{"id":307932,"date":"2026-01-28T11:53:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-28T11:53:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/307932\/"},"modified":"2026-01-28T11:53:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T11:53:13","slug":"donald-trump-tries-to-defuse-minnesota-outrage-as-ice-chief-gregory-bovino-is-sent-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/307932\/","title":{"rendered":"Donald Trump tries to defuse Minnesota outrage as ICE chief Gregory Bovino is sent home"},"content":{"rendered":"

President\u2019s border tsar meets with Minnesota governor Tim Walz in bid to calm tensions after two gun deaths caused by immigration troop\n<\/p>\n

The move to install Mr Homan in charge of the operation in place of border patrol official Gregory Bovino, who sources said was leaving after having led most of Mr Trump\u2019s crackdowns in Democratic-led cities, is part of a broader reset by the president to soften his administration\u2019s aggressive posture in Minneapolis.<\/p>\n

Some advisers are concerned Saturday\u2019s killing of 37-year-old Alex Pretti by federal officers, which sparked national outrage, could derail Mr Trump\u2019s immigration agenda.<\/p>\n

\"Police<\/p>\n

Police preparing to disperse a “Goodbye Bovino Noise Demo” demonstration at the Spring Hill Suites in Maple Grove, Minnesota. Photo: Getty<\/p>\n

News in 90 seconds – Wednesday 28th January <\/p>\n

Mr Homan\u2019s job in Minneapolis is to \u201crecalibrate tactics\u201d and improve co-operation with state and local officials, a source with ties to the White House said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe goal is to scale back, eventually pull out,\u201d the source added.<\/p>\n

A senior Trump administration official said Mr Homan would move away from the broad, public neighbourhood sweeps that Mr Bovino had conducted in Los Angeles, Chicago, Minneapolis and other cities and adopt a more traditional targeted approach.<\/p>\n

In a statement, Minnesota \u00adgovernor Tim Walz said he had outlined the state\u2019s priorities to Mr Homan, including impartial investigations into the two shootings and reducing the 3,000-strong force of federal agents that has been deployed to the city. Mr Homan and Mr Walz agreed to \u201ccontinue working toward those goals\u201d, the governor said.<\/p>\n

\"Donald<\/p>\n

Donald Trump. Photo: AP<\/p>\n

Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey said he told Mr Homan that the city \u201cdoes not and will not\u201d enforce federal immigration law and urged an end to Operation Metro Surge \u201cas quickly as possible\u201d.<\/p>\n

Mr Frey said he was joined by police chief Brian O\u2019Hara for a \u201cproductive\u201d meeting with Mr Homan. He said: \u201cI shared with Mr Homan the serious negative impacts this operation has had on Minneapolis and surrounding communities, as well as the strain it has placed on our local police officers.\u201d<\/p>\n

The president spent the weekend huddling with senior advisers to reassess the administration\u2019s response to Mr Pretti\u2019s death on Saturday, according to the same source and a White House official. As in the aftermath of the fatal shooting of 37-year-old Renee Good earlier this month, some Trump administration officials initially responded by accusing Mr Pretti of domestic terrorism, a claim belied by witness video that showed he posed no threat.<\/p>\n

The discussions included reducing the number of agents in Minnesota, \u00adrecalibrating the mission to focus more narrowly on deportations and exploring greater co-ordination with state authorities. Mr Trump also weighed up whether immigration officers should be required to have body-worn cameras, as many police officers do, according to the White House official.<\/p>\n

The killing of Mr Pretti, an ICU nurse shot multiple times by Border Patrol agents during daytime protests, has become a full-blown political crisis for Mr Trump, with even some Republicans in Congress calling for investigations.<\/p>\n

\n

The court\u2019s patience is at an end<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Coupled with the fatal shooting of Ms Good, a mother of three, earlier this month by an ICE officer, Mr Pretti\u2019s shooting sparked renewed anger over the aggressive tactics of the federal agents who have been roving the streets of Minneapolis for weeks.<\/p>\n

