Attendees gather during a vigil where Alex Pretti was shot and killed Jan. 24 by federal officers in Minneapolis on Jan. 28, 2026. Renee Good was shot and killed by ICE agents Jan. 7. (AP/Adam Gray)
by Brian Fraga
Staff Reporter
Cardinal Robert McElroy of Washington, D.C., joined several interfaith leaders in the nation's capital in denouncing the recent deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis as "murders."
McElroy and seven other faith leaders signed a statement, dated Jan. 29, that called the shooting deaths of Good and Pretti a "profound moral failure" that "demand our collective attention and response."
"The murders of Renee Good and Alex Pretti — two U.S. citizens devoted to civic engagement and to caring for their immigrant neighbors — have left communities in Minneapolis and across the nation grieving, shaken, and rightly outraged," the faith leaders said.
Washington Cardinal Robert McElroy, pictured in a file photo, was among several interfaith leaders in the nation's capital who signed a statement Jan. 29 that called two shooting deaths by immigration officials a "profound moral failure." (OSV News/CNS/Paul Haring)
"Renee and Alex were killed while seeking justice for their community," the faith leaders added. "We honor their lives by refusing to look away and by calling, together, for accountability from those entrusted with authority."
At a moment they described as "pivotal" in the nation's life, the faith leaders also said that people were faced with the choice of "whether to allow fear, cruelty, and disorder to define us, or to respond with courage, conscience, and moral resolve."
"We stand with our neighbors, fellow clergy, and state and local leaders who have called on national authorities to end practices that place people in harm's way," the faith leaders said.
Joining McElroy in signing the statement was the Right Rev. Mariann Edgar Budde, Episcopal bishop of Washington; Rabbi Abbi Sharofsky of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington; and the Rev. Sofía Betancourt, president of the Unitarian Universalist Association, among others.
Episcopal Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde delivers the sermon at a national prayer service Jan. 21, 2025, at the Washington National Cathedral, the day after Donald Trump's second inauguration. (OSV News/Reuters/Kevin Lamarque)
Outrage has been growing, and calls for accountability have been increasing across the political spectrum, since two masked U.S. Border Patrol officers shot and killed Pretti on Jan. 24 while he and others were protesting the surge of federal immigration enforcement operations in their city.
Trump administration officials at first justified Pretti's shooting, claiming that he was an armed "assassin" who "tried to murder federal agents." But eyewitness accounts and video footage taken at the scene refuted the White House's narrative, sparking protests across the country and prompting leading Democrats and some Republicans to demand changes to the administration's immigration enforcement tactics.
Tensions were already running high before Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care unit nurse, was shot 10 times by two federal officers on a Minneapolis street.
On Jan. 7, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shot and killed Renee Good, 37, while she was in her vehicle on a Minneapolis street. She was shot three times as she tried driving away from the area, according to video footage taken at the scene.
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On Jan. 26, two days after Pretti's death, Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark, New Jersey, slammed ICE as a "lawless" organization, and he urged Catholics to press Congress to vote against funding the agency.
"We mourn for a world, a country, that allows 5-year-olds to be legally kidnapped and protesters to be slaughtered," Tobin said during an online interfaith prayer service hosted by Faith in Action. The 5-year-old he was referring to was detained Jan. 20 by ICE agents in Minnesota and is currently at a detention center in Texas.
In their Jan. 29 statement, the interfaith leaders said they would "not accept the tearing apart of our neighborhoods or the normalization of dehumanization." They urged government officials "at every level" to recommit themselves to policies that "uphold life, dignity, and the rule of law."
"And we call on all people of conscience to work together for a society in which every person can walk their streets without fear, and with the knowledge that they are seen, valued, and protected," the faith leaders said.
Also signing the statement were Behram Panthaki, head priest of the Zoroastrian Association of Metropolitan Washington Inc.; Romi Sawhney, executive director of the Guru Gobind Singh Foundation; Bishop LaTrelle Miller Easterling of the United Methodist Church; and Sousan Abadian, executive director of the Interfaith Council of Metropolitan Washington.
