The FBI is now leading the investigation into the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, with Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations branch supporting the investigation, Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said.

The Minnesota Timberwolves released a statement from its players regarding the rising anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) tensions in Minneapolis.

There have been two fatal incidents in Minneapolis in recent weeks involving federal immigration agents amid heightened tensions over the operations as well as clashes with anti-ICE demonstrators.

Like everyone in the Twin Cities, the Timberwolves have been impacted by the events, and they released a statement expressing their “sincere sympathies and love to everyone.”

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“We, the Minnesota Timberwolves players, extend our sincere sympathies and love to everyone across the Twin Cities and throughout Minnesota who has been affected by the recent tragic events impacting our communities,” the statement read. “Minnesota is strongest when we uplift and support one another, and there is no room for hatred or division across our great state or among all who live here.

“We mourn the lives lost and send strength, peace and compassion to all who are hurting. We believe in the resilience, unity and care that define Minnesotans, and bring our communities together in times of hardship and need.”

The Timberwolves postponed their game on Saturday against the Golden State Warriors in the aftermath of the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old Department of Veteran Affairs ICU nurse, involving a Border Patrol agent.

ANTI-ICE PROTESTS TAKE PLACE AS T’WOLVES-WARRIORS NBA GAME TAKES PLACE

“The decision was made to prioritize the safety and security of the Minneapolis community,” the NBA said, adding that the game would be played Sunday.

The following day, NBA fans delivered anti-ICE messages at Target Center, with signs inside the arena reading, “ICE out now.” A moment of silence was held for Pretti — the same protocol for the Timberwolves following the earlier death of Renee Good.

The team held a moment of silence for Good, 37, who was killed while operating a vehicle that agents ordered her to exit, according to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. Good, according to Noem, refused and “attempted to run them over and ram them with her vehicle.”

“Our thoughts are with her family and everyone affected, and our hearts are with our community as we hope for healing and unity during this challenging time,” the Target Center’s public address announcer said. 

Timberwolves head coach Chris Finch also spoke before his squad defeated the Cleveland Cavaliers.

“As we all know, our community has suffered yet another unspeakable tragedy,” he said. “We want to just convey our condolences and heartfelt wishes and prayers and thoughts to the families and loved ones and all of those that are greatly affected by what happened.”

The National Basketball Players Association released a statement this past Sunday as well.

“Following the news of yet another fatal shooting in Minneapolis, a city that has been on the forefront of the fight against injustices, NBA players can no longer remain silent,” the union said. “Now more than ever, we must defend the right to freedom of speech and stand in solidarity with the people in Minnesota protesting and risking their lives to demand justice.

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“The fraternity of NBA players, like the United States itself, is a community enriched by its global citizens, and we refuse to let the flames of division threaten the civil liberties that are meant to protect us all. The NBPA and its members extend our deepest condolences to the families of Alex Pretti and Renee Good, just as our thoughts remain focused on the safety and well-being of all members of our community.”

The shooting fueled further protests in the Twin Cities amid a recent surge of ICE activity in the area as part of the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration.

Fox News’ Ryan Gaydos and Ryan Morik contributed to this report.

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Brandon Sigüenza saw his first federal immigration agent just one minute before he was arrested by one.

He and his friend, Patty O’Keefe, were following ICE officers in their vehicle after receiving an alert that agents were nearby. Soon after arriving to observe the scene, an agent approached their car and sprayed chemicals into the front vents, then began shouting.

An agent yelled at Sigüenza that he was under arrest, so he said he put his hands in the air and waited for instructions. The agent didn’t say to leave the car. Instead, they smashed the two front windows, pulled Sigüenza out of an unlocked door and slammed him against the car.

“I told him, ‘Sir, my passport is in my pocket.’ He said, ‘Shut the fuck up,’” Sigüenza, a US citizen, told the Guardian.

Sigüenza and O’Keefe were put into separate vehicles and taken to the BH Whipple federal building, a facility just south of the Twin Cities where agents take people they have arrested – both US citizens and immigrants they intend to deport. They were held there for hours before eventually being released.

The killing of Alex Pretti by a federal officer on Saturday, less than three weeks after the killing of Renee Good, brought heightened attention to the brutality observers and bystanders are facing in Minneapolis as they witness and document immigration enforcement. Volunteer observers told the Guardian they have been subjected to violence since the beginning of Operation Metro Surge in early December.

Observers who had been detained by federal agents and released, many without charges, told the Guardian they were denied access to medical care, phone calls and lawyers.

Still, even after federal agents killed two bystanders in Minneapolis, Sigüenza said he was determined to keep observing and recording the federal agents’ actions.

“If we don’t document and film federal agents, then they can shoot you 10 times and then say that you’re brandishing a firearm and it ends there,” he said. The fact that bystanders and community members were able to capture the agents who shot Good and Pretti, and present evidence to refute the Trump administration’s claims about those incidents, he said, speaks to the power of bearing witness.

“There will be absolutely no accountability unless people are documenting,” he said.

Federal agents have been taking an increasingly aggressive approach against observers – using so-called “less lethal” weapons such as chemical irritants and projectiles against onlookers at the scene of immigration raids.

