MAGA Is Proving How Little It Actually Cares About Gun Rights
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Politics
/ January 26, 2026
MAGA Is Proving How Little It Actually Cares About Gun Rights
The ability to kill dissidents at will is more important to Trump and his supporters than the Second Amendment.
Jeet Heer
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FBI director Kash Patel on January 23, 2026.
(Will Lester / MediaNews Group/Inland Valley Daily Bulletin via Getty Images))
Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is one of the most left-wing figures in American public life. Her recently retired GOP colleague Marjorie Taylor Greene is just as far on the right-wing side of the political spectrum. Yet the two are united in seeing the killing of Alex Pretti on Saturday by ICE agents as a constitutional crisis.
Rebuking Vice President JD Vance, Ocasio-Cortez wrote, “You are defending the open killing of everyday Americans for exercising their Constitutional rights.”
Taylor Greene explained the constitutional rights that were violated in this case:
I unapologetically believe in border security and deporting criminal illegal aliens and I support law enforcement. However, I also unapologetically support the 2nd amendment. Legally carrying a firearm is not the same as brandishing a firearm. I support American’s 1st and 4th amendment rights. There is nothing wrong with legally peacefully protesting and videoing.
Politically, the constitutional violation that is likely to pose the most trouble is the Second Amendment. The Republican Party, including Donald Trump, has long taken a maximalist position on gun rights, resisting even the most popular restrictions such as limits on automatic weapons. The radical right, which is in many ways the progenitor of Trump’s MAGA movement, has long warned that gun control is a step on the path toward the end of freedom in the US. Toward this end, the right has presented the most inflammatory version of famous cases where government agents faced off against gun owners, as in the Ruby Ridge standoff in 1992 and the Waco siege in 1993.
I’d like the Second Amendment to be repealed. But as long as it exists, gun owners do have the constitutional right to carry a gun. Alex Pretti was exercising those constitutional rights when he was killed. He had a license to carry a weapon. None of this, if one accepts the constitutional right to gun ownership, justifies his killing.
That doesn’t mean the government hasn’t tried to smear Pretti anyway. The Wall Street Journal reports that federal agents claimed that Pretti was “violently resisting” arrest but “bystander footage appears to tell a different story. A frame-by-frame review by The Wall Street Journal shows a federal officer pulling a handgun away …
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MAGA Is Proving How Little It Actually Cares About Gun Rights
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Current Issue
Politics
/ January 26, 2026
MAGA Is Proving How Little It Actually Cares About Gun Rights
The ability to kill dissidents at will is more important to Trump and his supporters than the Second Amendment.
Jeet Heer
Share
Copy Link
X (Twitter)
Bluesky Pocket
Ad Policy
FBI director Kash Patel on January 23, 2026.
(Will Lester / MediaNews Group/Inland Valley Daily Bulletin via Getty Images))
Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is one of the most left-wing figures in American public life. Her recently retired GOP colleague Marjorie Taylor Greene is just as far on the right-wing side of the political spectrum. Yet the two are united in seeing the killing of Alex Pretti on Saturday by ICE agents as a constitutional crisis.
Rebuking Vice President JD Vance, Ocasio-Cortez wrote, “You are defending the open killing of everyday Americans for exercising their Constitutional rights.”
Taylor Greene explained the constitutional rights that were violated in this case:
I unapologetically believe in border security and deporting criminal illegal aliens and I support law enforcement. However, I also unapologetically support the 2nd amendment. Legally carrying a firearm is not the same as brandishing a firearm. I support American’s 1st and 4th amendment rights. There is nothing wrong with legally peacefully protesting and videoing.
Politically, the constitutional violation that is likely to pose the most trouble is the Second Amendment. The Republican Party, including Donald Trump, has long taken a maximalist position on gun rights, resisting even the most popular restrictions such as limits on automatic weapons. The radical right, which is in many ways the progenitor of Trump’s MAGA movement, has long warned that gun control is a step on the path toward the end of freedom in the US. Toward this end, the right has presented the most inflammatory version of famous cases where government agents faced off against gun owners, as in the Ruby Ridge standoff in 1992 and the Waco siege in 1993.
I’d like the Second Amendment to be repealed. But as long as it exists, gun owners do have the constitutional right to carry a gun. Alex Pretti was exercising those constitutional rights when he was killed. He had a license to carry a weapon. None of this, if one accepts the constitutional right to gun ownership, justifies his killing.
That doesn’t mean the government hasn’t tried to smear Pretti anyway. The Wall Street Journal reports that federal agents claimed that Pretti was “violently resisting” arrest but “bystander footage appears to tell a different story. A frame-by-frame review by The Wall Street Journal shows a federal officer pulling a handgun away …
MAGA Is Proving How Little It Actually Cares About Gun Rights
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MAGA Is Proving How Little It Actually Cares About Gun Rights
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Current Issue
Politics
/ January 26, 2026
MAGA Is Proving How Little It Actually Cares About Gun Rights
The ability to kill dissidents at will is more important to Trump and his supporters than the Second Amendment.
Jeet Heer
Share
Copy Link
Facebook
X (Twitter)
Bluesky Pocket
Email
Ad Policy
FBI director Kash Patel on January 23, 2026.
(Will Lester / MediaNews Group/Inland Valley Daily Bulletin via Getty Images))
Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is one of the most left-wing figures in American public life. Her recently retired GOP colleague Marjorie Taylor Greene is just as far on the right-wing side of the political spectrum. Yet the two are united in seeing the killing of Alex Pretti on Saturday by ICE agents as a constitutional crisis.
Rebuking Vice President JD Vance, Ocasio-Cortez wrote, “You are defending the open killing of everyday Americans for exercising their Constitutional rights.”
Taylor Greene explained the constitutional rights that were violated in this case:
I unapologetically believe in border security and deporting criminal illegal aliens and I support law enforcement. However, I also unapologetically support the 2nd amendment. Legally carrying a firearm is not the same as brandishing a firearm. I support American’s 1st and 4th amendment rights. There is nothing wrong with legally peacefully protesting and videoing.
Politically, the constitutional violation that is likely to pose the most trouble is the Second Amendment. The Republican Party, including Donald Trump, has long taken a maximalist position on gun rights, resisting even the most popular restrictions such as limits on automatic weapons. The radical right, which is in many ways the progenitor of Trump’s MAGA movement, has long warned that gun control is a step on the path toward the end of freedom in the US. Toward this end, the right has presented the most inflammatory version of famous cases where government agents faced off against gun owners, as in the Ruby Ridge standoff in 1992 and the Waco siege in 1993.
I’d like the Second Amendment to be repealed. But as long as it exists, gun owners do have the constitutional right to carry a gun. Alex Pretti was exercising those constitutional rights when he was killed. He had a license to carry a weapon. None of this, if one accepts the constitutional right to gun ownership, justifies his killing.
That doesn’t mean the government hasn’t tried to smear Pretti anyway. The Wall Street Journal reports that federal agents claimed that Pretti was “violently resisting” arrest but “bystander footage appears to tell a different story. A frame-by-frame review by The Wall Street Journal shows a federal officer pulling a handgun away …
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