In their words: An examination of statements Trump officials made about what led to Pretti’s death

By MEG KINNARD and HANNAH FINGERHUT, Associated Press

Trump administration officials swiftly sought to portray 37-year-old Alex Pretti, an intensive care nurse, as an armed disruptor intent on doing harm to federal agents when he brought his own gun to a Minneapolis street where officers clashed with protesters over President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown. Video shot by bystanders and reviewed by The Associated Press appears to contradict some of those statements.

Trump himself weighed in on social media after the shooting, sharing images of the gun that immigration officials said was recovered from Pretti and asking: “What is that all about? Where are the local Police? Why weren’t they allowed to protect ICE Officers?”

However, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt stressed during a briefing Monday that she had “not heard the president characterize” Pretti as a domestic terrorist, as Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem had suggested a day earlier, or use such words as assassin, as deputy White House chief of staff Stephen Miller did.

In their own words, this is ...