DoJ cases against protesters keep collapsing as officers’ lies are exposed in court; The Guardian, February 21, 2026

Sam Levin, The Guardian; DoJ cases against protesters keep collapsing as officers’ lies are exposed in court

"Department of Justice prosecutors across the US have suffered a string of embarrassing defeats in their aggressive pursuit of criminal cases against people accused of “assaulting” and “impeding” federal officers.

In recent months, the federal government has relentlessly prosecuted protesters, government critics, immigrants and others arrested during immigration operations, often accusing them of physically attacking officers or interfering with their duties.

But many of those cases have recently been dismissed or ended in not guilty verdicts.

In several high-profile cases, the prosecutions fell apart because they relied on statements by Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officers that had no supporting evidence or in some instances were proven by video footage to be blatantly false. Criminal defense lawyers said it was unusual for federal prosecutors to pursue a high volume of charges over minor clashes with law enforcement, and that it was extraordinary to see the DoJ lose case after case across jurisdictions.

Still, the costs for defendants, even if ultimately exonerated, have been enormous, with many having their mugshots blasted by the government and some forced to languish in jail or have criminal charges hang over them for weeks and months."

He made a fake ICE deportation tip line. Then a kindergarten teacher called.; The Washington Post, February 20, 2026

Drew Harwell , The Washington Post; He made a fake ICE deportation tip line. Then a kindergarten teacher called.

A Nashville comedian’s deportation hotline, set up as a joke, has gone viral among viewers who say it shows the “banality of evil personified.”

"Ben Palmer, a stand-up comic in Nashville, has built a following online with his signature style of elaborate deadpan pranks, stumbling his way onto court TV shows and pyramid-scheme calls to poke fun at the latent absurdities of American life.

Then in January of last year, he had an idea for a new bit: He’d set up a fake tip line that people could use to report anyone they thought was an undocumented immigrant. It was darker than his other stunts, but it felt topical, the kind of challenge he wanted to try. At the very least, he thought, he might get a few calls he could talk about at his next show.

Instead, his tip line has received nearly 100 submissions from across the country: people reporting their neighbors, ex-lovers, Uber drivers, strangers they saw at the grocery store. One tip came from a teacher reporting the parents of a kindergarten student at her school.

"I mean, they seem like nice people or whatever,” the woman told Palmer on the call. “But if they’re taking up resources from our county, I’m not into illegal people being here.”...

A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said it was “aware of a fraudulent YouTube page falsely representing ICE” and that the agency “strongly [condemns] any actions intended to mislead the public or impersonate official government entities.

But neither Palmer nor the websites claim to represent a government agency, and the sites’ privacy policies include disclaimers at the bottom saying they’re intended only for “parody, joke purposes and sociological research.” (Palmer spoke on the condition that The Washington Post not name the websites, so as not to ruin the bit.)"

Episcopal presiding officers sign court brief opposing Trump administration’s asylum policies; Episcopal News Service (ENS), February 17, 2026

 David Paulsen, Episcopal News Service (ENS); Episcopal presiding officers sign court brief opposing Trump administration’s asylum policies

"The Episcopal Church’s two presiding officers, Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe and House of Deputies President Julia Ayala Harris, have signed onto a “friend of the court” brief along with a long list of other ecumenical and interfaith leaders in support of a lawsuit objecting to the Trump administration’s treatment of asylum-seekers.

The lawsuit was filed by Al Otro Lado, a California-based organization that supports refugees and migrants. Its class-action lawsuit seeks to end the Department of Homeland Security’s practice of turning away asylum-seekers at the border based on criteria that, opponents say, does not follow U.S. immigration law. At issue are administration policies under which border officials have ordered those migrants to remain in Mexico or have denied them asylum because they did not first seek asylum in another country.

The case is now before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco.

The Episcopal Church has long spoken in favor of upholding the dignity of refugees and migrants while citing the biblical call to “welcome the stranger.” Such beliefs were cited by the presiding officers and the dozens of ecumenical and interfaith partners in the “friend of the court” brief. The Episcopal Diocese of New York and Episcopal Divinity School also joined the brief.

“Many of these faith traditions are practiced across every country on Earth and have roots stretching back thousands of years,” the brief says. “All make safeguarding the stranger a core component of faith, a duty obligatory upon not just the individual but upon society as a whole.”

The brief also describes asylum as “a core religious and moral tenet of our society, with a history as old as humanity itself.” The signatories warn of “how extreme, and untenable, the government’s interpretation of our asylum laws is from a historical, religious and social perspective.”

