Most people are treating the Alex Pretti story as a straightforward immigration policy debate.

But the more revealing fight isn’t about borders or enforcement levels. It's about membership: who counts as “us,” and what happens when someone gets labeled a traitor.

After Alex Pretti was killed in Minneapolis during a Customs and Border Protection encounter, Nick Fuentes went on his show and framed Pretti’s death as basically deserved, not because of a careful review of the facts, but because Pretti was a “race traitor.” He mocked sympathy for Pretti and for Renee Good, who was killed earlier in Minneapolis in a separate ICE-related shooting.

I’m not saying Fuentes caused the shooting. I’m saying this traitor framing is the machinery that makes the next shooting easier to absorb.

Here’s how the machinery works:Here’s how the machinery works:

Turn policy into identity: Immigration enforcement stops being debated as tradeoffs and becomes “our survival vs. traitors.”

Make “race traitor” a moral category: Once you’re in that bucket, your rights become optional.

Convert death into proof: “One less traitor” is sold as social hygiene, not tragedy.

Build coalitions on shared separatism: Historically, separatist ideologies have produced strange alliances. The modern version doesn’t need agreement on dignity, only agreement on separation and enemies.

Yes, people can argue enforcement levels, crime, borders, and capacity. But you can do that without building a worldview where dissenters “had it coming.”

If the goal is a stable country, the question isn’t “Did he deserve it?”

The question is: What kind of politics requires “traitor” language to function, and what does it do the next time the target is you?

Links:Links:

People for the American Way: “One Less Asshole in the World”: Nick Fuentes Says Alex Pretti Was “Race Traitor”

Rumble: America First episode (timestamp)

Media Matters: Right-wing media figures who have justified Alex Pretti’s killing

CBS News: Two federal agents fired their weapons during Alex Pretti shooting

MPR News: Minneapolis woman dies after being shot by federal officer