At stake is the ability to govern without violent resistance.
I’ve spent the past 48 hours doing mostly two things: shoveling far more snow than I’d planned to, and tracking the steady stream of new information coming out of Minneapolis.
I remember the Black Lives Matter riots. There were moments when the unrest reached Washington, and images showed streets on fire and President Trump going into the White House bunker. It was an unnerving moment. I think it felt especially unnerving because what we want from the government is simple: peace and predictability, upheld through law and order — rules we agree to as a society, enforced consistently, until we decide together that it’s time to change them.
What happened during the BLM summer of 2020 — and what’s happening now in Minnesota — is a violent insurgency against the democratically chosen direction this country has taken. It is violent, coordinated, and engineered to produce the outcomes we’re now seeing: deaths among “protesters,” the ensuing demonization of the Trump administration and its supporters, and — ultimately — a halt to the enforcement of federal law, particularly immigration law.
As in 2020, much of the media now appears determined to side with a coordinated and well-funded insurgency.
The average American — particularly those left of center — may find themselves sympathizing with these protesters, rioters, or insurgents, whatever term one prefers. This is not because they share the same end goals or vision of governance. These actors are committed progressives, often rooted in anarchic and Marxist ideology. The broader public supports them largely because the media obscures their tactics, their objectives, and their motives — details that, in my view, most Americans would find deeply troubling if fully understood.
The last time the country reached a moment like this, in 2020, President Trump failed to restore order through law enforcement. The unrest eventually subsided not because it was resolved, but because the federal government effectively abdicated its responsibility to address it. And since the start of Trump’s second term, it is difficult to argue that he has fully reasserted control over these same elements.
For that reason, how the administration chooses to proceed now will determine not only its ability to implement domestic policy over the next two years, but also how emboldened and confident these insurgent forces will feel in their campaign to violently disrupt policies and administrations that the majority of Americans vote for.
The following piece is written to assemble all of the moving parts and events of the past week, and to be shared with those tuned into media sources who may not be fully seeing or hearing what is unfolding across the country.
_THE WELL-COORDINATED INSURGENCY_
Over the weekend, an investigative reporter on the ground in Minneapolis infiltrated Signal group chats used by a large network of activists focused on tracking Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and obstructing its operations.
One reason these groups have been so difficult to identify and disrupt is that they are highly organized. They operate like a military-style insurgency, using tools and methods designed to maintain a secure and tightly controlled structure.
For example, each group is capped at 1,000 members, and there are many such groups, organized by region across the country.
On a regular schedule, these chats are deleted and then recreated, with new passwords and links shared only through word of mouth. Within the groups, members are assigned specific roles. Some patrol areas where ICE is active. Others verify license plates reported by those patrols. Others are responsible for dispatching teams to interfere with ICE once agents are identified. There are mobile patrols, foot patrols, medics, and aftercare providers. The entire operation is planned and coordinated to a military level. All members operate anonymously, using code names.
New members go through training. Maps of the region are shared, with each region broken into zones for easier coordination. There is always an active dispatch call where members can join and share on-the-ground information related to ICE operations. The mobile patrols go out on the road and tail targets — either reporters they believe are hostile to their intentions, or, for their stated purpose, to track ICE. (It is likely that Renee Good, who was killed after she hit an ICE officer with her vehicle, was part of these efforts.)
These groups use specific methods to identify ICE units, track their size, monitor their activity, note their uniforms, and even locate where they may be staying. In the chats, they share license plates, and through what appears to be — shockingly — coordination with local police, they are able to track those plates and bring local police in to interfere with ICE. There are even members in the network with close ties to Minnesota Governor Tim Walz (D).
After these groups were infiltrated and reported on, new chats were formed, as they are every day.
As should be clear by now, these groups are extremely coordinated and highly sophisticated. Members on the ground sometimes appear in military-style gear with weapons, as in the case of Alex Pretti, which we will get to next.