“From the first days of its founding, this country has welcomed the stranger fleeing persecution,” the brief says. “Stopping outsiders at our border and preventing them from lawfully seeking asylum is contrary to our civilization’s longstanding understanding of asylum and antithetical to asylum’s understood role in a moral, democratic society.”"

The problem with doorbell cams: Nancy Guthrie case and Ring Super Bowl ad reawaken surveillance fears; The Guardian, February 14, 2026

Sanya Mansoor , The Guardian; The problem with doorbell cams: Nancy Guthrie case and Ring Super Bowl ad reawaken surveillance fears

"What happens to the data that smart home cameras collect? Can law enforcement access this information – even when users aren’t aware officers may be viewing their footage? Two recent events have put these concerns in the spotlight.

A Super Bowl ad by the doorbell-camera company Ring and the FBI’s pursuit of the kidnapper of Nancy Guthrie, the mother of Today show host Savannah Guthrie, have resurfaced longstanding concerns about surveillance against a backdrop of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. The fear is that home cameras’ video feeds could become yet another part of the government’s mass surveillance apparatus...

“Ring has a history of playing it pretty loose with people’s privacy rights,” said Beryl Lipton, senior investigative researcher at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. In 2023, the Federal Trade Commission charged the company with “compromising its customers’ privacy by allowing any employee or contractor to access consumers’ private videos and by failing to implement basic privacy and security protections”. This, in turn, allowed hackers to “take control of consumers’ accounts, cameras, and videos”. Ring agreed to pay $5.8m in a settlement with the FTC."

Homeland Security Wants Social Media Sites to Expose Anti-ICE Accounts; The New York Times, February 13, 2026

 Sheera Frenkel and Mike Isaac , The New York Times; Homeland Security Wants Social Media Sites to Expose Anti-ICE Accounts

The department has sent Google, Meta and other companies hundreds of subpoenas for information on accounts that track or comment on Immigration and Customs Enforcement, officials and tech workers said.

"The Department of Homeland Security is expanding its efforts to identify Americans who oppose Immigration and Customs Enforcement by sending tech companies legal requests for the names, email addresses, telephone numbers and other identifying data behind social media accounts that track or criticize the agency.

In recent months, Google, Reddit, Discord and Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, have received hundreds of administrative subpoenas from the Department of Homeland Security, according to four government officials and tech employees privy to the requests. They spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

Google, Meta and Reddit complied with some of the requests, the government officials said. In the subpoenas, the department asked the companies for identifying details of accounts that do not have a real person’s name attached and that have criticized ICE or pointed to the locations of ICE agents. The New York Times saw two subpoenas that were sent to Meta over the last six months.

The tech companies, which can choose whether or not to provide the information, have said they review government requests before complying. Some of the companies notified the people whom the government had requested data on and gave them 10 to 14 days to fight the subpoena in court."

Corey Lewandowski fired pilot for leaving Kristi Noem’s blanket on plane as sources say pair ‘spending nights regularly’ together; New York Post, February 13, 2026

Steven Nelson, New York Post ; Corey Lewandowski fired pilot for leaving Kristi Noem’s blanket on plane as sources say pair ‘spending nights regularly’ together

"Corey Lewandowski fired a Coast Guard pilot for leaving Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s blanket on a plane — but was forced to rehire them upon realizing there was nobody else to fly the party home, according to a stunning new report.

Lewandowski, an unpaid special government employee who unofficially acts as chief of staff for Noem — with whom he’s had a years-long affair — has overseen a reign of terror over department workers since President Trump took office last year.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Noem had to switch planes during an official trip due to a maintenance issue, but her blanket was not moved to the replacement aircraft.

Lewandowski fired the pilot and told them to find a commercial flight home when they reached their destination, only to reinstate them due to the lack of a backup."

ICE Expands Power of Agents to Arrest People Without Warrants; The New York Times, January 30, 2026

Hamed Aleaziz and Charlie Savage, The New York Times ; ICE Expands Power of Agents to Arrest People Without Warrants

"Amid tensions over President Trump’s immigration crackdown in Minnesota and beyond, federal agents were told this week that they have broader power to arrest people without a warrant, according to an internal Immigration and Customs Enforcement memo reviewed by The New York Times.

The change expands the ability of lower-level ICE agents to carry out sweeps rounding up people they encounter and suspect are undocumented immigrants, rather than targeted enforcement operations in which they set out, warrant in hand, to arrest a specific person.

