'FAFO' isn't a good law enforcement strategy
By: Timothy P. Carney
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
There are a hundred points to make and a hundred arguments to have about the chaos in Minneapolis, but the most salient question in the national political debate is why armed agents of the federal government killed two protesters.
Yes, Gov. Tim Walz's (D-MN) leadership deserves criticism, as does Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey's. The prudence of the late Alex Pretti and Renee Good can be discussed, along with the culpability of their companions and collaborators. Former President Joe Biden's open-borders experiment created the base conditions for this, and Democratic state, county, and city leaders made everything more violent and dangerous by refusing to cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement when they arrested illegal immigrant criminal suspects.
But the men of ICE and the Border Patrol carry guns and have the power of arrest as the agents of the people, and thus they ought to be held to a supremely high standard. When they act, they act on our behalf.
Even more so, their civilian bosses — Greg Bovino of the Border Patrol, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, and President Donald Trump — are accountable to all Americans for their actions and policies. Nowhere is that accountability more important than when these state actors are using their legal monopoly on lethal force.
In the media maelstrom, scrutiny of the officers who shot Good and Pretti often verged into the absurd or hysterical. Reviewing videos frame by frame and splicing together four different angles can give us a better idea of what happened, but it can't show us what the agents were seeing, much less thinking.
Zooming in too closely makes it harder, not easier, to understand the situation. It's time to zoom out a bit and look not at the actions of the specific officers in the specific moments, but at the culture and the policies that landed those officers in those situations.
We can start with an analogy to one criticism of Good and Pretti: They wouldn't have died if they hadn't put themselves in a bad situation.
Now, apply that very critique to the federal officers who shot Good and Pretti.
At the moment they pulled the trigger, the officers may have seriously feared for their lives: Good was gunning her engine with an ICE officer right in front of her, and Pretti was armed when he physically confronted Border Patrol. But if you watch the full context of these videos, in the seconds before Good started driving, and in the seconds before Pretti's gun was spotted, you see confrontational and aggressive officer behavior that might not have been necessary, and that likely escalated the situation to the point where each officer felt he had to fire.
Before the Pretti shooting, a Border Patrol agent was repeatedly shoving a woman out of the street. The woman fell, and when Pretti tried to help her up, an agent pepper-sprayed him. Then five agents went to town on Pretti, who had exhibited zero violence. The one who pepper-sprayed him began beating him with the pepper spray canister while two or three others pinned him to the ground.
It was in this chaos that agents discovered the gun, removed it, and then shot Pretti. It seems unlikely that anyone shot Pretti knowing he was unarmed. The chaos was a culprit in both cases.
Good policing involves avoiding chaos whenever possible. Prudent protesters would not have caused chaos by blowing whistles and obstructing traffic. But the errors of the protesters don't relieve law enforcement from the duty to reduce tensions and minimize violence and the loss of life.
But reducing tension is not Noem's style.
DHS, this administration, has a clear style: Maximize the conflict; increase the drama; flex at all times to demonstrate power and show toughness; provoke the other side. These overlap a good bit with the tactics of radicals, including plenty of folks in Minneapolis. They shouldn't be the tactics of the government.
Noem has been clear about her vision for the department. She wants a big show of toughness. Noem's recruiting videos have hip-hop soundtracks, dark, cinematic videos of mass roundups, and mottos like "run with the pack."
"FAFO," short for "F*** Around, Find Out," is another unofficial motto on DHS social media. The FAFO attitude relishes conflict and seeks it out, since conflict is an opportunity to demonstrate superior force.
Good cops de-escalate. Too many of Noem's cops escalate.
Noem is, at essence, a social media influencer. She sometimes uses her Cabinet department as an appendage of her social media profile, and so she favors spectacles, such as sending Border Patrol into Los Angeles parks on horseback and in armored vehicles. "Better get used to us now," Greg Bovino, who then ran the L.A. Border Patrol office, "because this is going to be normal very soon."
