Left-wing legal group shops signatures to push ICE prosecutions in Minnesota

An extreme left-wing legal advocacy group is circulating a letter looking for signatures aimed at getting criminal and civil rights prosecutions started against ICE officers in Minnesota.

The solicitation is seeking signatures from former Department of Justice (DOJ) and U.S. Attorney’s Office prosecutors for a public missive urging Attorney General Pam Bondi to compel evidence sharing with Minnesota authorities.

The letter by Prosecutors Alliance alleges two federal officer-involved shootings in Minnesota aren’t being investigated by local authorities, citing a single news report from an immigrant-based news organization in Minneapolis, claiming federal interference.

The Prosecutors Alliance is a leftist organization that’s a project of the Tides Center, which serves as a funding pass-through for organizations such as George Soros’s Open Society Foundation, which advocates defunding police and open borders. 

Critics say that such a letter is the same tactic used by the discredited “former intelligence officials” who deployed their pens during the 2020 election to allege the Hunter Biden laptop hard drive was a Russian disinformation operation. 

It was later found that the contents of the laptop were 100% authentic. 

Organizers have stated the prosecutor’s letter will only be released if a minimum of 100 former officials sign on, a condition that underscores the campaign’s reliance on optics rather than legal facts. 

As a matter of practice, federal authorities typically secure the scene, preserve evidence and investigate before local authorities. 

There is no indication locally that an investigation isn’t ongoing by Hennepin County, which has jurisdiction in the two cases. 

Just days ago, the Washington Post reported that anonymous sources had complained that the federal government wasn’t involved enough in the investigations, prompting resignations. 

Those resignations may be one reason why the federal side of the investigation is being held up.  

The DOJ said it typically investigates officer-involved shooting cases only in cases of civil rights violations. At press conference on Friday, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche confirmed that the recent shooting of Alex Pretti is being investigated for possible civil rights violations. 

However, the prosecutor’s solicitation and the local news item cited in the letter seem to complain federal authorities are too involved in the case.  

“The BCA Force Investigations Unit has been requested by Minneapolis police to investigate this morning’s federal agent-involved shooting in Minneapolis,” said a social media post by Minnesota’s Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA). “Our agents and crime scene personnel attempted to access the location but were blocked by @DHSgov personnel at the scene.”  

Disputes over jurisdiction and evidence control are routinely addressed through courts and formal interagency processes, not public social media campaigns designed to generate political pressure. 

Prosecutors Alliance presents itself as a professional organization promoting a “fair and humane justice system.” 

In practice it operates as part of the broader Tides Foundation network, a major progressive funding and administrative hub that houses and supports dozens of radical, left-wing advocacy initiatives at the political level. 

The alliance letter is framed as a defense of prosecutorial norms rather than political advocacy.  

But it’s designed to generate headlines referring to “former DOJ prosecutors” rather than the focus on the legal merits of the case or the limits of the signers’ actual involvement or knowledge of the case. 

In fact, critics might argue prosecutorial norms would be violated by publishing such a letter, because it would taint the jury pool against the officers and create an impression that the federal government is hiding evidence.  

Many observers worry about a repeat of the rush to judgment in Minneapolis in the wake of the death of George Floyd in 2020, which similarly sparked large scale protests. 

Just a year later, on the eve of a trial which would convict Officer Derek Chauvin in the death of Floyd, America expressed reservations about the scapegoating of law-enforcement and the need to protect public order. 

“Law and order is the most important thing to ensure, even if it means limiting peaceful protests,” said 49% of respondents to a Ipsos survey at the time, while 31% said protesting took priority.