The shift comes as the administration has deployed thousands of masked immigration agents into cities nationwide. A week before the memo, it came to light that Todd M. Lyons, the acting director of the agency, had issued guidance in May saying agents could enter homes with only an administrative warrant, not a judicial one. And the day before the memo, Mr. Trump said he would “de-escalate a little bit” in Minneapolis, after agents fatally shot two people in the crackdown there."

ICE’s surveillance app is a techno-authoritarian nightmare; The Guardian, January 30, 2026

Moustafa Bayoumi, The Guardian; ICE’s surveillance app is a techno-authoritarian nightmare

"Now is the time we must start paying attention to another highly damaging part of ICE’s arsenal: the agency’s deployment of mass surveillance.

I’m referring specifically to Mobile Fortify, a specialized app ICE has been using at least since May 2025. (Usage of the app was first reported last June by 404Media.) What is Mobile Fortify? It’s an app for facial recognition that can additionally take “contactless fingerprints” of someone simply by snapping a picture of a person’s fingers. The app has been used more than 100,000 times, including on children, as alleged in a lawsuit filed by the State of Illinois and the City of Chicago. And it’s dangerous."

Democrats Call for Release of 5-Year-Old Detained by ICE; The New York Times, January 29, 2026

Aaron Boxerman and Lina Fisher , The New York Times; Democrats Call for Release of 5-Year-Old Detained by ICE

Representative Joaquin Castro said Liam Conejo Ramos appeared lethargic during a visit by lawmakers to the facility where he and his father are being held. The pair was detained in Minnesota.

"Democratic lawmakers called Wednesday for the immediate release of Liam Conejo Ramos, a 5-year-old detained by federal agents in Minnesota, after visiting him and his father in an immigration holding facility.

The detention of the boy — seized while wearing a Spider-Man backpack — has become a flashpoint, as anger has continued to grow over the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown and deportation efforts. Critics called his detention emblematic of the callousness of the administration’s policies, while the Department of Homeland Security said the boy had not been targeted or arrested.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents detained the pair in Columbia Heights, Minn., shortly after Adrian Conejo Arias, Liam’s father, collected him from school, according to local officials. They were then taken to an immigration detention center in Dilley, Texas, about 70 miles south of San Antonio."

Key Witness in Alex Pretti Shooting Says Feds Are Totally Ignoring Her; The New Republic (TNR), January 28, 2026

Malcolm Ferguson, The New Republic (TNR); Key Witness in Alex Pretti Shooting Says Feds Are Totally Ignoring Her

"The woman who filmed federal agents shooting and killing Alex Pretti still hasn’t been contacted by the government days later, only fanning accusations of a federal cover-up. 

“Have you been contacted by anyone from the federal government?” CNN’s Anderson Cooper asked Minnesota resident Stella Carlson, whose footage has been crucial in delegitimizing the Trump administration’s lies about Pretti. “FBI?”

“No, no, I have not. I do have a legal team now who are fielding much of that, and I am no longer accessible in those ways,” Carlson replied. 

“I talked to your attorney this morning; she said she had not received any outreach from the FBI or anybody from the federal government,” Cooper said.

“I do not think they have my name yet,” said Carlson, a shocking oversight given that it’s been four days since the shooting. She then expressed that she had zero confidence in a federal investigation into Pretti’s killing."

After 36 hours justifying the killing of Alex Pretti, Fox News suddenly changes its narrative; Media Matters for America, January 26, 2026

MATT GERTZ , Media Matters for America; After 36 hours justifying the killing of Alex Pretti, Fox News suddenly changes its narrative

"On Sunday evening, Fox News correspondent Bill Melugin published a lengthy report detailing internal dissent among his federal immigration enforcement sources regarding the narrative pushed by Department of Homeland Security leaders after Border Patrol officers gunned down Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse who had been videotaping their activities, in Minneapolis on Saturday morning. 

Amid the several hundred words describing an internal schism over how DHS is messaging masked agents of the state opening fire on a man who had already been restrained, Melugin slipped in the following statement: “There is no indication Pretti was there to murder law enforcement, as videos appear to show he never drew his holstered firearm.”

Melugin’s stark acknowledgement was whiplash-inducing for anyone who had been following Fox’s on-air coverage of Pretti’s killing up to that point, and it marked the start of a dramatic shift in the network’s treatment of the case.

