More on Pretti

David | January 28, 2026 | 23 Comments

A lot of info and opinion – mostly the latter going around about the shooting VA ICU nurse, Alex Pretti. Multiple videos exist of the event, and it seems the critical minute or so was covered from a couple of angles. One such second-to-second description is at ABC News.

Seems incontrovertible that up until Pretti was tear-gassed and taken down, he neither reached for nor touched his gun. Now, I know a lot of folks seem to think he was unwise to carry it at all near a potential confrontation. Hard to dispute that, but given how violent some of the protesters have been, you would think almost anyone with a license might have thought it appropriate, if not even prudent, to have some means of defense available. What is indisputable – and funny – how the antigun left is now defending his right to concealed carry, and how many supposedly progun rightists are twisting themselves into pretzels to somehow condemn it while supporting concealed carry in general (which probably means they want it for themselves but not really for anyone else.)

It would be wise to look at all the supposedly “pro-gun/pro-Constitution” figures like Kash Patel issuing statements like “yes you can carry, but not when your are protesting.” Just remember that if you take the Constitution seriously, you need to take ALL of it seriously. We complain that the ACLU seems to concentrate all their efforts on the 1st Amendment and ignore the 2nd – well, they shouldn’t be mutually exclusive to ANYONE, rightist assholes or leftist asswipes included. Interesting comments from a frequent subject here:

Kyle Rittenhouse has urged gun owners to “carry everywhere” in the wake of criticism from the Trump administration over the presence of a gun in the death of Alex Pretti in Minnesota.

“Carry everywhere,” the 23-year-old wrote on X. “It is your right,” he continued, adding the hashtag #ShallNotBeInfringed.

Texas Gun Rights, the state affiliate for the National Association for Gun Rights of which Rittenhouse was named outreach director in June 2024, shared a statement condemning the Trump administration’s attempts to rationalize Pretti’s murder by highlighting the gun he was carrying. Daily Beast

Note as well that Rittenhouse blames the whole situation on Biden’s open immigration policies, not the current administration.

Current theory based on multiple videos says that the agents around Pretti opened fire on him when one of them had a negligent discharge, thinking they were under attack. The most likely candidate for that ND honor is thought to be the agent who took Pretti’s gun – he was not observed with a drawn gun before the shooting but appeared to be holding a SiG P320 afterwards, the same model gun the Feds say Pretti was carrying. Sounds familiar? It should, several columns here at TAH covered it, the supposed self-discharged gun accused (fallaciously) of killing an Air Force TAH 1, TAH 2, TAH 3, TAH 4 airman last year. Ironic the same gun, supposedly cleared of going off spontaneously, is now accused of – going off spontaneously.

Either that, or the agent carrying it had a negligent discharge, starting the whole mess. Given the SiGs lack of a manual safety, this is a fairly likely scenario. HOWEVER, BE WARNED: there is a video around of the agent supposedly showing said discharge – well, there may be more than one but that’s all I have seen – that is clearly bogus. Shows the agent walking along, the muzzle flash etc. of the gun firing – but the slide doe not move at all and there is no recoil. Very obvious fake, and I suspect it will become ubiquitous. Be warned.

Me, I still think an open investigation is in order – again.