Two cities under siege
Remarkably similar scenes from Boston and Minneapolis, 260 years apart, show a federal government betraying its founding principles.
Conservatives are fond of invoking the American Founding, the framers of the Constitution, and the principles that drove the fight for independence. Those invocations have always been selective and opportunistic, but they’ve grown downright farcical as right-wingers contort themselves into knots to defend executive powers explicitly contradicted by the Constitution.
This gaping chasm between what they claim to believe and how they govern is best exemplified by the copy of the Declaration of Independence Donald Trump has put on display in the same Oval Office gilded with gold flourishes and garish gifts from foreign leaders and business titans seeking favors.
Given the way Trump has been governing like a mad king, it’s almost as if he displayed the document not in tribute to the founding, but to treat the famous list of colonial grievances as his to-do list. (This would require him to have actually read it.)
The Republicans’ veneration of the Founders is particularly rich at the moment because, of all the abuses England heaped on the colonies, nothing angered them more than the Crown’s deployment of soldiers on city streets — and the streets of Boston in particular. Anger, resentment, and violence simmered in Boston for years before the Boston Massacre in 1770. The Declaration of Independence Trump hangs in his office came six years later, followed by the American Revolution, then the birth of the United States.
The rage from those pre-revolution clashes in Boston continued to linger for years into the Constitutional Convention, and then the debate over the Bill of Rights. The Founders were also students of history, and saw how the domestic use of the military led to the fall of the Roman Republic. This, in large part, is why we have the Second, Third, and Fourth Amendments, and why the Constitution splits control of the military between the president and Congress. You really can’t overstate how much the Founders worried about . . . exactly what we’re seeing in Minneapolis.
When I was researching my first book, Rise of the Warrior Cop, I found a remarkable archive of colonial-era newspaper articles published as a collection in 1936 by a historian named Oliver Morton Dickerson. The articles are from A Journal of the Times, a pro-patriot, anti-monarchy paper published in colonial Boston. Dickerson’s published archive, which runs from 1767 to 1769, documents the rising tension as English troops patrolled the streets of Boston.
The accounts are clearly biased in favor of the angry colonists, but they’re also consistent with other contemporaneous accounts of the occupation. They read like a social media feed — if social media had existed at the time. They also depict scenes remarkably similar to what we’re seeing in Minneapolis.
We’re now at two dead in Minneapolis, and at least four people killed by immigration officers overall. We’re at 41 dead since Trump was inaugurated last year if you count the soaring number of deaths in ICE custody, many of which appear to be from either neglect or abuse.
Even as I was working on this post, there were two alarming new developments: First, the A.P. reported that the administration has been keeping a secret memo authorizing immigration to enter homes without a warrant to arrest people who have final removal orders (the memo itself suggests even a final removal order may not be necessary). This is remarkably similar to the general warrants or “writs of assistance” the British crown issued permitting soldiers to forcibly enter any home they suspected of harboring untaxed imports.
I’ll just state the obvious: If the Fourth Amendment permits the government to tear down your door with nothing more than an administrative warrant, the Fourth Amendment doesn’t exist. (The argument that this only affects undocumented immigrants is both legally dubious and utter garbage — they’ve already used this policy to terrorize an American citizen.)
The second alarming new incident was the murder of Alex Pretti. And within hours of Pretti’s death, the administration promptly did what they’ve done after the previous shootings: they slandered the victim, brazenly lied about what happened, and prevented local law enforcement from conducting their own investigation. They’ve also refused to release the names of the officers who killed Pretti, publicly praised those officers, and then quickly announced that those officers have been returned to the field.
The latter is a particularly sociopathic attempt to project strength. From the officers’ perspective, it’s a hell of a thing to kill someone. The notion that they’d bounce back within a couple days to go out and round up more immigrants is incomprehensibly callous. It’s also a demonstration of this administration’s contempt for human life and its dearth of basic humanity.