_THE ALEX PRETTI INCIDENT_
Over the weekend, ICE fatally shot Alex Jeffrey Pretti, 37, in Minneapolis while agents were carrying out deportation operations. Pretti was dressed in military-style clothing — a uniform, black hat, and glasses — and was filming agents at close range as they worked.
At one point, an agent pushed a woman who was likely another “protester” agitating the operation. Pretti then stepped in to block the agents. He was pepper-sprayed, and a struggle with multiple ICE agents followed as they attempted to bring him to the ground.
Throughout the encounter, Pretti was acting as an agitator and was armed with a concealed carry handgun. An ICE agent can be heard yelling that Pretti had a gun. Video analysis suggests he may have been disarmed, though a shot rang out, leading some to believe his gun may have accidentally discharged. Immediately after that shot, an ICE agent fired multiple rounds at Pretti.
The entire incident unfolded in under 30 seconds. During the confrontation, outside agitators were blowing whistles, shouting at agents, and creating chaos that prevented ICE from operating in a normal environment.
For the most part, the media has downplayed the fact that Pretti was armed throughout the encounter. It has also largely ignored reporting on the organized group chats Pretti was allegedly involved in — suggesting he was deliberately present, armed, and aiming to interfere with ICE agents who have repeatedly been targeted and violently attacked. A neighbor of Pretti’s claimed that he was, unsurprisingly, part of those group chats.
After the death of Renee Good, the media — along with key politicians and former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama — released statements portraying Alex Pretti as the latest martyr: an American protesting an immoral deportation effort who was killed by a tyrannical administration for doing so.
But we know that Pretti arrived at the scene as part of an organized effort to obstruct the federal government, that he was armed, and that he directly interfered with ICE agents as they carried out their work.
From the agents’ perspective, once they saw the gun and heard a shot, it was entirely reasonable to believe they were facing another agitator who intended to kill or assassinate them. That is how the administration has described the incident, and it is difficult to imagine the agents interpreting the situation any other way.
As in the case of Good — whose vehicle drove directly into a federal agent — ICE officers are operating in extraordinarily dangerous conditions. They are often tasked with deporting illegal migrants with criminal and violent histories. They have been hunted and attacked, aware that outside activists and agitators want the same fate for them.
And while the media presents Pretti as a protester merely exercising his right to free speech, to the ICE agents on the ground, he was a man with a gun, actively interfering with their operation, and potentially intent on causing serious harm. In the moment they identified the weapon and heard that first shot, it is implausible to think they understood the situation any differently.
_WHY ICE IS INNOCENT — AND WILL ALWAYS LOSE_
Since Trump took office in 2025, ICE reports to have made over 350,000 arrests of criminal illegal migrants — or as the administration calls them, the “worst of the worst” — and deported just as many.
ICE agents are tasked with enforcing federal law and carrying out lawful orders. As ordinary people with families and lives of their own, they are also responsible for protecting themselves against real and numerous threats. Many anti-ICE activists, it is becoming increasingly clear, are ready to turn them into martyrs the moment the opportunity arises.
It is impossible for ICE agents — who must prioritize their own safety — to “win” in situations where they are confronted by agitators like Pretti, who was armed and being physical with agents, and whom the media will ultimately portray as an innocent “protester.”
Further, in chaotic situations like these, it is impossible to act perfectly, even with the level of training these agents receive. Anyone genuinely concerned with safety would avoid provoking armed officers in the middle of an active operation. These insurgents are clearly intent on placing themselves in dangerous situations.
_INSURRECTION_
Seditious conspiracy legally defined: If two or more persons in any State or Territory, or in any place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, conspire to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States, or to levy war against them, or to oppose by force the authority thereof, or by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of the United States, or by force to seize, take, or possess any property of the United States contrary to the authority thereof, they shall each be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both.
Clearly, in the case of these group chats with thousands of members focused on stopping the federal government from enforcing immigration law, this amounts to a seditious conspiracy. Whether it technically meets that definition is beside the point. In the debate over President Trump invoking the Insurrection Act, the threshold is simply a state requesting assistance and federal law being obstructed.
