and doused her with an unidentified liquid from a syringe just as she was advocating for reducing the Trump administration’s aggressive anti-immigration stance.

Meanwhile, the White House is scrutinizing the actions of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents involved in the fatal shooting of nurse Alex Pretti. Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller indicated that there is an ongoing assessment to determine if the agents deviated from established protocols designed to maintain a safe distance between arrest teams and any potential disruptors.

During the town hall, Omar had been discussing the possibility of dismantling Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and called for the resignation or impeachment of Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem. At this moment, a man in the front row abruptly stood, commented, and sprayed the congresswoman before being restrained by security personnel.

In response to the attack, Omar firmly raised her fist and confronted the assailant, only to return to her position and assertively declare: “Here’s the reality that people like this ugly man don’t understand: We are Minnesota strong. And we will stay resilient in the face of whatever they might throw on us.”

Omar has often been a vocal critic of President Donald Trump, who continues to stand by Noem despite her controversial leadership over federal immigration agents who recently shot and killed two American citizens. Trump has praised Noem’s performance, stating she is doing a “very good job” and should not resign.

Following the uproar after Pretti’s tragic death at age 37, Trump mentioned on Fox News that there would be a slight reduction in tensions, clarifying that this would not amount to a complete withdrawal.

Trump also admitted that Gregory Bovino, a hardline Border Patrol commander who is now expected to leave Minneapolis, was “a pretty out-there kind of a guy” whose presence may not have helped the situation, and sent top US border security official Tom Homan to meet with officials in the city.

Trump told reporters that he rejected the “assassin” label used by a top aide to describe the 37-year-old nurse, adding that he wants “a very honorable and honest investigation.”

But he criticised Pretti for carrying the licensed firearm that was taken off him before he was shot.

“I don’t like that he had a gun, I don’t like that he had two fully loaded magazines,” the president said

Alex Pretti was fatally shot by a federal immigration officer in Minneapolis on Saturday. Source: AAP / AP

‘Pretty out there’

After meeting with Homan on Wednesday, Mayor Jacob Frey said in a statement they discussed the “serious negative impacts this operation has had on Minneapolis,” and the city “will not enforce federal immigration laws.”

Just weeks after federal immigration agents shot and killed US citizen Renee Good in Minneapolis, Pretti’s death sparked national outrage and added to a litany of complaints of abusive tactics.

Good, a mother of three, was shot by an agent at point-blank range in her car on 7 January.

The killings capped months of escalating violence in which masked, unidentified, and heavily armed ICE and border patrol agents have grabbed people they accuse of violations off the streets.

Despite multiple videos showing that Pretti posed no threat, Bovino and Noem initially claimed Pretti had intent to kill federal agents, calling him a “domestic terrorist.”

Noem ‘grossly incompetent’

Republican Senator Rand Paul said on Wednesday that agents involved in the shooting should be put on administrative leave, later adding that the immigration enforcement leaders would testify before Congress next month.

Centrist Democratic Senator John Fetterman said “grossly incompetent” Noem should be fired.

The turmoil could even result in a fresh US government shutdown, with Democrats calling for broad reforms to federal immigration operations at DHS and threatening to block approval of it funding, as part of the spending bills that go up for votes in the Senate later this week.

The judicial branch also pushed back on Trump’s actions in Minneapolis on Wednesday, when a US judge blocked the deportation of a five-year-old boy and his father who were detained last week in another incident that went viral.

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