From the perspective of the people of Minneapolis — and the rest of the country — the message is clear: This administration believes that killing protesters is a thing to be celebrated and encouraged. They believe that performatively lying about these killings in the face of directly contradictory video evidence is a display of strength and power. And they believe that the First, Second, and Fourth Amendments forged after the violence in Boston are mere suggestions.
So here are some excerpts from those newspaper accounts of the siege of Boston, along with comparative examples from the siege of Minneapolis.
Boston:
We now behold Boston surrounded at a time of profound peace, with about 14 ships of war, with springs on their cables, and their broadsides to the town! — If the people of England could but look into the town to see the utmost good order and observance of the laws, and that this mighty armament has no other rebellion to subdue than what existed in the brain or letter of the inveterate governor and commissioners . . .
Minneapolis:
From the complaint the state of Minnesota filed in federal court:
In December 2025, the federal government initiated “Operation Metro Surge,” an unprecedented deployment of federal immigration enforcement agents . . . to the State of Minnesota, including into the cities of Saint Paul and Minneapolis. Operation Metro Surge has instilled fear among people living, working and visiting the Minneapolis Saint Paul metro area. Thousands of armed and masked DHS agents have stormed the Twin Cities to conduct militarized raids and carry out dangerous, illegal, and unconstitutional stops and arrests in sensitive public places, including schools and hospitals—all under the guise of lawful immigration enforcement.
Defendants claim this unprecedented surge of immigration agents is necessary to fight fraud. In reality, the massive deployment of armed agents to Minnesota bears no connection to that stated objective and instead reflects an alarming escalation of the Trump Administration’s retaliatory actions towards the state.
Defendants claim to have deployed over 2,000 DHS agents to the Twin Cities—a number that greatly exceeds the number of sworn police officers that Minneapolis and Saint Paul have, combined. Operation Metro Surge is, in essence, a federal invasion of the Twin Cities.
This operation is driven by nothing more than the Trump Administration’s desire to punish political opponents and score partisan points—at the direct expense of Plaintiffs’ residents. Defendants’ actions appear designed to provoke community outrage, sow fear, and inflict emotional distress, and they are interfering with the ability of state and local officials to protect and care for their residents. After weeks of escalation, including a DHS agent shooting into an occupied vehicle on December 21, 2025, in Saint Paul, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) agent shot and killed a Minneapolis resident on January 7, 2026.
Other federal courts have already found that Trump’s justifications for sending troops into Los Angeles, Chicago, and Portland were based on lies and gross distortions of the reality on the ground.
Boston:
[It] appears that the Commissioners of the Board of Customs had repeatedly complained of being obstructed in the execution of their office.
The proceedings of Council that “what happened on the 10th of June, seems to have sprung wholly from those who complain of it, and that it seems probable, an uproar was hoped for and intended . . . and there was no occasion for men of war to protect them.”
. . . [In] their unanimous opinion, the civil power does not need the support of troops; that it is not for his Majesty’s service, nor the peace of this province, that any troops be required . . .”
Again from the state of Minnesota’s complaint:
Defendants have targeted Minnesota for the latest unprecedented surge not based on any real or legitimate concern for the enforcement of immigration laws or promotion of public safety, but rather in service of Defendants’ goal to score political points. If the Defendants’ true goal was to detain and deport dangerous individuals, they would not accomplish it through what DHS describes as “consensual” (namely: random) encounters with people on the street. And if the Defendants’ true goal was to prioritize detaining and deporting the highest number of immigrants with no legal right to remain in the U.S., they would not be targeting Minnesota for what Defendants refer to as the largest ever immigration operation. Data suggests that just over 1.5% of Minnesota’s total population are noncitizen immigrants without legal status, less than half the national average rate.
