Trump and team seem to prioritize vilifying victims of their immigration operations, regardless of conflicting evidence

In the moments after federal officers shot Minneapolis ICU nurse Alex Pretti dead, Trump administration figures almost immediately made public statements in press conferences, televised interviews and social media posts that were at best indifferent to the evidence available at the time and at worst completely fabricated.

A pattern is emerging, in which the Trump administration prioritizes the vilification of the dead victim as to blame for the incident over preserving the neutrality of any investigative process.

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“It is nonsense and it’s lies,” said Minnesota governor Tim Walz at a press conference about six hours after the shooting. “I’m rejecting the rush to judgment within 15 minutes of this … They already will slander this individual. They’ve already made this the case, and I will just say, you will all start to see it, and some of you probably have. There’s multiple angles of this, and I’ll go back to what we talked about before. They’re telling you not to trust your eyes and ears, not to trust the facts that you’re seeing in front of them.”