WSJ What’s News
Pretti Shooting Escalates Standoff Between Federal Agents, Minnesota Officials
26 Jan 2026
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Minneapolis reels after federal agents kill another U.S. citizen.
They shot that guy. I know. They have shot a man. They have shot a legal observer.
We'll get reaction from around the country, plus the rest of the day's news, including a massive scandal at the very top of China's military leadership. It's Monday, January 26th. I'm Luke Vargas for The Wall Street Journal, and here is the AM edition of What's News, the top headlines and business stories moving your world today.
President Trump says his administration is investigating the killing of intensive care nurse Alex Preddy by federal agents in Minneapolis over the weekend.
Speaking to the Journal yesterday, Trump repeatedly declined to say whether the officer who shot Preddy had acted appropriately, though he also criticized Preddy for carrying a gun during protest activity, calling his 9mm semi-automatic handgun, quote, "...very dangerous and unpredictable."
Those comments come after the Department of Homeland Security alleged that Preddy violently resisted officers trying to disarm him, leading them to fire, quote, defensive shots. However, bystander footage contradicts that version of events, as Visual Investigations reporter Brenna Smith explains.
The Wall Street Journal reviewed numerous bystander footage of Preddy's encounter with DHS agents, including before, during, and after the shooting. What these videos show is before the shooting, Preddy was seemingly with two other civilians and filming DHS agents with his phone. Eventually, after filming the agents, Preti and two other civilians walk away.
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Chapter 2: What happened during the recent federal shooting incident in Minneapolis?
Following Preddy's killing, Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O'Hara ordered that his officers not leave the crime scene, despite being told that they weren't needed. The state of Minnesota's top criminal investigators then took on the case, only for them to be blocked by federal officers, including after they obtained a signed search warrant.
Speaking to CBS's Face the Nation, O'Hara described federal operations in the city as having gotten out of hand.
We understand that for as long as there has been ICE, there has been immigration enforcement in Minnesota. The problem is not that enforcement is happening. It's clearly the manner in which these things are happening. These tactics are very obviously not safe, and it is generating a lot of outrage and fear in the community.
A hearing is scheduled for today in Minnesota federal court in a suit brought by the state's attorney general that seeks to bar Homeland Security and Justice Department officials from destroying or concealing evidence related to Saturday's shooting.
A Homeland Security spokeswoman defended the actions of immigration agents and described claims that evidence was destroyed as, quote, an attempt to divide the American people. When pressed on how the investigation is being managed, Secretary Kristi Noem told Fox News that more details would be provided in due course.
I think the information is consistently coming out when it's appropriate, when investigators deem that it is something that they can release that will give answers to people. That's exactly what President Trump and his administration want.
In addition to widening a rift between divisions of law enforcement, Saturday's killing is spurring gun rights advocates to issue rare criticism of the Trump administration, following comments like this from FBI Director Kash Patel on Fox News' Sunday Morning Futures.
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 that right to break the law and incite violence.
The Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus called Patel's statement completely incorrect on Minnesota law, while the National Rifle Administration said officials shouldn't be demonizing law-abiding citizens. Meanwhile, back in Washington, Senate Democrats angry over events in Minnesota say they won't vote for a government funding package
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Chapter 3: How did President Trump respond to the shooting of Alex Pretti?
According to analysts at JPMorgan, about 250,000 barrels of daily crude production has been lost due to closures in Oklahoma and parts of Texas. Travelers are also bearing the brunt of the storm, with tens of thousands of flights canceled yesterday and more than 4,000 canceled so far today. Pediatricians are pushing back against the CDC's new and slimmed-down childhood vaccine schedule.
In its guidance out today, the American Academy of Pediatrics continues to recommend that children be vaccinated against 18 diseases, including hepatitis A and B, COVID-19, influenza, rotavirus, and the disease that causes meningitis and other infections. Those six immunizations were dropped from the CDC's schedule for children earlier this month,
with the agency now recommending children get vaccinated against 11 diseases. Hitting out at the CDC's pared-back vaccination schedule, the AAP's Dr. Sean O'Leary said the recommendations aren't grounded in science, but rather in ideology.
A purge of the Chinese military has now reached the country's senior-most general, and we can exclusively report that he's being accused of leaking information about China's nuclear weapons program to the U.S. and accepting bribes for official acts. General Jian Youxia was once considered Xi Jinping's most trusted military ally,
and is a descendant of revolutionary elders who helped Mao Zedong's communist forces seize power in 1949. Analysts say the opacity of China's political system makes it hard to ascertain Xi's motivations for targeting John.
A spokesman at the Chinese embassy in Washington said the party's decision to investigate John underscores that China's leadership maintains, quote, a full-coverage, zero-tolerance approach to combating corruption. We've left a link to our reporting in our show notes. And gold has surged past $5,000 for the first time ever, adding to its historic rally.
We're less than a month into 2026 and gold prices have risen 17% so far this year. That's nothing, though, compared to the silver market, which is up 8% this morning. and 55% for the year so far. So this is a really historic rally in both precious metals.
That's markets reporter Joe Wallace, who said that political uncertainty regarding Greenland and Venezuela, coupled with President Trump's latest threat of 100% tariffs on Canada, is pushing safe havens like gold and silver to new highs.
There's also some concern among investors about the independence of the Federal Reserve after the DOJ investigation into Chair Jerome Powell became public earlier this year. There are a couple more things going on. The Fed has been lowering rates and gold prices typically do well when rates are lower. That's because gold doesn't pay any dividends or contributions. coupons.
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