On information and belief, that small percentage includes individuals whose presence has been long known to DHS and who have kept regularly scheduled appointments with DHS. Many states have higher rates of reported non-citizens relative to their populations, including Utah, Texas, and Florida. The administration has made no similar efforts to surge federal immigration agent deployments into cities in Utah, Texas, or Florida. Incredibly, the reported non-citizen population of Utah, Florida, and Texas (combined together) is nearly the size of the entire population of Minnesota . . .
And as for the pretext that the immigration crackdown was about combatting fraud in the Somali community:
. . . the “Feeding our Future” fraud case was in no way new, and in fact was a case involving collaboration between state and federal resources to bring perpetrators to justice, President Trump and others in his Administration have repurposed the case in recent months in order to use the pretext of “fraud” concerns as an excuse to engage in all manner of unlawful actions. Pertinent to this lawsuit, the Trump Administration recognized that the Feeding our Future scheme involved a large number of Somali immigrants, and since then, have used the case to disparage the entire Somali community, and Minnesota’s Democratic politicians and policies.
On November 21, 2025, President Trump posted on social media that Minnesota “is a hub of fraudulent money laundering activity,” and that he was therefore “terminating, effective immediately, the Temporary Protected Status (TPS Program) for Somalis in Minnesota.” Then, on Thanksgiving Day, President Trump posted a lengthy screed, falsely claiming that “Hundreds of thousands of refugees from Somalia are completely taking over the once great State of Minnesota. Somalian gangs are roving the streets looking for ‘prey’ as our wonderful people stay locked in their apartments and houses hoping against hope that they will be left alone . . . .”
The White House has similarly expressed that the 2,000 deployed DHS agents have been sent to Minnesota to help with “targeted, door-to-door investigations at locations of suspected fraud.” But Defendants’ investigations have not been “targeted.” DHS agents have been conducting raids at job sites and businesses, detaining and deporting individuals while they perform essential work that directly benefits Plaintiffs’ communities. DHS agents also appear to be conducting general sweeps and detaining people within their path based on their race and ethnicity. Defendants’ conduct further undermines the notion that they are focusing efforts on individuals with violent criminal histories or known targets in fraud investigations—particularly where fraud allegations are primarily investigated via reviewing documents, not by roving groups of DHS agents dressed in riot gear and military fatigues.
Multiple federal courts have found Trump’s pretexts for occupying other cities to be wholly without merit, from the claim that violence from protesters was preventing immigration officers from doing their jobs in Los Angeles, to false claims about protest violence at a detention center in Portland, to Trump’s deranged declaration of war on Chicago and claims that the city was fomenting an “insurrection.”
The above passage from colonial Boston also speculates that England may have wanted a violent reaction from the colonists, in order to justify more oppressive measures. That’s an authoritarian scheme that’s as old as authoritarianism.
Here too, there are parallels to the occupation of Minneapolis and other cities. Former ICE and DHS officials say the administration is encouraging the sort of tactics and aggression prohibited by most police agencies, in a way that seems designed to provoke violence and backlash. And of course we know that Trump has been itching for an excuse to invoke the Insurrection Act since the summer of 2020.
Boston:
Several persons have been taken up within these few days by the soldiery, and confined without warrant
Minneapolis:
Boston:
Gentlemen and ladies coming into town in their carriages were threatened by the guards to have their brains blown out unless they stopped.
Minneapolis:
Amid heated protests in Minneapolis following the killing of Renee Good by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer Jonathan Ross, federal agents have repeatedly invoked Good’s death to threaten the lives of observers and demonstrators in Minnesota.
In multiple confrontations in the Minneapolis area, agents repeatedly referred to civilians learning their lesson — in an apparent nod to the use of deadly force in Ross’s killing.
Two U.S. citizens detained by immigration officers said one agent told them, “You guys have got to stop obstructing us. That’s why that lesbian bitch is dead.” Another woman, a former Marine who says an ICE agent rammed her car, says agents warned, “Have you not learned? This is why we killed that lesbian bitch.”