Spectacles. Shows of force. FAFO.
The alternative to immigration enforcement spectacle is not no immigration enforcement. The alternative is targeted immigration enforcement: Prioritizing the removal of felons here illegally and those remaining here despite deportation orders. DHS and ICE do this, and border czar Tom Homan has emphasized this, but the Noem/Bovino approach prioritizes massive roundups and big numbers.
Combine the demand with spectacle with the attitude of FAFO, and you get a culture of bravado and arrogance instead of excellence and professionalism. And then you get Minneapolis.
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I can agree with this as a general statement of truth. However, like anything, context matters. Good policing does mean avoiding chaos whenever possible but the relevant portion of that is "whenever." It is not reasonable to suggest that law enforcement shouldn't do anything about people blocking their efforts simply to avoid violence. Nor is it reasonable to just stand there or attempt to reason with the people who do these things. They have a job to do and they don't need public approval every time they are performing some duty.
Nor is FAFO actually anyone's policy, at least in the sense that what happened to Good and Pretti was in line with policy concerning responding to protesters or we would have a hell of a lot more dead protesters.
In my opinion though, there's a time to be nice and a time not to be nice. I've seen so many times where I wonder why law enforcement doesn't just draw batons and start beating on protesters who are refusing lawful orders until they do obey. Especially when it appears the goal is to see how much they can get away with concerning provoking police. And where are the water cannons?
And I can agree with the essence of what you wrote. In the abstract, it is correct.
When it is time NOT to be nice, the question is what is the appropriate action to take?
Before killing someone, the situation should be one where the killed person was reasonably seen to be trying to seriously harm or kill someone.
I also would agree with what you wrote here.
Because if the protestors are just there and some representative of the state decides to open a can of whoop-ass on them, the optics and consequences for legitimacy are very bad for the state. Protesters are responsible for remaining nonviolent and accepting arrest if necessary. The state is responsible for restraint, individualized enforcement, and protecting constitutional rights. Neither side’s failure licenses collective punishment. Period.
I prompted Chat GPT "Define peaceful protest":
In other words, the state cannot use violence or coercive force, including the methods federal agents have employed in cities across the US, against protesters who are exercising their fundamental right to free speech. Protesters may lawfully be arrested for violating the law, but the state cannot, without violating the First Amendment, “...just draw batons and start beating on protesters who are refusing lawful orders until they do obey.”
This is the reasoning behind civil disobedience.
Civil disobedience works not because it seeks chaos, and not because it rejects the law,
but because it reveals something essential about power and authority.
When people who are acting peacefully are met with coercion, with violence, with the heavy hand of the state,
the public is forced to confront a hard truth.
And that hard truth is this.
Authority in this country is not supposed to rest on fear.
It is supposed to rest on the consent of the governed.
The people.
The government is granted power by the people so it can act with legitimacy, not compulsion.
When the state substitutes coercion for consent, when it answers nonviolent dissent with force,
it shows that legitimacy has been replaced by raw power.
A government may still command obedience in that moment, but without the endorsement of the governed,
without the endorsement of the people, it cannot rightly claim the authority entrusted it.
Indeed, once the government stops asking and starts commanding, we are no longer citizens of the United States, but subjects of those who presume to wield that power.
There is no answer that will satisfy everyone. Opinions seem to vary. They seem to go from those who think officers should practically have to be shot before they can respond to those who think the government should gun down anyone who protests.
Personally, I think a good idea is that if people are going to protest they must not do so within 20 feet of a police line. This should be applicable everywhere and not subject to a state's whims. Of course, that's just the idea in its broadest terms and would need to be filled out a little more than that but the idea is to stop this nonsense of taking everything out on law enforcement. They do not set policy and they are not punching bags. Also, to recognize that police are there to keep the peace, not suppress legitimate protesting.
Totally agree, if the protesters are "just there." That is, not being violent nor disrupting the free exercise of travel of other citizens.