At this stage in the breakdown of order in Minneapolis, insurgents appear to be setting up another autonomous, no-police zone, similar to what occurred in Portland, Oregon, famously known as CHAZ. In that case, local police abandoned their jurisdiction in deference to violent activists who had already burned precincts. Local residents were left without police protection and, in many cases, without access to ambulances or basic medical care.
Anti-ICE agitators have also attempted to force their way into hotels where they believed federal agents were staying. This followed earlier interference at local churches, where worship services were disrupted, and parents were prevented from retrieving their children to encourage congregants to support their efforts.
In addition to likely coordinating with agitators, local police have also refused to come to the aid of federal agents when they have been attacked — such as instances where agents were off duty and eating at restaurants, or situations where they were holding back protesters with no backup at all.
Just last night, multiple ICE agents were chased into a hotel and left without assistance. Videos show the agents bloodied. Other footage shows agitators throwing bricks and physically attacking federal agents.
Under the city’s leadership, Mayor Jacob Frey (D) has effectively instructed local police not to assist ICE on immigration-related matters. At the state level, Governor Walz has publicly and vocally amplified tensions, encouraging ordinary citizens to rise up against ICE. He has compared federal agents to Nazis hunting Jews, called for their removal from the state, and shifted responsibility away from his office — implicitly toward the insurgents attempting to force that outcome.
In effect, the city and the state — sharing key objectives with the insurgents — have created a permission structure that encourages thousands of well-organized actors to violently obstruct federal agents, even as those agents carry out President Trump’s agenda with disciplined precision.
_THE MEDIA_
If the media were trying to unify the country and promote peace, it would urge protesters, agitators, and insurgents to recognize that they are obstructing federal law and encourage them instead to pursue change through elections and the democratic process rather than what is happening now.
If the media were doing that, it would also make clear that these agitators and insurgents share little to nothing in common with the average American voter, either in their political goals or their vision of governance. It would show what radical movements and organizations they belong to, and what they are willing to do to stop federal agents from carrying out their duties.
But the media has done none of this. Instead, it has done the opposite.
Mainstream outlets have continued to encourage unrest by demonizing ICE operations and shielding agitators from scrutiny. This coverage fuels further resistance in two ways: first, because activists know the media will protect them and portray them as innocent martyrs; and second, because they know public support will remain on their side, as media reporting has steadily lowered approval of ICE enforcement.
There has been almost no reporting on how organized these insurgent groups are in tracking and obstructing ICE. And in both high-profile deaths — Pretti and Good — the media has largely ignored ICE’s perspective, despite agents confronting individuals who were actively interfering with their operations and appeared willing to harm them.
During the Obama administration, when ICE was led by Tom Homan — who was awarded the 2015 Presidential Rank Award for Distinguished Service for his deportation efforts — the media frequently rode along with ICE agents, portraying their work positively and with support.
Now, under the Trump administration, the media — much as it did during the BLM protests — has positioned itself in direct opposition to the administration rather than as a neutral observer.
_WHAT’S AT STAKE_
The portrait of the situation painted above is a serious one. It’s unnerving. But the events spiraling out of control aren’t going to lead to mass chaos near you. It’s not going to mean we’re living in an anarchic state with violence and agitators making our lives intolerable — in fact, if you’re not in a small part of Minneapolis right now, you’re almost completely unaffected.
What will happen, though, is that these activists and protesters will take their cue from how the Trump administration responds and plan their future actions accordingly. If the administration retreats and halts its enforcement efforts in Minneapolis, they will be incentivized to run the same playbook in every region where the administration deploys ICE.
And if that approach succeeds against ICE, they will apply it to other domestic policies they oppose — not just under a Republican president, but under a Democrat as well — because these groups are rooted in anarchic and far-left ideas, rejecting mainstream, center-of-the-road politics on both sides of the aisle.
We know what the federal government is up against and the kind of political movements active in America — these are not new forces. Emboldening this resistance would mean that the outcomes we vote for, whether on the left or the right, could be effectively vetoed by these groups.
Now, we wait to see how the administration responds.