We also now know that Alex Pretti was coming to the aid of a woman who had been assaulted by an immigration officer when he was assaulted, tackled, disarmed, and shot (you can see the video evidence here).
His reported last words: “Are you okay?”
Boston:
At about noon the inhabitants were greatly alarmed with the news that the sheriff, accompanied by the soldiery, had forced an entry sword in hand . . . Mr. Brown one of the inhabitants, in attempting to disarm him, received several thrusts in his cloaths, the sheriff’s deputy entered with him; he then gave possession of the cellar to some of the troops: A large number of soldiers immediately entered the yard, and were placed as centinels and guards at all the doors of the house, and all persons were forbid from going in and out of the same, or even coming into the yard. The plan of operation being as it is said to terrify or starve the occupants out of their dwellings.
The sheriff refused giving Mr. Brown a copy of his warrant or orders for
this doing . . .
A federal judge in Minnesota on Thursday ordered the release of a Liberian man four days after heavily armed immigration agents broke into his home using a battering ram and arrested him.
U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Bryan said in his ruling that the agents violated Garrison Gibson’s Fourth Amendment rights against unlawful search and seizure.
“To arrest him, Respondents forcibly entered Garrison G.’s home without his consent and without a judicial warrant,” he said.
Boston:
This night the sheriff procured guards of soldiers to be placed at his house for his protection, a measure that must render him still more ridiculous in the eyes of the people.
White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller is one of a handful of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet members who are hiding out on military bases so they don’t have to be exposed to the public that hates them.
The Atlantic reported Thursday that Miller, his wife, and their two children have relocated out of their home north of Arlington, Virginia, to a U.S. military base after local activists embarked on a campaign to shame Miller for his role leading Trump’s fascistic crime and immigration crackdown.
Kristi Noem and Marco Rubio are also reported to now be living on military bases.
Boston:
. . . there was a general appearance of the troops in the Common, who went through their firings, evolutions, etc. in a manner pleasing to the general . . .The glitter of the arms and bayonets, and this hostile appearance of troops in a time of profound peace, made most of the spectators very serious, and reminded me of what a late traveller relates in his account of Turkey, “That being present on a day when the Grand Signior was passing from his palace to his mosque, and observing that the Janissaries stood without their arms, and with their hands across, only bowed as the Sultan passed; he was led thereby to ask a captain of those guards why they had no arms? Arms said he, thou infidel, they are for our ENEMIES; we govern our subjects with the LAW.
This passage expresses frustration at the British troop’s performative shows of force. We saw that early on in Los Angeles, when Border Patrol conducted a showy, militarized raid on a mostly empty public park to intimidate an immigrant neighborhood.
Minneapolis:
We’re also seeing this in Minneapolis, with Border Patrol commander Greg Bovino strutting through city neighborhoods bedecked in his fashiest trench, baiting local residents into confrontations. Last week he and his entourage started showing up at gas stations, always with a garish show of force to draw angry crowds. DHS then put out a indignant statement complaining that the city’s “agitators” won’t even led immigration officers urinate in peace.
Boston:
Lord Bottetourts, ordered [the soldiers] to their several stations in the colonies, in order to exert their whole influence to carry down the late regulations. In pursuance of this ministerial plan of policy, we now behold a standing army and swarms of crown officers, placemen, pensioners and expectants, co-operating in order to subdue Americans to the yoke.
Minneapolis:
Boston:
The inhabitants of this town have been of late greatly insulted and abused by some of the officers and soldiers, several have been assaulted on frivolous pretences, and put under guard without any lawful warrant for so doing. A physician of the town walking the streets the other evening, was jostled by an officer, when a scuffle ensued, he was afterwards met by the same officer in company with another, both as yet unknown, who repeated his blows, and as is supposed gave him a stroke with a pistol, which so wounded him as to endanger his life.
