In the wake of federal immigration agents shooting and killing Alex Pretti, former American presidents, who tend to say very little about current affairs, decided to speak up.
The day after the slaying, for example, Bill Clinton issued a lengthy statement that, among other things, warned Americans, “Over the course of a lifetime, we face only a few moments where the decisions we make and the actions we take will shape our history for years to come. This is one of them. If we give our freedoms away after 250 years, we might never get them back.”
Joe Biden soon followed with a similar statement that celebrated the Minnesotans who have protested the federal government’s immigration crackdown, noting that they have “reminded us what it is to be American, and they have suffered enough at the hands of this Administration.”
Barack and Michelle Obama also issued a written statement in the wake of the deadly violence. “It should also be a wake-up call to every American, regardless of party, that many of our core values as a nation are increasingly under assault,” the Obamas wrote. They went on criticize the “unprecedented tactics” the Department of Homeland Security has employed, saying “people across the country have been rightly outraged by the spectacle of masked ICE recruits and other federal agents acting with impunity and engaging in tactics that seem designed to intimidate, harass, provoke and endanger the residents of a major American city.”
The Obamas concluded that “rather than trying to impose some semblance of discipline and accountability over the agents they’ve deployed, the President and current administration officials seem eager to escalate the situation, while offering public explanations for the shootings of Mr. Pretti and Renee Good that aren’t informed by any serious investigation — and that appear to be directly contradicted by video evidence.”
Donald Trump didn’t respond to the substance of any of the former Democratic presidents. But the Republican incumbent, seizing on the FBI executing a search warrant in Fulton County, Georgia, did take the opportunity to launch a ridiculous offensive against one of his Democratic predecessors. HuffPost noted:
In one post on his Truth Social site, he accused former President Barack Obama of ‘treason.’ … In addition, Trump shared a bizarre post claiming China, Iran, Italy, Merrill Lynch, the CIA, the FBI and others all worked with Obama to ‘install Biden as a puppet.’
As part of the same overnight avalanche of weird and conspiratorial missives, the president also amplified one item, written by someone else, that insisted that Obama had “falsified evidence,” followed by a separate missive that concluded, “ARREST OBAMA NOW.”
Suffice it to say, the claims that Trump seemed eager to push were all quite bonkers, though the Republican’s online tantrum did offer the public a timely opportunity to appreciate the difference between the incumbent president and his modern Democratic predecessors: While Clinton, Biden and Obama urged Americans to protect our freedoms and civil liberties as they come under assault, Trump had nothing to offer but tiresome trash.
