RICHMOND, Va. β Virginia Governor Abigail Spanberger called the fatal shooting of Minneapolis Veterans Affairs nurse Alex Pretti by a U.S. Border Patrol officer Saturday an "outrage" during an interview with CBS 6 Sunday.
"There needs to be really significant oversight into the actions that we're seeing and accountability," Spanberger said.
When President Donald Trump was asked by a Wall Street Journal reporter Sunday if the officer who shot Pretti did the right thing, the president said, "We're reviewing everything and will come out with a determination."
Over the weekend, Border Patrol Chief Gregory Bovino said agents were in the area Saturday conducting a targeted operation for a man with a criminal record in the country illegally.
"Look at his criminal record, domestic assault, intentional infliction of bodily harm, disorderly conduct. He's also got some other records there as well. This individual is still roaming the streets today. This is the individual on that targeted law enforcement efforts that border patrol agents were engaged in yesterday, when they were disrupted, assaulted and prevented from conducting that title eight mission by individuals intent on making the choice to riot, to create anarchy and to be a violent mob," Bovino said.
Cell phone video appears to show Pretti filming agents before an officer pepper sprays him, and then he is pulled into the street by agents where there is a scuffle with him. It appears an officer then fired several shots at Pretti.
Governor Spanberger, a former federal officer with the CIA, said the videos she watched raise questions about training and procedure.
"There's a man who's there holding a camera, and the fact that that escalated with this border patrol agent confronting a man who was exercising his first amendment right, and the Border Patrol agent approached him and not deescalating, right? Law enforcement is so frequently trained to deescalate. But, in fact, you know from the videos that I've seen, appears to escalate the situation, throw a man to the ground and then shoot him while he's on the ground. It's an outrage," Spanberger said.
With Hanover County announcing last week that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security intends to purchase a building there to use as an ICE processing facility, the governor says she worries incidents like the Pretti shooting erodes the community's trust in local and state law enforcement.
"Anytime there is a tragedy like this, it impacts the entire law enforcement community when somebody else, someplace else, or other agencies are employing such careless, reckless, I don't even know if you can call them tactics. No one would ever be trained to respond that way or behave that way as a law enforcement officer," Spanberger said.
Republican Congressman John McGuire, who represents voters in Goochland, Amelia, Powhatan, Louisa and parts of Hanover, said he's still "working to understand what led to the recent tragic events in Minnesota," and he wants the "facts fully investigated."
But he said that "Minnesota's refusal to allow ICE arrests at county jails has pushed enforcement activity into public spaces, increasing the risk for law enforcement officers and the community."
McGuire said he hopes Border Czar Tom Homan can come to agreement with Minnesota Governor Tim Walz to allow ICE actions to take place inside jails, where they are safer and more controlled.
"This is an approach Mr. Homan has been advocating for over a year, and it should not take further tragedy to make this common-sense change,β McGuire said.
Local Republican Congressman Rob Wittman was also asked for his perspective on the Pretti shooting but has not yet responded.
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