Boston:
Here Americans you may behold some of the first fruits springing up from that root of bitterness a standing army. Troops are quartered upon us in a time of peace, on pretence of preserving order in a town that was as orderly before their arrival as any one large town in the whole extent of his Majesty's dominions; and a little time will discover whether we are to be governed by the [military] or the common law of the land.
Minneapolis:
Boston:
The unhappy consequences of quartering troops in this town, daily visible in the profaneness, Sabbath breaking, drunkenness, and other debaucheries and immoralities, may lead us to conclude, that our enemies are waging war with the morals as well as the rights and privileges of the poor inhabitants.
Minneapolis:
Boston:
After noting that local grand juries had attempted to indict several soldiers for “detentions, assaults, and robberies” on Boston residents, the paper lamented that servants of the British crown refused to honor the indictments.
Our young King’s Attorney, refused . . . alleging as it is said, that “If a soldier should with his fixed bayonet at the breast of an inhabitant stop and detain him two hours, it would not in law be adjudged an assault.” It is hoped a court and jury will otherwise determine it, and that it will no longer be a doubt even in the minds of the most sceptical that the law of the land is to yield to the maxims of a meer economy of the military, in civil communities.
Minneapolis:
Here’s Stephen Miller, incorrectly telling ICE soldiers that they have complete immunity from prosecution. He said this in a Fox News appearance last fall.
Miller’s admonition was then amplified by the Department of Homeland Security after the killing of Renee Good:
Vice President JD Vance has also wrongly claimed that federal immigration officers have “absolute immunity” from prosecution.
Boston:
Last Wednesday night several officers of the army, sallied out of a house in King Street, and meeting with one of the inhabitants of the town, they beat and wounded him very cruelly
Minneapolis:
A Getty photographer throws his camera to a colleague as he’s swarmed and tacked by federal immigration officers.
ICE agents chasing an immigrant family through the streets:
Boston:
Abuses are daily offered some one or another of the inhabitants, who are generally for seeking redress in a legal way; and we cannot but hope that those of the military, who oppose themselves to the law of the land, will find the predictions of a great lawyer verified; “that in so doing, they gnaw a file which will break their teeth.”
Minneapolis:
Boston:
. . . six more regiments may be soon expected from Ireland, and another from Halifax. If pensions of £10,000 sterling per annum had been settled upon the [public], rather than making so unnecessary a military parade, it would have been a vast saving to the nation.
Minneapolis:
Boston:
The old honest music master was roughly handled by one of those sons of Mars; he was actually in danger of being throttled, but timously rescued by one who soon threw the officer on lower ground than he at first stood upon; the inoffensive keeper of the house for the Commissioners, presuming to hint a disapprobation of such proceedings, was, by an officer, with a drawn sword, dragged about the floor, by the hair of his head, and his honest Abigail, who in a fright, made her appearance without a head dress, was very lucky in escaping her poor husband’s fate. Whether our Governor will so resent this behaviour of the military, as to collect affidavits, and make it a subject of representation to the Crown cannot as yet be determined . . .
Minneapolis:
Boston:
As some sailors were passing near Mr. Justice Ruddock’s house, the other night, with a woman in company, they were met by a number of soldiers . . . this soon brought on a battle in which the sailors were much bruised, and a young man of the town, who was only a spectator, received a considerable wound on his head; a great cry of murder, brought out the justice, and his son, into the street; when the former who is a gentleman of spirit, immediately laid his hands upon two of the assailants
Minneapolis:
Boston:
. . . he was presently surrounded with thirty or forty soldiers, who had their bayonets in their hands . . they then made at him with their fists and bayonets; when he received such blows as obliged him to seek his safety by flight; they struck down a young woman at his door holding out a candle, and followed him and son into the entry-way of his house with their bayonets, uttering the most profane & abusive language, and swearing they would be the death of them both . . .
Federal immigration agents bashed open a door and detained a U.S. citizen in his Minnesota home at gunpoint without a warrant, then led him out onto the streets in his underwear in subfreezing conditions, according to his family and videos reviewed by The Associated Press.