Fox spent Saturday and much of Sunday blaming the victim and local Democrats for his death while excusing and even valorizing his executioners. In doing so the network was following in the footsteps of the high-ranking administration officials who baselessly argued that Pretti was a “would-be assassin” engaged in “domestic terrorism.” Melugin himself was the vehicle DHS used to launder its excuse that Pretti “was armed.” 

And notably, some Fox contributors repeatedly justified Pretti’s killing by going beyond the official comment to allege that he had drawn the gun he was reportedly legally carrying and that he even pointed it at the Border Patrol officers — the very claim Melugin said Sunday night had been disproved by videos.

The fallacy of the DHS smear of Pretti had long been clear to anyone who had reviewed videos of the shooting, triggering widespread outrage over his killing. But Melugin’s admission — and his reporting on a schism within immigration enforcement over the case — apparently provided his colleagues the permission structure they needed to abandon their narrative."

How We Determined That Minneapolis Videos Contradicted Federal Officials; The New York Times, January 26, 2026

Mark Scheffler, The New York Times ; How We Determined That Minneapolis Videos Contradicted Federal Officials

"The first viral video from Minneapolis last Saturday morning told only a partial story: Federal agents skirmish in the street with several civilians. Officers bring a man to the ground. Gunshots go off.

What were the federal officers doing? What preceded the confrontation? What went on in the scuffle? Who fired? Who was the man? Was he alive or dead?

There are often more questions than answers in the work of the Visual Investigations team at The New York Times. Our job is to assemble and analyze visual material — including video footage taken by both witnesses and security cameras — to piece together chaotic events and present as full a picture of what happened as we can.

Our goal isn’t to establish guilt or innocence. We aren’t a court of law. Instead, we establish what we call ground truth: what happened, how it happened and who might be responsible. We follow the visuals wherever they take us, not to a predetermined conclusion. In doing so, this work can start to establish accountability."

New Video Analysis Reveals Flawed and Fatal Decisions in Shooting of Pretti; The New York Times, January 26, 2026

Devon Lum, Haley Willis, Alexander Cardia, Dmitriy Khavin and Ainara Tiefenthäler , The New York Times; New Video Analysis Reveals Flawed and Fatal Decisions in Shooting of Pretti

"A frame-by-frame assessment of actions by Alex Pretti and the two officers who fired 10 times shows how lethal force came to be used against a man who didn’t pose a threat."

Episcopal priests share experiences protesting as immigration raids continue in Minnesota; Episcopal News Service (ENS), January 27, 2026

Shireen Korkzan, Episcopal News Service (ENS); Episcopal priests share experiences protesting as immigration raids continue in Minnesota

"Since federal immigration raids started in December in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Episcopalians have joined rallies, vigils and other events alongside interfaith partners and thousands of other protesters...

Anti-federal immigration enforcement protests also have been held in other cities nationwide, including Los Angeles, Chicago, Illinois, and New York. Last weekend, Episcopalians, including Maine Bishop Thomas J. Brown, joined thousands of protesters in rallies in Maine in response to an ICE raid that launched on Jan. 21. in the New England state.

The Episcopal Church offers several resources for Episcopalians engaged in immigration advocacy work and peaceful protests, including its Protesting Faithfully Toolkit. The resource offers “spiritual grounding and practical resources for faithful presence at protests and public demonstrations.” The church’s Immigration Action Toolkit shares resources from organizations that address migrants’ legal rights."

How ICE is using facial recognition in Minnesota; The Guardian, January 27, 2026

Sanya Mansoor, The Guardian; How ICE is using facial recognition in Minnesota

"Immigration enforcement agents across the US are increasingly relying on a new smartphone app with facial recognition technology.

The app is named Mobile Fortify. Simply pointing a phone’s camera at their intended target and scanning the person’s face allows Mobile Fortify to pull data on an individual from multiple federal and state databases, some of which federal courts have deemed too inaccurate for arrest warrants.

The US Department of Homeland Security has used Mobile Fortify to scan faces and fingerprints in the field more than 100,000 times, according to a lawsuit brought by Illinois and Chicago against the federal agency, earlier this month. That’s a drastic shift from immigration enforcement’s earlier use of facial recognition technology, which was otherwise limited largely to investigations and ports of entry and exit, legal experts say."

Episcopal leaders call for action after latest federal killing of Minnesota resident; Episcopal News Service, January 25, 2026

David Paulsen, Episcopal News Service; Episcopal leaders call for action after latest federal killing of Minnesota resident

"Episcopal leaders are amplifying widespread calls for the Trump administration to de-escalate its deployment of federal immigration authorities to American cities and for Congress to block new Homeland Security spending after those authorities on Jan. 24 killed a second U.S. citizen in three weeks in Minnesota.

