Redditors Are Mounting a Resistance Against ICE | WIREDSkip to main contentMenuSECURITYPOLITICSTHE BIG STORYBUSINESSSCIENCECULTUREREVIEWSMenuAccountAccountNewslettersSecurityPoliticsThe Big StoryBusinessScienceCultureReviewsChevronMoreExpandThe Big InterviewMagazineEventsWIRED InsiderWIRED ConsultingNewslettersPodcastsVideoMerchSearchSearchSign InSign InKat TenbargeCultureJan 26, 2026 2:46 PMRedditors Are Mounting a Resistance Against ICEA user from r/Minneapolis was among the first to share footage of federal agents shooting Alex Pretti. Following his death, subreddits about football, cats, and embroidery have all rallied against ICE.Photo-Illustration: WIRED Staff; Getty ImagesCommentLoaderSave StorySave this storyCommentLoaderSave StorySave this storyOn Saturday morning, a Reddit user who has posted about living in Minneapolis for years shared a video on the city’s subreddit, r/Minneapolis, with the title “Another ICE murder in front of Glam Doll Donuts.”The 40-second clip showed a group of federal agents tackling 37-year-old Alex Pretti to the ground and beating him. About 20 seconds in, one of them begins shooting Pretti. At least 10 gunshots go off, from multiple agents, and a person can be heard yelling “Did they fucking kill that guy? Are you fucking kidding me dude? Not again.” (The agents who fired on Pretti have not been charged, nor has ICE agent Jonathan Ross, who shot and killed Minneapolis resident Renee Nicole Good on January 7. They have been moved to “other locations,” according to CBP official Greg Bovino.)The video was upvoted more than 60,000 times, reaching the top of Reddit’s homepage.Over the past month, as the Department of Homeland Security has deployed thousands of armed, masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to Minnesota’s Twin Cities, the r/Minneapolis subreddit has become a vital news and information hub for both residents and outsiders.Previously, the user who shared the shooting footage posted about a missing dog poster and about trees being cut down near a local lake. “I just wanted a local subreddit to know what was happening in my city, and now all of a sudden, we’ve turned into this de facto hub of information for basically how to fight fascism,” says one r/Minneapolis moderator, who has been in the volunteer position for close to a decade and spoke on the condition of anonymity due to safety concerns.For many of the longtime r/Minneapolis users, ICE agents have occupied their backyards. Outside of the local Minnesota subreddits, rage against ICE has also reached a boiling point. A majority of posts in r/all, where top posts across all subreddits are ranked, was devoted Saturday and Sunday to mocking and criticizing ICE for killing Pretti.In the Reddit community for cross stitching, the top post this weekend was a “Fuck Ice” embroidery, and there were multiple variations of the same slogan in the stained glass subreddit, too. “FUCK ICE” was painted on an acrylic set in a nail polish subreddit, where other users offered dupes to get the look of a woman’s bright pink nails in a picture where her hand was pressed against a prominent right-wing influencer’s face during a downtown Minneapolis clash.When the moderator of camera subreddit r/Leica prohibited “partisan comments” on photos of ICE officers in Minneapolis, a user wrote “HATE the censorship of this sub.” (Photojournalist John Abernathy—who went viral after tossing his camera to another photographer while being tackled by ICE agents—had shared pictures from the scene.) Even users in r/massivecock, where most of the posts are images of erect penises, railed against ICE in their captions.“I think it’s just like this awareness of the level of injustice taking place,” said the r/Minneapolis moderator, adding that people outside the state are increasingly worried about being targeted by ICE. “They’re testing things here. They’re coming for you next.”Americans have become significantly more in favor of abolishing ICE since Donald Trump’s second administration began unprecedented raids of blue cities.Before the 2024 election, polling showed only around 1 in 4 people surveyed supported abolishing ICE—now, the same polls show 43 percent support it. Anger has peaked over ICE’s brutal occupation of Minneapolis, especially after officer Ross killed 37-year-old Good. After agents killed Pretti, even people who rarely share positive sentiments about Minneapolis, like fans of competing football teams in Minnesota, Chicago, Detroit, and Green Bay, are increasingly protesting ICE in their shared subreddit. “The ruling on the field is that this is a meme football sub,” said one of the top posts this weekend in r/NFCNorthMemeWar. “HOWEVER … FUCK ICE and fuck any bootlicker who supports them.”The moderator of r/catbongos, a subreddit for playfully patting your cat like you’re playing the bongos, posted an anti-ICE screed—and it quickly became the subreddit’s most-upvoted post ever. “The nice thing about owning a subreddit is I can use it as my