ChongLy “Scott” Thao told the AP that his daughter-in-law alerted him on Sunday afternoon that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were banging at the door of his residence in St. Paul. He told her not to open it. Masked agents then forced their way in and pointed guns at the family, yelling at them, Thao recalled.
“I was shaking,” he said. “They didn’t show any warrant; they just broke down the door.”
DHS would later claim that Thao was living with two convicted sex offenders. That still would not have justified a warrantless raid on his home. But it was also a lie. Thao lived alone.
Boston:
The other evening a petty officer of one of the ships of war, who had knocked down a married woman of this town as she was quietly passing the streets, was bro’t before him; and being reproved for his indecent speech & behaviour, on trial, he swore that he would run his jack-knife thro’ the magistrates heart, whereupon the justice committed him to goal: soon after as several fishermen were coming out of a tavern in the same part of the town, they were assaulted by a corporal and some soldiers, who wounded one of the fishermen very grievously . . .
Minneapolis:
Boston:
Here’s some pushback in the form of a sardonic letter to the editor written by a resident of the city.
“I am glad the troops are come and, believe their arrival will be for the health of this country. There is a great deal of oratory in the glitter of arms; and a few ships of war contain all the arts of persuasion. A cannon ball carries with it, solid and weighty arguments; and a thrust in the side with a bayonet, will give conviction in a moment . . . and as we can’t be persuaded into such a wholsome practice by lenitive and moderate means, we must be brought to the exercise of reason by vigorous measures, and the point of the bayonet becomes necessary to fix the conviction. Preparations of steel and surgical instruments, when lenitives fail, often times produce wonderful effects, and are frequently used in opening the eyes of the blind. If we were not a dull stupid race of mortals, and had seasonably relinquished the trade to Great-Britain, the operation of cutlary ware, and the rhetoric of red coats, would be of no service; but as matters now stand, the eyes of many want couching, and these surgical operations must take off the film, and bring us to our senses, and to measures that are so confessedly for our interest.”
Minneapolis:
Boston:
A young woman lately passing thro’ Long Lane, was stopped and very ill treated by some soldiers, the cry of the person assaulted, brought out another woman into the street, who for daring to expostulate with the ruffians, received a stroke from one of them, and would probably have been further abused, had not her husband, and some other men came up timely to her assistance; the soldiers were then soon beat off and the young woman whom they had seiz’d as their prey, rescued.
Minneapolis:
Boston:
A girl at New-Boston, was lately knock’d down and abused by soldiers for not consenting to their beastly proposal; a gentle¬man hearing the cry of murder, ran to her assistance, one of the villains, immediately made off, the other the gentleman seiz’d, tho’ upon his stiffly denying the fact, and charging it upon the other soldier, the gentleman suffered him to depart; presently after the same men assaulted a young gentleman of character supposing him to be the person who had rescued the girl from their violence; their oaths, and insults brought several people out of their houses, upon which the soldiers made off, but re¬turn’d a few minutes after with a number of others, and a sergeant at their head, calling out a riot! A riot! They then drew their bayonets upon the people, and with many oaths and execrations, threatening to confine them in the barracks if they did not immediately disperse, accordingly, they began to put their threats in execution by seizing one of the company and drag’d him towards the barracks, but the rest being resolute, the soldiers were obliged to quit him; upon which the whole dispersed.
Minneapolis:
Boston:
Last evening after church service, there was a considerable gathering of children and servants, near the Town House, drawn by the music of the fife, &c. which is again heard on the Sabbath, to the great concern of the sober and thoughtful inhabitants; some of those youth’s having behaved so as to displease the officer, orders were given the guard to clear the parade; they marched up with bayonets presented — one of the lads was pursued by a soldier to some distance, who made a thrust with his bayonet, which passed thro’ his coat, and had he not thrown himself on the ground that instant, its thought he would be run thro’ the body . . .
