Sen. Raphael Warnock traveled to Minneapolis on Tuesday morning to visit the site where Alex Pretti was killed by federal agents just three days before, becoming one of the few members of Congress to visit the area as the city continues to reel from Pretti’s death.
The Georgia Democrat and pastor said the city’s standoff with federal agents could only be described as “soul force meeting brute force.”
“This is holy ground consecrated by blood spilled here ... I had to stand at this very place,” he said of the frost-covered street that is now covered with flowers and signs.
Warnock, like his fellow Senate Democrats, has vowed to block a $1.3 trillion government spending package if it funds the Department of Homeland Security. Democrats want the DHS funding split off from the rest of the spending package but Senate Republicans have so far refused to do so. Warnock noted that even if the DHS funding doesn’t pass, the agency received billions in mandatory appropriations through the Republican-led reconciliation bill, passed in 2025.
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“Even as we stand up to block ICE funding this week, the sad reality is that when they passed the one big, ugly bill, as I call it, they supersized the funding on this organization,” he said. “When you build a beast that big, it’s gotta eat. And this beast is literally consuming bodies all across this country — the undocumented and the documented, noncitizens and citizens alike.”
Warnock said he spent the morning praying with local faith leaders before heading to the memorial, where he stood in silence for a few minutes late Tuesday morning. Minnesota’s state crime scene forensics agency is currently fighting to get access to evidence from federal agencies, who have not committed to investigating the shooting as a criminal matter. The state has also sued to obtain a judicial order blocking the immigration operation.
The Trump administration’s Operation Metro Surge flooded the Twin Cities with federal agents conducting immigration raids, but has also swept up and attacked citizens who attempt to stand by and record their activities. NOTUS spoke with two hotel workers on Tuesday who said they’re afraid to go to church or work — and find themselves cleaning the rooms of federal agents who are currently staying in the city.
“This is a sad story that we see all the time. It is exacerbated and brought into sharper focus by this tragedy. But you’re talking about essential workers who stand up for us all the time, who work in hotels, who clean up hospitals in the middle of the night, who stock grocery store shelves. And a lot of those people come from immigrant communities, and they are being poorly treated,” Warnock said.
“And not only is it immoral, I might say when you think about what all of this is doing to this economy and to the American economy, it’s stupid,” he continued.
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