Amateur video of the latest killing shows 37-year-old Alex Pretti using his cellphone camera to record federal agents patrolling a Minneapolis street. Those agents can be seen roughing up residents at the side of the street and attacking them and Pretti with pepper spray, then tackling Pretti to the ground and, seconds later, opening fire on him.

“Fellow Americans, things are impossibly hard in Minnesota right now. We are a state that feels under siege, and the people of this place are doing everything possible to resist,” Minnesota Bishop Craig Loya said in a written statement released after Pretti’s killing. “The campaign of reckless brutality being waged by the federal government has been well documented, including today’s killing of a citizen who was restrained and immobilized.”

The killing of Pretti, a nurse who worked at a Minneapolis Veterans Affairs hospital, occurred one day after a major anti-ICE demonstration in downtown Minneapolis that was attended by Episcopal clergy from across the country. Those developments follow the Jan. 7 shooting death of Renee Good, another 37-year-old Minneapolis resident, at the hands of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer.

In his statement, Loya also highlighted what he described as “something much more powerful” as his diocese joins efforts at “mobilizing for revolutionary love.”

“Vast networks of care, compassion, and solidarity, organized by churches to deliver food and supplies to those who cannot leave their homes,” Loya said. “People are documenting the violence being used against us in a way that puts their own lives at risk. … A rich web of underground care and hidden love is taking deep root, and it’s amazing to think what fruit that might bear when this occupation ends.”

He added calls to action for all Episcopalians. “Minnesotans cannot do more than we are doing,” he said, but others interested in helping can “flood your U.S. senators with appeals to not to further fund ICE,” organize peaceful demonstrations in their own communities and “nurture the Diocese of Minnesota’s primary engine of underground care and subversive love by donating to Casa Maria,” an Episcopal ministry that is providing food and supplies to “those rightfully afraid to go about their daily lives amidst the violence.”

As news spread of Pretti’s killing, other Episcopal bishops released statements offering solidarity with Loya and Minnesota Episcopalians and outrage at the Trump administration’s increasingly aggressive tactics targeting both legal and illegal immigration...

In an evening letter to the church, Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe referenced Matthew 4:12-23, the Jan. 25 Gospel reading, saying Jesus understood the divisions sewn “when earthly powers persuade human beings to fear one another, regard one another as strangers, and believe that there is not enough to go around.”

“In our time, the deadly power of those divisions is on display on the streets of Minneapolis, in other places across the United States, and in other countries around the world,” he said. “As has too often been the case throughout history, the most vulnerable among us are bearing the burden, shouldering the greatest share of risk and loss, and enduring the violation of their very humanity.”

And not unlike vulnerable communities, Episcopalians can no longer expect to practice their faith without risk; the Constitutional right to peaceful protest comes with deadly risk, he continued.

“In the coming years, our church will continue to be tested in every conceivable way as we insist that death and despair do not have the last word, and as we stand with immigrants and the most vulnerable among us who reside at the heart of God. We will be required to hold fast to God’s promise to make all things new, because our call to follow God’s law surpasses any earthly power or principality that might seek to silence our witness.”"

'It's about freedom of the press': photographer tackled by ICE throws camera to save it – video; The Guardian, January 26, 2026

Lauren Hurrell , The Guardian; 'It's about freedom of the press': photographer tackled by ICE throws camera to save it – video

"Last week, the independent photographer John Abernathy was tackled to the ground by ICE agents during a protest in Minneapolis. He said he tossed his camera in the hope of saving his photographs because the images of the protests 'deserve to be seen'. The Department of Homeland Security told CNN Abernathy had been arrested for obstructing pedestrian and vehicle traffic on federal property."

Most Fox News Reporting on Minneapolis Shooting Supports Official Version; The New York Times, January 25, 2026

Ken Bensinger, The New York Times; Most Fox News Reporting on Minneapolis Shooting Supports Official Version

Fox anchors were laser focused on promoting the Trump administration’s narrative that the slain protester, Alex Pretti, had brought the violence upon himself.

"On Sunday morning, reporters on many TV networks were poring over multiple videos of the shooting over the weekend of a protester in Minneapolis by immigration agents, trying to understand what happened from slow-mo footage and freeze-frame images.