Yes, they are responsible for remaining nonviolent. They don't give a crap about being arrested and actually seem to think it is simply a rite of passage of some kind. Like getting street cred.
Except "punishment" isn't the right word. Collective enforcement would be more accurate. People throw around the word "peaceful" as if it were some sort of magical ward. It isn't, as much as some would like it to be. That protesters are peacefully breaking the law by intentionally blocking traffic doesn't legalize blocking traffic. I think the state would be perfectly justified if protesters were ordered several times to desist and vacate to lay into them with batons and arresting those stupid enough to try fighting back. Those who wisely decided that bruises were not worth it and left shouldn't be arrested. There's no point in having laws or law enforcement if people think they have the right to disobey them.
I agree, it is inherently subjective. But what bothers me is that people are so polarized (or whatever) that they cannot even agree when an extreme has been crossed.
Pretti's killing was waaaaaay past the line of an appropriate response. We cannot have our government killing people because they came to a protest with a holstered, legal gun in a state where that is allowed, captured video, and helped a woman who was pushed by a DHS agent.
I think the most effective protest is one where people are entirely peaceful. No angry rhetoric, name-calling, etc. No action whatsoever other than to capture video, chant, raise signs, and ultimately produce the effect of peaceful solidarity. But I certainly can appreciate how having armed, masked agents en masse walking the streets in a community and seizing neighbors will trigger the natural human response of anger. So on the government side, it is best to not keep poking the bear (the people).
This is not fact or law. This has more to do with a book by Henry David Thoreau called "Civil Disobedience," originally called "Resistance to Civil Government." Thing is, it's a blueprint for how to resist in order to impose your own ideas but assumes they're everyone's. Not the case. It it's really a way to force your will on everyone through disobedience to laws rather than taking the legal route of making the effort of changing the law the right way.
That's a good question. One that I think points at the root. Why are immigration agents with little or no formal training in crowd control engaged in it? If the answer is that it's because Minneapolis PD won't assist then why would the feds not bring in agents from another agency that is trained in it such as FPS or US Marshals to cover a targeted raid?
Look. I'm not trying to twist your nose about this subject, but I look at this situation like a systems analyst would. What happened? How did it happen? Why? What can be done to prevent it? I also think it is ridiculous to think it's correct to put in in terms of the state killing people. That also seems ridiculous, since if the state intended what happened to Pretti as policy, there'd be a lot more dead people out there. I see this as an isolated incident specific to the situation, not as intended policy.
I agree, with the addition of also not doing anything illegal, like not blocking streets, cars or other similar things. I do not think there is a systems analyst out there worthy of the title that would not conclude that such things increase the chances of things going wrong. I don't believe for a second that any system analyst would deny that Pretti being armed contributed to what happened, as well as his actions. They would not be interested in rights or anything like it. Just cold evaluation of what contributed, like when professionals examine what caused a plane crash.
The point is not to serve any political agenda. It isn't to opine about who was right and who was wrong. It is simply how one thing led to another, given relevant facts. We, the individual, have to understand things like this so that we, the individual can make smart, informed decisions about these things. Because what we do is the only real control we have.
People making that argument aren't arguing in good faith....
and your next point shows why:
. That also seems ridiculous, since if the state intended what happened to Pretti as policy, there'd be a lot more dead people out there.
Well, I think it is precisely that it is the Minneapolis PD's responsibility and that there isn't a federal agency in existence that is intended to do the job of local PD if they won't or aren't allowed to do their job. The closest thing I know of to a federal police department is the FBI, and that isn't in their ballpark. That is why I think Frey has contributed to Pretti's death. They are forcing ICE and Border Patrol to do jobs they aren't trained to do.
Maybe. From our perspective, it seems hard to misunderstand what we're saying, but they may actually not see it and believe what they're saying. One question I keep asking myself. I'm pretty solidly convinced I'm right, but am I exhibiting the same blindness I see in them? That question makes me reluctant to say they are arguing in bad faith.
