Gun rights groups and legal experts question Trump administration’s stance on the Second Amendment after shooting

By Devan Cole, Josh Campbell, CNN

(CNN) — Claims by Trump administration officials that the man fatally shot by a federal agent in Minneapolis lacked a right to possess a firearm and that his killing was justified are being dismissed by legal experts and assailed by gun rights groups ordinarily aligned with the president.

The rhetoric from Trump law enforcement officials, including his FBI director and the top Border Patrol agent, goes against the decadeslong GOP effort to throttle gun control rules.

“They’ve stood up in court and tried to push back against state laws that regulate firearms — access, use, carry — so it’s pretty shocking to me to see them now use an example of a lawful gun owner as justification for force,” Megan Walsh, a professor at the University of Minnesota Law School who specializes in the Second Amendment, said of the Trump officials’ comments.

A federal immigration officer shot and killed 37-year-old Alex Pretti in Minneapolis on Saturday after wrestling the lawful gun owner to the ground as he was recording agents with a phone. At least one officer can be heard shouting “he’s got a gun” as one officer appears to reach into Pretti’s waistband. An officer appears to step away holding Pretti’s weapon, and then a shot rings out about a second later, followed by at least nine more, videos reviewed by CNN show.

“We respect that Second Amendment right, but those rights don’t count when you riot and assault, delay, obstruct and impede law enforcement officers and, most especially, when you mean to do that beforehand,” Border Patrol Commander-at-Large Gregory Bovino told CNN’s Dana Bash on Sunday:

Bovino, who has been leading the administration’s immigration enforcement operation in Minneapolis, did not cite evidence on his claims that Pretti committed violence or interfered with agents or that the protest was a “riot.”

Minnesota has for years allowed the open and concealed carry of a handgun with a license issued after an applicant meets certain criteria, and state regulations do not restrict such individuals from having firearms at protests. The state’s laws are so permissive that licensed firearm owners are even allowed to bring guns into Minnesota’s Capitol building.

Yet FBI Director Kash Patel, one of several administration officials who rushed to defend the shooting, said on Fox News: “You cannot bring a firearm loaded with multiple magazines to any sort of protest that you want. It’s that simple.”

“No one who wants to be peaceful shows up at a protest with a firearm that is loaded with two full magazines,” he added.

Walsh said she sees “no gray in this situation.”

“He was lawfully carrying a firearm, and that is not any license to kill someone,” Walsh said. “We have a Constitution that provides a Second Amendment individual right, and it is unlawful to kill a man for exercising his constitutional rights.”

Walsh noted that the Trump administration’s rhetoric toward Pretti is out of step with its opposition to state firearms regulations. Just last week, the Justice Department urged the Supreme Court to strike down a Hawaii law that bans people from carrying guns onto private property without the explicit approval of the property owner, arguing it trampled on Second Amendment rights.

Amy Sweasy, a former longtime prosecutor in the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office, which prosecutes cases in Minneapolis, agreed.

“It is inconsistent to hear an administration that has been very, very vocal in protecting Second Amendment rights and things like concealed-carry laws and open-carry laws to then — in a victim-blaming sense — saying, ‘Our agents aren’t responsible’ or that that this young man lost his life because of choices he made that are actually guaranteed to him by the same laws that they purport to support,” she said.

Patel’s statements also drew immediate pushback from the Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus, which on Sunday joined several other gun rights advocacy groups in sounding the alarm.

Gun rights groups have long defended the right to openly carry firearms in public, a position that Trump and others on the right have championed over the years.

“This is completely incorrect on Minnesota law. There is no prohibition on a permit holder carrying a firearm, loaded, with multiple magazines at a protest or rally in Minnesota,” the Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus wrote on X in response to Patel’s comments.

A day earlier, Bill Essayli, a top prosecutor in the US Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles, posted on X that “if you approach law enforcement with a gun, there is a high likelihood they will be legally justified in shooting you. Don’t do it!”

Those remarks drew swift condemnation from the National Rifle Association, the US’ leading gun lobby, which called them “dangerous and wrong” and urged officials to resist “making generalizations and demonizing law-abiding citizens.”

Another prominent group, the Gun Owners of America, described Essayli’s comments as “untoward” and said the Second Amendment “protects Americans’ right to bear arms while protesting — a right the federal government must not infringe upon.”

Andrew Willinger, a professor at Georgia State University’s College of Law and expert on the Second Amendment, said that while the groups may not be outright embracing Pretti, their rapid rejection of the officials’ statements underscore a commitment to the gun rights they’ve worked to advance.

“At the very least, I think it will put them in a tough position if they don’t,” Willinger said. “It may be an instance where these gun rights groups are going to have to decide what to do when the victim is not your typical gun owner … and I think that might be the case here.”

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