STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Some people who voted for President Trump have been horrified by the video from Minnesota. We heard elsewhere on today's program about a focus group of Trump voters from 2024 who've turned against his immigration policy. They'd seen the video. They knew it frame by frame. In Minnesota, Republican candidate for governor dropped out to show his objection to that policy, and Republican Nolan West joins us next from Minnesota. He is a state representative, and his district includes some of the Twin Cities' northern suburbs. Welcome to the program, sir.
NOLAN WEST: Thanks for having me on.
INSKEEP: I noticed that you put out a statement over the weekend calling for an end to the federal immigration operation in Minnesota. Did you have some personal experience that motivated you to say that?
WEST: Oh, so that was the day of my 1-year-old's birthday. And my wife was going to pick out a cake - well, pick up a cake from a baker on the very street where Pretti was shot minutes after it happened. As she was leaving, droves of protesters were showing up, and it took her, like, an extra 20 minutes to get home.
INSKEEP: And how did that affect you when you heard that story?
WEST: Well, I was already looking at the situation with resounding depression, let's say. And when you see this happening in your own state and somewhat again after it happened recently, it's - just hurts. And when it affects your family's safety, and, you know, honestly, I was more concerned about the protesters and her safety than the ICE agents posing any threat to her.
INSKEEP: Understood.
WEST: But it was still, like, a horrible situation. And knowing it's an ongoing situation, and the only way to stop it I see is the federal government to do something.
INSKEEP: Would you have been in support of the way the president has been enforcing immigration law up to the last month or two in Minnesota?
WEST: Well, I think there's broad support for deporting illegal immigrants who have committed an actual crime or charged with drug or murder or something, a violent crime like that. The idea that we're going to deport every single one was never - like, it's shocking that that seems like it was even attempted because, you know, our immigration system has been broken for so many years that that was never going to be something doable without, well, one, violence and two, economic calamity 'cause significant parts of our economy, especially in agriculture, depend on them.
INSKEEP: I want to be clear, the Trump administration has constantly given multiple messages on this. We were told during the campaign, first, we're going to get rid of the criminals, which it sounds like you completely support and which most Americans would support. But then they kept adding to the numbers, increasing the numbers, saying, actually, it's 11 million, maybe 15 million, maybe 20 million. A few weeks ago, the Department of Homeland Security talked about 100 million deportations, which, of course, is far more than the number of people without legal status in the entire United States. Was there something of a bait-and-switch, or just inviting people to believe what they wanted to do what they liked?
WEST: Well, I mean, there's always a difference between any presidential candidate's campaign and their administration. It happens with every single administration. I don't - I can't speak to their motives, but I would like them to stick to a more refined approach that doesn't have any of these situations where they, you know, even just detain a U.S. citizen is unacceptable.
INSKEEP: I want to take a little bit of extra time and talk about what the administration has said over the last several days and get your thoughts about it. As you know very well, the Trump administration got its say on this - referred to Mr. Pretti, your fellow citizen, as a domestic terrorist, said that he had brandished a gun, when video clearly showed that he did not brandish a gun. Lots of other things were said, saying that he wanted to do maximum damage to immigration agents and so forth. Now we have an opportunity to hear from the other side, a friend of Alex Pretti was on All Things Considered, the NPR program, yesterday. Scott Detlow (ph) spoke - Detrow spoke with Heather Zielinski, who's a friend of this nurse, this ICU nurse. And here's some of their conversation.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR CONTENT)
SCOTT DETROW: I want to ask what you thought when you heard Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem call Alex Pretti a domestic terrorist or top White House aide Stephen Miller call him a would-be assassin.
HEATHER ZIELINSKI: Liars, traitors, cowards.
INSKEEP: And she went on to say a little more.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR CONTENT)
ZIELINSKI: He was nothing like what the people you just named said. He was an American citizen. He was a good man. He was a hard worker, and he cared for people.
INSKEEP: What do you think of the way the administration has handled this incident once it happened?
WEST: I mean, it obviously was a complete disaster. For one, when you speak in these situations, you don't speak for yourself. You speak for the organization you represent. And I have no idea why it was so hard not to say, you know, this is a active investigation. We're going to investigate, get to the bottom of it, and we have no comment at this time, and then actually investigate it and cooperate with state investigators. I just - it was absolutely horrifying to see. I'm glad it looks like there's a corner being turned with the conversations between Governor Walz and President Trump, and bringing in Tom Homan as somebody who doesn't have a bunch of statements that they refuse to retract. So I'm optimistic that we're trending in the right direction now, but the response was terrible.
INSKEEP: What do you want from your state's Democratic governor, now, Governor Walz, who did speak with President Trump?
WEST: Well, I would like to see him meaningfully compromise. Like, both sides have been really dug in. One of the things that caused this, outside of just having federal agents here, is local law enforcement, state patrol were pulled from providing protection for them, which created a lot of these opportunities for ICE agents who are not properly trained for this kind of stuff to engage with protesters. And that - you know, that helped create this situation. So what I would like to see is, OK, you have to get less ICE agents on the street. Like, that's his position he wants (ph). Let's make sure we - the federal government takes them out and they can do that if you help them enforce a more targeted approach. And that's what I would like to see.
INSKEEP: And I guess we'll just note for the record. We've heard differing statements about whether police have said they're withdrawing from DHS or whether DHS isn't giving them information. But in any case, you are correct that in this incident and so many others, it's DHS people not trained for crowd control who are doing crowd control and a little more. Representative, thanks for your time. I really appreciate it.
WEST: Thank you for having me.
INSKEEP: Nolan West is a Republican state representative in Minnesota who has called for federal immigration agents to pull back.
(SOUNDBITE OF PARACHUTE DAY'S "YEARBOOK") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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