If that were actually the case, why are they not focusing on training agents in such, cause it might be to reach some ridiculous quota by the end of the day, week, or month. This is a thoroughly fCkd operation from the get go, and the unwillingness to properly investigate shootings tells US All much, Trump and maga are our countries crutch and as their grip slips, like a clutch, they attempt tp grab even more, much.
A losing strategy as we all are beginning to see, nothing here, doesn't look so real, to everyone seeing what is the actual deal.
I agree that it is their responsibility but there are several federal agencies that have provided crowd control in previous ICE surges.
Per COPILOT
Thanks for the info. I'd never heard of the FPS before this. My guess, though, is that they don't begin to have the manpower to deal with something like this, nor any of the other agencies listed except local police. And even they would be stretched. Perhaps the local PD backed up by some of these other resources?
Because such is not their job. That's the local PD's job.
But they're not "just there", are they?
There is a difference between actual peaceful protest and obstruction or harassment.
That said, it seems a gross failure of LEO management not to have a plan for misbehavior they know is going to occur.
You wouldn't run a junior high school like that.
I glad I didn't go to a school in TX. Does one regularly beat all of the children to find the one who left the gum stuck to the bottom of the desk? Smoked in the boys room? Yelled, "Sooooooie!" when the principal took the stage during assembly? I mean, where does the collective punishment start?
Granted, that may be an imperfect analogy, but the principle it illustrates is not. If misconduct by one justifies force against many, then we have abandoned individual responsibility in favor of collective punishment.
For anyone following along, the disagreement here isn’t about whether misbehavior should have consequences. It’s about whether consequences must remain individualized and proportionate, or whether collective coercion becomes acceptable when dissent is inconvenient.
For reiteration:
The individuals and agencies to whom we delegate the responsibility of protecting the public should know this.
You would have been exposed to concepts like accountability, which would make it much more difficult to defend the nonsense you try to defend.
If we were seeing that, you might have a point.
We're seeing organized groups using radio communication in a coordinated attempt to impede law enforcement. That's a federal crime, not a "peaceful protest", no matter how many feeble excuses claim otherwise.
No it's about the refusal to acknowledge the obvious misbehavior.
"It was a peaceful protest"... Oh really... Then why did they bully little kids and try to stop parents from getting to them?
On a side note, how deep is the mental illness of someone who storms into a church and then starts screaming at the 5 year olds? WTF is wrong with these people?
"Peaceful protest" does not include putting your vehicle in the way of a police car. Or spitting on people. Or kicking the tail light off a vehicle.
This is the equivalent of a teenager claiming "Dad... We were just watching TV", as though the floor isn't littered with beer cans and the place doesn't smell like weed.
You're welcome and you're right they do not. To me that seems to be a lack of foresight by DHS leadership.
Sure and perhaps the governor could have mobilized the MNG to assist.
I've read there are about 600 police officers and approximately 3,000 ICE and or BPA's in the area.
Thus Y they need to modify their so called plan of attack.
Their tactics do not have the support of the locals, nor should it. Blatant Constitutional rights violations, unnecessary brutality, premature use of tear gas and flash bang etc's (as determined by judges, not I ) smashing of vehicle windows, attempted access to homes without proper warrants....and beyond.
And it is about the proper response to events. No matter what Pretti did days ago or even if he had just (hypothetically speaking) spit in the face of a DHS officer, there is no justification to riddle his body with 10 rounds after he has been tackled, subdued, and disarmed (gun still holstered) by ½ dozen agents.
One can talk about consequences for his actions, mistakes he made (e.g. carrying a legal gun) and end up with maybe a justified arrest. But no way on the planet was this not an outrageous abuse of lethal force. And in this case, it was by government agents so 'by the government' is a proper characterization.
Homans & Scott are HSI agents who have come up through the ranks. They still maybe hardliners but they say, no more "performative" press conferences,
no more social media participation and a return to the less disturbing, media attracting tactic that they have developed over the last few decades.
The adults have quietly staged a coup within DHS.