A Christian Response to the Killing of U.S. Citizen Alex Pretti by Federal Immigration Agents

Over the weekend in Minneapolis, 37-year-old U.S. citizen Alex Jeffrey Pretti was shot and killed by a U.S. Border Patrol agent during a federal immigration enforcement operation. Pretti, an intensive care nurse at a Veterans Affairs hospital, had joined community members who were observing, documenting, and questioning the unconstitutional treatment of both citizens and immigrants by federal agents. His death has left many Americans — and Christians—deeply unsettled.

According to video footage and eyewitness accounts that have circulated publicly, Pretti was standing in the street holding a cellphone and filming agents as they carried out their operation. At one point, footage appears to show a federal agent pushing or pepper-spraying another person to the ground. Pretti is seen moving toward that person, shielding them and helping them back to their feet. Shortly afterward, multiple agents turned their attention to Pretti. Video shows him being pepper-sprayed and forcibly wrestled to the frozen pavement by several federal agents.

Once on the ground, agents are seen grappling with Pretti as they attempt to restrain him. During that struggle, an agent appears to remove a firearm from Pretti’s waistband holster. Within seconds, another agent opens fire at very close range, discharging multiple rounds. Pretti is left motionless on the sidewalk and later pronounced dead at the scene.

Despite widely-circulated video evidence and multiple eyewitness accounts showing that Alex Pretti did not have a weapon in his hands at the time he was shot and that none of the footage appears to show him drawing or brandishing a firearm, federal officials have maintained that Pretti posed a threat.

For Christians, this moment is about discernment. Scripture teaches respect for authority, but it also reminds believers that the state is not the highest moral authority—God is. Throughout the Bible, people of faith are shown questioning and resisting power when it violates justice, mercy, and human dignity.

Faithfulness has never meant looking away when violence is done in the open, especially by our own government to our own citizens. In times like these, Christians are called neither to rush to judgment nor to retreat into silence. We are called to look honestly at the evidence, to pray for wisdom, to grieve the loss of life, and to ask hard questions rooted in love of neighbor and respect for human dignity. Watching the footage, listening to witnesses, and seeking truth are acts of moral responsibility.

As many have asked quietly and prayerfully in the wake of Alex Pretti’s death, the question before us is not only what happened, but how we will respond. Discernment requires attention. Justice requires courage. And faith calls us to ask: what would Jesus do?