By Tim Reid and Nathan Layne
WASHINGTON, Jan 26 (Reuters) - Trump administration officials’ suggestion that Alex Pretti should not have brought a legally carried handgun to a Minneapolis protest has opened a rare rift with gun rights groups, creating election-year risks for Republicans with one of their most loyal voting blocs.
Several of President Donald Trump's officials drew swift pushback from gun rights groups for their stance after Pretti, a 37-year-old nurse, was shot dead by federal agents
on Saturday.
Pretti had a license to carry a concealed weapon, and the Minneapolis police chief said he has seen no evidence that Pretti brandished the weapon before he was shot multiple times.
In defense of the agents, Trump, FBI Director Kash Patel, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, and Gregory Bovino, a senior Border Patrol official, all said Pretti should not have been carrying a gun.
"You cannot bring a firearm, loaded, with multiple magazines, to any sort of protest that you want. It’s that simple," Patel said on Fox News on Sunday.
Gun rights groups, including the politically influential National Rifle Association, however, countered that Pretti had simply been exercising his right to carry a firearm in public.
They argued that the administration's suggestion that his right to carry a gun depends on the setting - and does not extend to protests - runs against a bedrock principle of conservative politics: the right to keep and bear arms.
The Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus called Patel's comments "completely incorrect on Minnesota law."
ANOTHER ISSUE FOR DISGRUNTLED VOTERS
Bryan Strawser, the group's chairman and a Republican, told Reuters the administration was backtracking on the Second Amendment - the constitutional right to keep and bear arms - and that could hurt his party going into the November midterm elections that will decide control of Congress.
Voters are already disgruntled over the cost of living and high healthcare costs, and a rising number, including some Republicans, are growing increasingly unhappy with the aggressive tactics being used in Trump's sweeping immigration crackdown.
"It's unbelievably stupid that they've chosen to alienate the gun lobby. The NRA and the gun lobby have basically been a bedrock constituency of the Republican Party for 50 years," said Jacob Perry, a Republican strategist based in Florida.
Gun rights groups are major donors to Republican political campaigns, are effective in turning out supporters, and their members are reliable voters.
Asked by a reporter on Monday if Trump believes Americans have a right to carry a gun while protesting, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt appeared to suggest that right did not extend to events involving armed law enforcement.
"Any gun owner knows that when you are carrying a weapon, when you are bearing arms, and you are confronted by law enforcement, you are raising the assumption of risk and the risk of force being used against you, and that's unfortunately what took place on Saturday," Leavitt said.
The NRA on social media on Monday referred to Leavitt's comments, saying that while law-abiding Americans had a constitutional right to carry guns, they did not have a right to “impede lawful immigration enforcement operations.”
GUN RIGHTS ROOTED IN US ORIGIN STORY
Verified videos reviewed by Reuters show Pretti holding a phone, not a gun, as he filmed federal agents pushing protesters to the ground.
After stepping between an agent and two women, Pretti was pepper-sprayed, subdued, and pinned to the ground. Footage then appears to show an agent removing a handgun from Pretti’s waistband. Moments later, an officer shot Pretti four times in the back, with additional shots fired by other agents.
While avoiding direct criticism of Trump, Gun Owners of America and the NRA instead targeted comments by Bill Essayli, a Trump‑appointed federal prosecutor in Los Angeles, who wrote on social media that “if you approach law enforcement with a gun, there is a high likelihood they will be legally justified in shooting you.”
The NRA called his remarks "dangerous and wrong." The lobbying organization, which has been closely aligned with Trump, did not respond to a request for comment.
Luis Valdes, a GOA spokesman, said, "Our stance is very simple. We will defend the Second Amendment, no ifs, ands or buts."
Guns and gun rights are wrapped up in the American origin story, rooted in a frontier mentality, a resistance to tyranny, and independence. Yet it wasn't until the 1960s and 1970s that gun rights became a hot-button political cultural issue.
Political assassinations in 1968, including those of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. and U.S. Senator and Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, led to the 1968 Gun Control Act, which banned gun sales to certain groups, including felons and drug users, and required the federal licensing of gun dealers.
It triggered a backlash among conservatives, who saw the law as government overreach. In 1977, NRA leadership changed from mostly gun club members to hardline political activists, bringing about the birth of the modern gun-rights movement.
Jeanette Hoffman, a Republican consultant, said gun owners are a reliable Republican bloc and take seriously their Second Amendment rights.
"This could have ramifications in the midterms if Second Amendment groups feel their constitutional rights are under attack by the Trump administration," she said.
Conservatives have often brought weapons to protests. Among them was Kyle Rittenhouse, who was acquitted on charges of killing two people and wounding another during a 2020 protest in Wisconsin. He was lauded by conservatives and later met with Trump.
"Carry everywhere. It is your right," Rittenhouse posted on X on Monday.
(Reporting by Tim Reid and Nathan Layne; Additional reporting by Andrew Hay; Editing by Ross Colvin and Bill Berkrot)