RM, an observer who asked that their name remain anonymous because they feared further retaliation from federal agents while patrolling, said that they were at the scene of a raid – on the same day that Good was killed – when agents smashed their car window and sprayed chemical irritants directly into their car.

Then an agent cuffed RM and used a pain-inducing restrain to drag them out, crushing their wrist in the process. Afterwards, agents drove RM to the Whipple building. When RM told one of the agents he looked rather young, they pushed them down and held their face into the ground. The agents yelled at RM, who is trans, saying, “Do you like the dirt, queer?”, they recalled to the Guardian.

They were not offered water to clear the irritant out of their eyes for more than an hour. Eventually, they were left to wash their face at a broken, low-pressure sink inside the cell where they were held.

“The whole incident was painful and humiliating,” said RM. When they were released about three hours later, without any charges, they were finally able to wash in a shower. It took almost an hour to fully rinse off – and the irritant spread and burned their skin even as they tried to wash it off. “That, I would say, is the most painful experience of my life.”

These escalating tactics, observers told the Guardian, seem to be designed to intimidate and deter them from monitoring the activity of federal agents, warning their communities and bearing witness to immigration arrests.

In a statement to the Guardian, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said that “rioters and terrorists have assaulted law enforcement”. The agency said that “despite these grave threats and dangerous situations our law enforcement as followed their training and used the minimum amount of force necessary to protect themselves, the public, and federal property.” The statement did not give a spokesperson’s name and did not address multiple questions about the use of force against RM and other observers, nor did it address questions about why agents have been smashing the car windows of observers.

Jac Kovarik, who has been volunteering as an observer for nearly two months now, said that agents had tried a number of times to intimidate them, including by taking photos of their former house and car.

In December, Kovarik was arrested by agents and taken to Whipple. They were patted down, told to remove all their jewelry and put all personal belongings into a bag, cuffed at the ankles, and taken to a cell. They were denied a request to make a phone call.

Other observers found Kovarik’s information in their car, and informed neighbors that they had been detained. An attorney eventually came to Whipple, and Kovarik was released after about seven hours in detention. They, too, were never charged with a crime.

On another occasion, after Good was killed, Kovarik was on patrol with a friend when agents routed them from the friend’s home and drew guns on them.

“That was a huge escalation,” Kovarik said.

Attorneys told the Guardian that the DHS had been regularly denying them access to clients held at the Whipple building – which has become a home base for the thousands of immigration officers who have swarmed the Twin Cities. The building is also the first stop for immigrants detained in the recent enforcement surge, and the spot where dozens of bystanders and observers have been held after arrest.

On Wednesday, the Advocates for Human Rights and a detained individual filed a class-action lawsuit challenging detention practices, alleging a pattern of denying lawyers confidential communication with their clients at Minnesota facilities including Whipple.

In a statement to the Guardian, the DHS categorically denied that people detained at Whipple were unable to access attorneys.

Sigüenza was eventually able to meet with a lawyer, but the door to the room where they met would not close, and agents were able to listen in, he said.

Observers who were detained at Whipple provided corroborating accounts that agents appeared disorganized and unclear about who, exactly, they were holding at the facility.

Wes Powers, who was arrested and detained there on 8 January, told the Guardian he witnessed agents accessing Facebook and personal social media accounts on the same cellphones they were using to photograph detainees and their identification cards.

Sigüenza said that at one point during his detention he was brought into a cell with three men who identified themselves as from Homeland Security Investigations. They seemed to insinuate he was in a lot of trouble and they could help him if he would give them the names of protest organizers or undocumented neighbors. They said if he had family members outside the US who wanted to enter the country, they could help with that as well (Sigüenza is of Mexican descent).

“I told him, ‘I’m just trying to protect my neighbors.’ And he said, ‘Oh, where are your neighbors from?’” Sigüenza said. “He thought I meant my nextdoor neighbors. I just meant my community generally.”

Meanwhile, Tippy Amundson and Heather Zemien, neighbors in the Brooklyn Park suburb of Minneapolis, had a different experience than most while being detained.

They saw federal agents at an apartment building and were alerting people to their presence by honking their horns on 22 January. Agents told them to leave, but as they were leaving, they saw a police officer and stopped to ask some questions.

Then a federal agents’ vehicle blocked their car and the agents accused them of calling the cops. The agents pulled them out of the car and arrested them. An agent put Amundson’s phone on a console in the vehicle, but she was able to use Siri to call her husband.

A few blocks into the drive, an agent in the front passenger seat started having a seizure, and the women told the other agents what to do and how to help. Amundson moved his weapon so she could put him on his hip and held his head up so he wouldn’t choke on his own tongue.

After emergency services arrived, and after helping the agent through multiple seizures, they were again handcuffed and brought to the Whipple building.

Amundson’s husband alerted her state representative, who quickly worked to get them released. Between the aid rendered to the agent and the knowledge of a representative on the way, Amundson and Zemien said “they pretty much rolled out the red carpet for us” at the Whipple building – they got water and a bathroom and a heater.

They were out within three hours and were cited for impeding federal officers.

“I’m not well,” Amundson said in the aftermath of the experience, noting she had not been eating. “But I’m well supported and I’m well cared for.”