But on Fox News, the nation’s top-rated cable news network, there was little of that kind of analysis. Instead, most of its hosts, reporters and guests appeared laser focused since the shooting late Saturday morning on supporting the Trump administration’s official narrative: that Alex Pretti, a 37-year old intensive care nurse, brought the violence upon himself."

The Trump Administration Is Lying About Gun Rights and the Death of Alex Pretti; Reason, January 25, 2026

ROBBY SOAVE, Reason; The Trump Administration Is Lying About Gun Rights and the Death of Alex Pretti

"As with the killing of Renee Good two weeks ago, the legal threshold at which lethal force can be justified is whether the officer who killed Pretti reasonably feared for his own safety. Only a careful, impartial investigation can determine that. The Justice Department has declined to conduct such an investigation into Good's death, instead seeking to investigate the victim's family.

Video footage of Pretti's death shows federal agents using pepper spray on protesters. Pretti appears to be recording the altercation with his cell phone. After an agent shoves one of the protesters to the ground, Pretti moves to assist her. Several CBP agents then decide to bring Pretti down.

It's conceivable that the agent who shot Pretti had the impression that he was reaching for his weapon—though the first shot clearly went off after another agent disarmed the protester. It's also possible that the killer didn't have even that much justification. Yet federal authorities have all but ruled out that possibility, and are making abjectly false statements in support of their mendacious posture.

Noem has repeatedly claimed it as a fact that Pretti intended to harm officers. "This individual showed up to a law enforcement operation with a weapon and dozens of rounds of ammunition," she told reporters. "He wasn't there to peacefully protest. He was there to perpetuate violence." Miller flatly asserted that Pretti was a "domestic terrorist" who "tried to assassinate federal law enforcement."

These are lies. They have no evidence that Pretti wanted to kill anyone. Even if evidence were unexpectedly to come out tomorrow that he was secretly a would-be assassin, it would still be wrong for officials to state as fact that Pretti intended to kill. There are no known facts that establish murder as his motivation. This is a man who was watching officers interact with protesters and recording it on his phone. Contrary to what the Department of Homeland Security wrote on X, he did not approach law enforcement, let alone with a gun drawn."

Alex Pretti’s Friends and Family Denounce ‘Sickening Lies’ About His Life; The New York Times, January 25, 2026

Talya Minsberg, Corina Knoll and Julie Bosman, The New York Times; Alex Pretti’s Friends and Family Denounce ‘Sickening Lies’ About His Life

[Kip Currier: How despicable and unethical it is to see and hear Trump 2.0 government officials like Kristi Noem, Greg Bovino, Kash Patel, Stephen Miller, J.D. Vance, and others -- whose salaries are paid for by American tax dollars and who take oaths to serve as public servants for U.S. democracy and uphold the Constitution -- wield conspiracy theories and unsubstantiated falsehoods as reputational weapons to defame and slander individuals like Alex Jeffrey Pretti and Renee Nicole Good.]

[Excerpt]

"He was a calm presence amid hospital chaos. A mentor who taught kindness and patience to younger friends and colleagues. A singer with a knack for dancing. A bicyclist who treasured the beauty of Minnesota.

This weekend, the family, co-workers and friends of Alex Pretti, who was killed by immigration agents in a confrontation after he was apparently filming them, remembered his life, even as the circumstances of his death were debated on the national stage.

They shared photos of the Alex they knew: a smiling, bearded Mr. Pretti in the powder-blue scrubs he wore at his job as an intensive-care nurse at the Veterans Affairs hospital, an outdoors lover posing with his mountain bike on a wooded trail and a student wearing a green cap and gown as he sang a solo at his high school graduation in Green Bay, Wis.

And they denounced what they saw as smear campaigns in the aftermath of Mr. Pretti’s death.

Within hours of the killing by federal agents on a Minneapolis street, Trump administration officials labeled Mr. Pretti a “would-be assassin” and asserted, with no evidence, that he had committed an act of “domestic terrorism.”

Through their own shock and grief, people who knew him struggled to rise above the lies and insults, they said, to describe who he was.

Rory Shefchek, a friend from high school who now lives in Madison, Wis., said that he hoped that Mr. Pretti would be remembered as the person he knew.

“He was a helpful, kind guy,” Mr. Shefchek said. “He was a confident, diligent and respectful person throughout his life. I hope that Alex’s story can catalyze change, as someone who believed in doing the right thing.”

Of the cellphone footage of Mr. Pretti’s death that has circulated widely in the news and on social media, Mr. Shefchek said, “We have all seen the video and our eyes don’t lie.”"