Minneapolis:
Liam was detained as he returned home from preschool The ICE agent in the photo then used him as bait to lure his father out of their home, after which both were arrested and sent to a detention center in Texas.
Here is a photo of teenaged girl confronted and detained by Border Patrol:
The girl and another teenager riding with her were arrested after what was initially described as a “collision” with immigration officials. Here’s what that collision looked like:
A journalist saw the incident, and reported that the immigration agents struck the girl’s vehicle, as the photo suggests, and not the other way around. It isn’t clear why the two were arrested (even if the girl caused the accident, a traffic violation is not a federal crime). The journalist says the girl handed a U.S. passport to federal officials. Details about her passenger are unclear.
What we do know is that there have now been multiple incidents in which ICE, Border Patrol, and DHS have been caught lying after agents rammed into the cars of protesters, observers, and people they suspect of being undocumented, then arrested the occupants of those vehicles on the lie that they intentionally assaulted the officers with their vehicles.
Boston:
Here, A Journal of the Times article explains why it decided to publish the names of Boston merchants who were cooperating with the Crown . . .
Fellow Citizens and Countrymen: Inasmuch, as some persons among us have in a case of the utmost importance, preferr’d their own supposed private advantage to the welfare and freedom of America, it is highly proper you should know who they are, who have at this critical time sordidly detach’d themselves from the public interest. May this disgraceful, but necessary, publication of their names, lead them to reflect on the baseness of their crime; and when they find themselves slighted and shunned by their neighbours and acquaint¬ ance; when their shops are deserted, and they feel their fortunes miserably impaired by prosecuting the plan of purblind avarice; when their guilty consciences have rendered this life insupportable; may they seriously attend to the concerns of another: And altho’ they must suffer the punishment due to their parricide in this world, may a humble and sincere repentance open the way to their forgiveness in the next.
The identities of thousands of federal employees working with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol have been leaked online, raising safety concerns.
According to a report from The Independent, the leak includes the identities of about 4,500 federal employees working with ICE, including 2,000 agents. They were shared with the website The ICE List, which calls itself a “journalistic project” meant to share information to “hold ICE members legally accountable.”
The site, which accepts user-generated data, includes photos and descriptions, and is indexed by state. DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin, who is included on the site, told NewsNation that the leak “would constitute 4,500 felonies.”
Boston:
. . . a tradesman in an alley was without the least provocation knocked down by a grenadier of the 29th Regiment; he soon came to himself, and having recovered his cane, was quietly walking off; but soon perceived was followed by the same soldier, who he called upon to stand back, but this not being regarded he made so good a use of his cane, as to protect himself from any further abuse for that time; [the soldier] dared to assault & wound him with his bayonet, in a most cruel manner, a number of soldiers looking on, and had it not been for the timely assistance of some of the inhabitants passing by at that time, he would probably have been murdered: This person was confined to his house a considerable time, by means of the wounds received.
Minneapolis:
Boston:
The soldier had a bill found against him by the grand jury, but this being suspected before it was given in, the criminal deserted, or rather was concealed for a time, and then, as is supposed, conveyed away, as others had been before him, out of the reach of the law . . .
Gun-toting Feds swarmed the home of the ICE agent who fatally shot protester Renee Good on Friday morning, the Daily Mail can exclusively reveal.
A Special Response Team arrived at the suburban Minneapolis home, where Jon Ross, 43, lives with his wife and children, early this morning.
Daily Mail images captured half a dozen Federal officers wearing masks and balaclavas, one carrying pepper spray and another wielding an assault rifle.
They entered the smart five-bed home before carrying out five large plastic crates, a computer tower and a stack of picture frames.
Also:
After Good’s death on Wednesday, the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension announced that they would be investigating Good’s killing in tandem with the FBI. But on Thursday, Superintendent Drew Evans said he’d been told that the FBI would be the sole investigator and that the state agency had “reluctantly withdrawn” from the investigation.
