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The National Rifle Association pushed back Tuesday on President Donald Trump’s claims that Alex Pretti was wrong to bring a firearm to the anti-ICE protest where he was killed.
Trump and FBI Director Kash Patel argued that Americans “cannot” bring firearms to a protest this week. The NRA has vocally defended Pretti, however. The Veterans Affairs nurse was armed at the time of his killing, and he owned a permit for the firearm.
“The NRA unequivocally believes that all law-abiding citizens have a right to keep and bear arms anywhere they have a legal right to be,” the NRA wrote in a post on X.
The Trump administration had highlighted Pretti’s firearm and the extra magazines he carried with him after the deadly shooting on Saturday.
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“You cannot bring a firearm loaded with multiple magazines to any sort of protest that you want. It’s that simple. You don’t have the right to break the law and incite violence,” Patel said during an appearance on Fox News.
“You can’t have guns. You can’t walk in with guns,” Trump said to reporters at the White House on Tuesday.
White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller came under heavier fire after claiming that Pretti was a “domestic terrorist” and “would-be assassin” who “tried to murder federal law enforcement.”
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The NRA isn’t the only Second Amendment group to speak out after Pretti’s death. Gun Owners of America vowed to “hold any administration accountable” on Tuesday.
“Peaceful protests while armed isn’t radical—it’s American. The First and Second Amendments protect those rights, and they always have,” GOA wrote on X.
The two Customs and Border Protection agents who fired their weapons during the confrontation with Pretti have since been placed on administrative leave.
The move is standard procedure and should not be viewed as any suspicion of wrongdoing, the Department of Homeland Security said. The agents are no longer on field duty, for now.
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