Videos of Minneapolis shooting undercut Trump admin claims

On Saturday, Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care unit nurse and U.S. citizen, was shot and killed by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis. There’s a wide gap between what Americans have seen of the shooting and what federal officials are telling them.

Soon after the shooting, Department of Homeland Security officials rushed to defend the officers involved, claiming the victim “approached U.S. Border Patrol officers with a 9 mm semi-automatic handgun” and that when federal agents attempted to disarm him, “the suspect violently resisted.”

DHS Secretary Kristi Noem defended the Border Patrol agent who shot Pretti, saying in a news conference that the agent fired “defensive” shots after the victim violently brandished a gun. “The officers attempted to disarm this individual, but the armed suspect reacted violently,” Noem said.

In a separate press conference, Border Patrol commander-at-large Greg Bovino claimed Pretti may have wanted to do “maximum damage” and “massacre law enforcement.”

But videos taken by bystanders, filmed from several different angles, tell a different story.

In the first video verified by CNBC, protestors can be heard honking their horns on an urban Minneapolis street, while the video’s author records through a car windshield as the car moves.

At 15 seconds, the camera pans to the left to show a man on the side of the street wearing a brown jacket and tan pants (believed to be Alex Pretti) holding up what appears to be a phone while being confronted by two federal agents. 

Pretti steps backwards away from the confrontation while appearing to yell at an agent.  

At 21 seconds, the person filming the video drives past the confrontation, and the camera swings to the other side of the street as someone in the car yells profanities.  

In a second video verified by CNBC, protestors can be heard blowing whistles and honking their horns at federal agents in a video on a cold Minneapolis street. 

At seven seconds, the video shows a man dressed in tactical gear believed to be a federal agent shove a woman wearing a brown jacket and black leggings in the back near the side of the street. She doesn’t fall but moves several feet away because of the shove.  

The camera briefly shifts to the middle of the street before going back to the confrontation on the side at 11 seconds. The agent is face-to-face with one woman wearing a long cream jacket and charcoal pants. Next to her is a man in a brown jacket and tan pants believed to be Pretti, and next to him is the woman in brown jacket, black leggings who was shoved seconds ago.  

At 12 seconds in the second video, the agent shoves the woman wearing the cream jacket to the ground. Pretti puts himself between the agent and the woman, who is on her back in a snowbank on the side of the road.

At 14 seconds, the agent starts spraying Pretti in the face with a chemical agent. Pretti covers his face and turns away from the officer. Other agents wearing…