New Jersey leaders demand accountability following Alex Pretti’s killing by federal immigration agents

New Jersey leaders are strongly denouncing the use of force by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal immigration agencies and calling for accountability nationwide.

The reaction comes in the aftermath of the killing of 37-year-old intensive care nurse Alex Pretti in Minneapolis by U.S. Border Patrol agents. The latest fatality has renewed calls for more scrutiny of the aggressive enforcement tactics used by ICE and other federal agents.

In a statement issued Jan. 25, Gov. Mikie Sherrill described the killing of Pretti, who cared for veterans, as “a tragedy — and the result of a reckless operation where federal leaders have clearly lost control.”

“This also isn’t the first tragedy,” Sherrill said, as a reminder of the recent shooting death of Renee Good, a mom of three, by ICE agents.

After Good was killed Jan. 7, President Donald Trump’s administration said the shooting was in response to “an act of domestic terrorism,” but Minnesota officials and eyewitness accounts rejected that assertion.

“These untrained, masked agents aren’t making communities safer — they’re occupying cities, inciting violence, and violating the Constitution,” Sherrill said. “And there must be accountability for their lawless actions.”

The governor called on Congress to immediately impeach Kristi Noem, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security secretary.

“There needs to be a stand-down from duty, because all of these agents are acting completely outside the scope of their duties,” Sherrill said during an interview with WNYC. “It’s dangerous, and it should not be acceptable to anyone — Democrat, Republican alike, should all be calling for this to end immediately.”

New Jersey U.S. Sens. Cory Booker and Andy Kim announced that they will vote against a pending bill to fund the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. “Congress must not continue funding an out of control and unaccountable DHS and ICE that have repeatedly escalated violence and so severely broken laws and Constitutional protections,” Booker said in a statement posted on social media.

Kim said in a statement that he will not vote to “fund this lawless violence.”

“Trump’s abuse of power is tearing us apart,” Kim said. “We have three years left of this presidency, and either we stand up and protect our democracy now, or we risk going down a path that is unthinkable, will hurt countless people and do irreversible damage to our country.”

U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone, a Democrat representing New Jersey’s 6th District, issued a statement urging his Republican colleagues to speak up. “I mourn Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti, two Americans whose lives were taken in the midst of this lawlessness,” the statement reads. “They deserved better from their government. There was a time when Republicans in Congress believed in the Constitution and in a basic moral obligation to speak when something was plainly wrong. They must join Democrats in speaking out now.”

Four other New Jersey U.S. representatives — Donald Norcross (D-1), Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-12), LaMonica McIver (D-10) and Rob Menendez (D-8) — called for abolishing ICE in its current form.

“If Minnesota is where the fight for the soul [of] our nation is going to be then I will go back again and again until ICE is out of Minnesota,” Menendez said in a statement. “And I will keep fighting until ICE is out of all of our communities. And I will keep fighting until ICE no longer exists.”

New Jersey U.S. Reps. Tom Kean Jr., R-7, and Chris Smith, R-4, have not publicly commented on the issue, but during an appearance on Fox News, Rep. Jeff Van Drew, R-2, called the suggestion to abolish ICE “ridiculous.”

He blamed Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz for Pretti’s death.

“They defend illegals, but not only worse than that, what we’re really going after, illegal criminals who are guilty of violent crime,” he said. “I know it’s bizarre to say but it’s true, they still want to keep them in the city, they still want to keep them in the state.”