“The BCA would no longer have access to the case materials, scene evidence or investigative interviews necessary to complete a thorough and independent investigation,” Evans said. “Without complete access to the evidence, witnesses and information collected, we cannot meet the investigative standards that Minnesota law and the public demands.”
We’ve also learned that the FBI agents who initially began investigating Good’s death recommended opening a civil rights investigation. That was then vetoed by the administration, which ordered a criminal investigation of Good’s wife instead. Six federal prosecutors resigned, as did the FBI agent.
I expect we’ll see similar stories about Alex Pretti in the days ahead.
Boston:
A country butcher who frequents the market, having been in discourse with a grenadier of the 14th Regiment, who he said had before abused him, thought proper to offer such verbal resentment as led the soldier to give him a blow, which felled the butcher to the ground, and left other proofs of his violence. The assaulter was had before Mr. Justice Quincy, convicted and fined, and upon refusing to make payment, was ordered to [jail]; but rescued out of the hands of the constable, by a number of armed soldiers, in the sight of the justice, when they carried their rescued comrade, in triumph, thro’ the main street to his barracks, flourishing their naked cutlasses, giving out that they had good support in what they were doing, and that they defied all opposition.
Minneapolis:
After killing Renee Good, DHS and Trump administration officials — including Trump himself — celebrated Jonathan Ross, Good’s killer, as a hero.
Meanwhile, immigration agents teargassed and flash-banged a car with six children inside, sending two to the hospital, including six-month-old who had temporarily stopped breathing. After the incident made national news, DHS posted this:
The family was driving home from a basketball game.
I’ll sum up with this:
The day before the murder of Alex Pretti, somewhere between 50,000 and 100,000 Minnesotans braved below-zero temperatures to protest and demand that Trump end his occupation of Minneapolis. Their resolve, bravery, refusal to abandon their neighbors, and defiance of a tyrannical federal government is the best of us.
Our founding is fraught with moral complexities. But for all its faults if the American experiment survives all of this, it will be because of the valor and courage of the people of Chicago, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Memphis, Charlotte, and Portland — and others like them all over the country.
I also can’t help but admire their restraint. This administration has given them every reason to lash out with violence. They haven’t. Not yet. Perhaps that’s in part because, as noted, they know that this is exactly what Trump, Vance, Miller and the other ghouls in charge want.
This administration wants an excuse to declare war on our cities. This administration should probably learn our history.
From here in occupied Minneapolis, I have to say first how brilliant this is, Mr. Balko: and second how heartened I was to learn that in a vigil or protest in Boston over the weekend as citizens gathered to mourn the murder of Alex Pretti by Trump's paramilitaries, a chant went up from the crowd; "We're not cold, we're not afraid, Minnesota taught us to be brave."
Thank you, Boston. What goes around comes around.
(Sorry: original misspelling due to brain tumor, my apologies.)
Will try to keep this short. Just reviewed the New York Times video and audio of the latest killing. I spent over 35 years as an inpatient psychiatric nurse. When I see videos of police assaults, that should be simple containments, I am usually appalled. This one really shook me up. I trained staff for decades mostly in a large county psychiatric hospital in prevention and management of assaultive behavior. This was required of everyone who worked on one of the units. At any given time Under one very large roof there were 100 of the most severely mentally ill residents of that large county that had much more than its share of violent crime, poverty, rampant drug dealing and abuse, and untreated mental illness. After Rodney King , depending on who was in the class and how well they performed, I would often say at the end of the training, “any six or seven of us could now contain Rodney King safely, without anyone getting hurt.“ I hope to see a careful forensic analysis of the Pretti killing. I would like to know the amount of training and experience of each of the participants in the killing. I would like to know what standards if any they were being held to. This looked like the incompetent action of a mob of goons. Sickening. Thanks for letting me vent.