Federal agents detain a protester in Minneapolis on Tuesday.CHARLY TRIBALLEAU/AFP/Getty Images
Ian Buruma is the author of numerous books, including, most recently, Spinoza: Freedom’s Messiah.
When a white police officer in Minneapolis killed George Floyd nearly six years ago, the political repercussions were serious, immediate, and felt nationwide. The Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement gathered steam. Huge protests – mostly peaceful, but not always – took place across America, as well as in many other countries. “Defund the police” became a popular slogan.
It looked like a high point for liberal politics. But in fact, BLM probably ended up hurting the Democrats, as many voters came to regard the party, fairly or not, as elitists who coddled minorities and treated white working-class Americans with contempt.
But the recent killings by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Border Patrol agents of people observing their raids in that same city of Minneapolis could be more consequential. On January 7, Renee Nicole Macklin Good, a mother of three, was shot dead through her car window while moving away from federal officers. On January 24, intensive-care nurse Alex Pretti, with only a phone in hand, was shot 10 times in the back after being wrestled to the ground.
Without any evidence, U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem smeared Ms. Macklin Good as a “domestic terrorist.” Stephen Miller, President Donald Trump’s deputy chief of staff, described Mr. Pretti in a social-media post as a “would-be assassin.”
The shootings were predictable. Sending poorly trained, heavily armed masked men into Democratic cities to kick down doors, shove people into cars, detain children, and arrest people without a warrant or probable cause is a performative kind of brutal violence. ICE agents do not try to hide their aggression; they want people to see their abusive behaviour.
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More migrants were deported under presidents Barack Obama (more than 3.1 million) and Joe Biden (roughly 4 million) than under Trump (1.9 million in his first term, and 540,000 so far in his second term). But these Democratic presidents were more discriminating in their methods, and mostly targeted convicted criminals. There were no stories of children being used as bait, of half-dressed old men being dragged from their homes in freezing conditions, of people being shipped off to countries whose languages they don’t even speak – let alone of U.S. citizens being gunned down in the street.
This orgy of violence is deliberate. It is meant to show that the Trump administration is serious about ridding the United States of “drug dealers, criminals, and rapists.”
Autocratic governments – and some revolutionary movements – tend to use performative brutality to intimidate people who could conceivably stand in their way. The Nazis consolidated their power with the help of the Sturmabteilung, brown-shirted thugs who were licensed to beat up Jews, Communists, and other “undesirables.”
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Many people who might not approve of such tactics prefer to look away, not only because they are intimidated, but also because violent regimes are selective in their targets. So long as one wasn’t a Jew or a leftist in the early years of Hitler’s Germany, one was unlikely to get into serious trouble.
But Joseph Stalin was deliberately indiscriminate. Anyone, even loyal party members, could end up in torture prisons or slave labour camps. People in the Soviet Union lived in a permanent state of fear, which was of course Stalin’s intention. But this is relatively rare. Most dictators, or aspiring dictators, select specific groups to isolate and persecute.
When ICE agents targeted Hispanics or people of colour, most white Americans did not fear for their safety, even if they deplored such tactics. The murders of Ms. Macklin Good and Mr. Pretti changed that. Not only were they U.S. citizens, they were about as mainstream as a white American from the Midwest can be. Neither had a criminal record. Mr. Pretti was even a gun owner.
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But the killings upset many other people, too, across the political spectrum. If Mr. Pretti and Ms. Macklin Good could be executed in broad daylight, anyone could. The Trump administration realized fairly quickly that this could harm their chances in November’s midterm elections. Allegations of “domestic terrorism” were dialed back. Mr. Miller acknowledged a possible breach of ICE “protocol.” Mr. Trump even called Ms. Macklin Good’s killing a “tragedy.” The man overseeing the raids in Minneapolis, Gregory Bovino, was demoted and transferred out of Minnesota.
This may come as a relief to some. Public opinion still counts in America, even if it can be fickle. While memories are often short, the footage of two peaceful American citizens killed at close range by trigger-happy government goons won’t fade fast. But we will have to wait and see if it drives Americans, especially those who might be having second thoughts about voting for Mr. Trump, to the polls in November.
Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2026.