Healthcare workers, union members, and veterans gather for “ICE OUT NOW!” A vigil and memorial for Alex Preti in front of the Jesse Brown Veterans Affairs Medical Center on January 27, 2026 in Chicago, Illinois.
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The Justice Department has launched a federal civil rights investigation into the shooting death of Minneapolis resident Alex Preti, who was killed by a Border Patrol agent on Saturday, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said.
“We’re looking at everything that might shed light on that day,” Blanche said at a press conference Friday.
The Department of Homeland Security also announced Friday that the Federal Bureau of Investigation will lead the federal investigation.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem first revealed the change in the agency leading the investigation in an interview on Fox News Thursday night. The department announced earlier this week that Homeland Security Investigations, a division within the department, would lead the investigation.
“We will continue to follow the investigation led by the FBI, provide them with all the information they need to reach a conclusion, and ensure that the American people know the truth of the situation and how we can continue to move forward and protect the American people,” Noem told Fox host Sean Hannity.
Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin confirmed Friday that the FBI will lead the Preti investigation and that HSI will assist the FBI. Separately, Customs and Border Protection, part of DHS, is conducting its own internal investigation into the shooting, during which two officers fired at Preti.
U.S. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche speaks during a press conference at the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington, DC, on January 30, 2026.
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DHS did not immediately respond to questions about when the change was made or why. The FBI did not respond to requests for comment.
It was also not immediately clear whether the FBI would share information or evidence with Minnesota investigators who have been frozen from federal investigations.
In the same interview, Noem appeared to distance herself from her comments in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, claiming that Preti brandished a handgun and approached officers aggressively.
Videos of the shooting contradicted this claim, showing officers slamming Preeti to the ground while an intensive care nurse was holding only her cellphone, and one officer pulling a handgun from the back of Preeti’s pants before another officer began firing into her back.
Preti had a state permit to legally carry a concealed firearm. The video shows he never reached for it.
In an interview with Hannity on Thursday, Noem said: “You know the situation was very chaotic and there was information being relayed from the scene by CBP agents and officers who were on the scene.” “We took the best information we had at the time and tried to be transparent with the American people and tell them what we knew to be true on the ground.”
The change comes after two other videos were released on Wednesday that recorded altercations between Preti and federal immigration officials that occurred 11 days before Preti’s death.
The Jan. 13 video shows Preti, wearing a winter coat, screaming at federal vehicles and at one point spitting on them before kicking one of the vehicles’ taillights. A scuffle breaks out between Preeti and some policemen and Preeti is pushed to the ground. Preeti threw off his winter coat and ran away, or the police let him go and hurried away.
Two women embrace as they visit a makeshift memorial to Alex Preti on January 26, 2026. January 26, 2026. Two gun holes are shown. The hole was created when Alex Preti was shot and killed by federal agents on January 24, 2026, in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the company’s owners said.
Robert Schmidt AFP | Getty Images
As he turns his back to the camera, we see what appears to be a handgun in his waistband. The video does not show Mr. Preti reaching for a gun at all, and it is unclear whether federal agents witnessed it.
Minneapolis-based attorney Steve Schleicher, who represents Preti’s parents, said Wednesday that the earlier altercation in no way justified the police officer who shot and killed Preti more than a week later.
President Donald Trump suggested in a post on his Truth Social platform early Friday that the theory that Preti was a peaceful protester when she was shot was undermined by video of an earlier incident.
Trump’s post read: “The stock price of provocateur and possibly insurrectionist Alex Preti has fallen significantly after the just-released video shows him screaming, spitting, and frantically kicking a new, very expensive government vehicle in the face of a very calm and controlled ICE officer. So violent, in fact, that the taillight shatters.” “It was an obvious display of abuse and anger for everyone to see, and it was crazy and out of control. The ICE officers were calm and collected, which is not easy to do under those circumstances!”