Late on Monday, Minnesota\u2019s chief federal judge threatened to hold the acting head of US ICE, Todd Lyons, in contempt for his agency\u2019s failures to comply with court orders that some detainees receive bond hearings.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe court\u2019s patience is at an end,\u201d US district Judge Patrick Schiltz wrote in ordering Mr Lyons to appear before him on Friday.<\/p>\n

Public support for Mr Trump\u2019s immigration enforcement tactics appeared to be waning both before and after the shooting of Mr Pretti, a Reuters\/Ipsos poll showed.<\/p>\n

The issue has put Republicans on the defensive ahead of November\u2019s mid-term elections, when the party\u2019s narrow congressional majorities are at stake.<\/p>\n

The president held a two-hour meeting with Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem in the Oval Office on Monday evening after Ms Noem asked to meet, a source confirmed.<\/p>\n

House Democratic leaders yesterday threatened to launch impeachment proceedings if Ms Noem isn\u2019t fired \u201cimmediately\u201d.<\/p>\n

The statement, co-signed by House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic whip Katherine Clark and the Democratic Caucus chair Pete Aguilar, accused the Trump administration of using taxpayer dollars to \u201ckill American citizens, brutalise communities and violently target law-abiding immigrant families\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"Minnesota<\/p>\n

Minnesota governor Tim Walz. Photo: Getty<\/p>\n

\u201cKristi Noem should be fired immediately, or we will commence impeachment proceedings in the House of Representatives,\u201d they said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can do this the easy way or the hard way.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the White House yesterday, Mr Trump expressed sympathy for Mr Pretti\u2019s family and said he would be \u201cwatching over\u201d the investigation into his killing. But he also defended Ms Noem and said she would not be stepping down.<\/p>\n

Privately, Mr Trump has made clear to advisers he did not want to defend the agents\u2019 actions or attack Mr \u00adPretti, after deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller labelled Mr Pretti an \u201cassassin\u201d and Mr Bovino suggested he intended to \u201cmassacre\u201d officers, despite widely shared videos contradicting those claims.<\/p>\n

Senior aides were asked not to target Mr Pretti publicly and the president discussed distancing himself from public comments made by Mr Miller and Ms Noem, the White House official said.<\/p>\n

Mr Bovino, who said the officers who killed Mr Pretti were the true victims in Saturday\u2019s shooting, was expected to depart Minneapolis yesterday along with some border patrol agents deployed with him, a senior administration official told Reuters on Monday.<\/p>\n

Another source said Mr Bovino had been stripped of his title of \u201ccommander at large\u201d and would return to his former job as a chief patrol agent along California\u2019s El Centro sector of the US-Mexico border, before retiring soon after.<\/p>\n

Department of Homeland Security officials said agents fired in self-defence after Mr Pretti approached them with a handgun, even though video showed him holding a phone, not a gun, as agents wrestled him to the ground.<\/p>\n

Gun rights groups have pushed back on Trump administration officials\u2019 suggestion that Mr Pretti should not have been armed, a rare election-year rift between Republicans and one of their most loyal voting blocs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"President\u2019s border tsar meets with Minnesota governor Tim Walz in bid to calm tensions after two gun deaths…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":307933,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[9,10,356,13,14,6,56,11,12,15,16,5,117443,7,8,26765,1543,65,66,67],"class_list":{"0":"post-307932","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-donald-trump","11":"tag-featured-news","12":"tag-featurednews","13":"tag-headlines","14":"tag-immigration","15":"tag-latest-news","16":"tag-latestnews","17":"tag-main-news","18":"tag-mainnews","19":"tag-news","20":"tag-tim-walz","21":"tag-top-stories","22":"tag-topstories","23":"tag-us-politics","24":"tag-usa","25":"tag-world","26":"tag-world-news","27":"tag-worldnews"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115972591091565141","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307932","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307932"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307932\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}