After federal immigration agents shot and killed nurse Alex Pretti in Minneapolis on Saturday, Rep. Mark Amodei (R-NV), who led House negotiations for Department of Homeland Security (DHS) funding, joined other Republicans in raising concerns about the administration’s border security operation. 

“It’s not an open and shut issue,” Amodei said in a Monday interview with The Nevada Independent. “Not that there’s anything good coming out of this, but I’m looking forward to some facts instead of, ‘Well, I saw it and it was legit,’ or ‘I saw it and it was bullshit.’ I’ll tell you this, there needs to be a pivot in the whole operation. Because regardless of what side of immigration enforcement you’re on, we are not in a good place right now.” 

Amodei chairs the House Homeland Security appropriations subcommittee, which is responsible for funding DHS. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) falls under the department, meaning he is one of the key Republicans who can provide oversight for the agency. Amodei previously worked to limit how much DHS could move money around. The House passed the DHS appropriations bill on Thursday by a vote of 220-207, with just seven Democrats voting for it.

The congressman said he had not watched video of the shooting, but staff had briefed him on it. While he did not go as far as Nevada Democrats such as Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-NV), Rep. Dina Titus (D-NV), Rep. Steven Horsford (D-NV) and Rep. Susie Lee (D-NV), who backed impeaching Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, he did not sound entirely pleased with the secretary.

“There’s people who have had it with Kristi Noem,” Amodei said. “For an administration that’s had a lot of success on the border and immigration issues generally, in my view, this has put all that stuff into question, and whether that’s right or not, well, it is politics, and perception is reality. And right now, the perception is not outstanding.” 

He characterized DHS’s reaction to the shooting as “reflexive defense.” In particular, Amodei said he disagreed with Noem’s statement that Pretti had committed “domestic terrorism.”

“Sending [White House border czar] Tom Homan to check in on one of Kristi Noem’s departments operating up there after the last few weeks is not a sign of confidence,” he said. “She didn’t do herself any favors when she called this guy a domestic terrorist.”

Amodei called President Donald Trump’s announcement that Homan would head to Minnesota “a step in the right direction.” He also said Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) — who he served with in the House and used to see in the gym — “seemed like a decent guy” and that he was glad the governor and the president finally had a conversation on Monday. 

“If anybody thinks they’re going to ‘talking point’ their way out of this, they’re nuts,” he said. 

Transparency and culture change

As for the “pivot” he has in mind, the congressman said DHS shouldn’t leave Minnesota, since that would set a bad precedent for immigration enforcement across the country. But he does want more transparency to make sure the administration is actually focusing on apprehending “the worst of the worst” and people whose asylum claims have been denied. Those are goals that he thinks have strong support, even if some protesters might still have objections. 

Amodei said he and the subcommittee’s top Democrat have put out a request for a conversation with DHS to help get answers. He wants to know whether the operation is still targeting the worst offenders so he can say confidently that that’s what’s happening. If it isn’t, he wants to know that, too. He hopes the discussion will happen soon after the House returns to Washington next Tuesday. 

Amodei also said that he knows agents in Minneapolis have a tough job, especially as they face so much local resistance, but that the way they behave needs to change.

“Part of that pivot is you got to get a real tight, firm control over your operational culture in this town, so it doesn’t turn into Fallujah or Kandahar,” he said, naming sites of bloody conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan. “I think there’s a lot of bullshit in the air right now, but guess what? The wind's blowing at about 100 miles an hour.” 

Amodei responds to Democrats’ opposition to funding DHS

After Pretti was killed, Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV) and Rosen said they would not support the Homeland Security funding package that Amodei helped negotiate. The congressman said he wasn’t surprised but that he had not spoken with them about DHS appropriations. 

“Catherine and Jacky appear to be doing pretty well making up their own minds based upon their own constituencies,” he said. “I don’t think they’re wondering when they’re gonna get a call from me trying to lobby ’em on it, because we’ve been doing pretty well for a few years with everybody doing what they think’s right.”

Democratic senators hope to carve out DHS and vote separately on five other House-passed funding bills this week, a move which would require unanimous support from Senate Republicans. If the Senate does not pass the bills by Friday, there will be a partial government shutdown. 

Asked if the shooting changed his view on DHS funding, Amodei stressed that the DHS umbrella also includes the Coast Guard, the Transportation Security Administration, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and numerous other essential parts of the government, not just ICE.

“If you want to talk about ICE and what needs to change and the pivot and whatever, that’s fine.” he said. “But to say, ‘We’re taking all the Secret Service, the cyber warfare folks.’ That’s like saying, ‘Hey, I heard one of your relatives fought on the wrong side of the Civil War, and so I’m going to firebomb your house.’

“There’s no connection between those parts of DHS and unhappiness with everything that’s going on in Minneapolis,” he added. “Do I think DHS should be defunded? Absolutely not.”

Amodei does not support defunding ICE and did not directly say whether he agreed with Democrats that money for ICE should be separated from other funding. He did say that attempts to shutter ICE or Border Patrol would quickly unify Republicans. And even if the DHS appropriations bill does not pass this week, ICE will have a financial backstop thanks to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act that the GOP passed last summer. 

The House-passed appropriations bill includes at least one accountability measure: $20 million for DHS body cameras, though no requirement that agents wear them. 

“Body cams are an important tool for law enforcement everywhere,” Amodei said. “Not that they’re going to be the answer to whatever, but they sure as hell are a better tool than hoping that somebody on whatever side had their video, cellphone stuff pointed in the right direction at the right time.”

Amodei said the Republican and Democratic counterparts on the House and Senate DHS appropriations subcommittees spent weeks going back and forth about possible political horsetrading. Democrats requested policies such as cuts to the border wall and geographical limits on ICE’s jurisdiction, he said. Staff slept in their offices. 

“We finally got the point, it was like, ‘OK, everybody take their marbles and go home,’” Amodei said. “And so we did. And actually, I can tell you that, having experienced it, it actually wasn’t a bad idea.”