personal soapbox, so after the blatant murder by ICE today in Minnesota, I wanted to say something,” the post, titled “If you still support Trump/ICE even slightly, you're not welcome in this sub,” began. “We are reaching a point where we can no longer tolerate the people who are supporting or making excuses for this, or have them be a part of our lives.” Many of the top replies to the post said they were joining r/catbongos because of it.The popular backlash against ICE over killing Pretti extends well beyond Reddit and other social media platforms. Republican House Oversight Committee chairman James Comer suggested that Trump should pull ICE out of Minneapolis, while Fox News host Maria Bartiromo said there was no evidence Pretti was threatening law enforcement, and a guest on the channel said that the White House misrepresented the facts of the shooting. Plus, since Pretti was carrying a concealed gun, the National Rifle Association and other gun advocacy groups that are usually pro-Trump have called for a full investigation—while the subreddit for concealed-carry weapons lambasted Trump’s posts about Pretti’s setup.The longtime r/Minneapolis moderator is reminded of what happened after Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin killed George Floyd roughly 17 blocks away from where Pretti was shot, inspiring the 2020 Black Lives Matter movement. Both times, the subreddit became a front line for news, on-the-ground footage, community resources, and supporters from around the world. She and her fellow moderators work “easily 20 hours a week,” unpaid, to keep up at peak times. They respond to reports and messages, weed out duplicate posts of the same videos, and guard the subreddit from agitators and trolls.“We’re filtering the comments, we’re banning problematic users before they can really spread out and go into multiple threads and harass multiple people,” the moderator says. “You are literally dealing with the worst types of people ... They’re trying to misrepresent what happened or just straight up make fun of them. They find it funny.”Another r/Minneapolis moderator who spoke to WIRED on the condition of anonymity started volunteering around a month ago, as activity on the subreddit was ramping up. He has had to force himself to take a break after spending hours staring at screenshots of the moment when Pretti was shot. To prevent users from seeing something graphic they may not want to, the moderators require these posts to have a NSFW (not safe for work) or “spoiler” filter. But the horror of what is happening makes it harder to compartmentalize elsewhere on the platform, this r/Minneapolis moderator thinks, leading to more people in other subreddits posting about ICE.“Logically you’re like ‘Yeah, of course, people wouldn’t post political stuff there,’ but the people who are moderating and using these communities are people and they’re still seeing that content in other places and they’re still wrestling with the moral questions of this time,” he says. “And if that means they’re going to do it in ‘catbongos’ or some ‘not safe for work’ sub, that’s where they’re going to do it.”Reddit offers moderators resources during times of increased traffic, a Reddit spokesperson told WIRED, including a suite of automated filters related to crowd control and harassment. Reddit's internal safety teams can also take action against rule-violating content using automated tools at scale.Both r/Minneapolis moderators bear the additional toll of seeing state violence committed against their own neighbors. For the longtime moderator, using r/Minneapolis started as a way to find “some drinking buddies from a website.” Then, her city became the epicenter of police and ICE accountability movements.“I drive by there,” she says, of the location where Pretti was killed. “We go to get donuts. I eat pho a block away from there. That hurts. That’s the knife twist.”CommentsBack to topTriangleYou Might Also LikeIn your inbox: WIRED's most ambitious, future-defining storiesDoes the “war on protein” exist?Big Story: China’s renewable energy revolution might save the worldThe race to build the DeepSeek of Europe is onWatch our livestream replay: Welcome to the Chinese centuryKat Tenbarge is an award-winning culture reporter who publishes Spitfire News, an independent newsletter about the internet, politics, and media. She has previously written for NBC News and Business Insider. ... Read MoreContributorTopicsredditSocial MediaImmigration and Customs EnforcementpoliticsDonald TrumpMinnesotaRead More10% Off Dell Coupon Codes for January 2026Get 10% off with verified Dell promo code, plus today’s coupons for up to $600 off laptops, Alienware monitors, and all things tech.20% Off TurboTax Service Codes for January 2026Tax season doesn’t have to be stressful. 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I am not proud that the company I enjoy so much working for is part of this,” one worker wrote on Slack.TikTok Data Center Outage Triggers Trust Crisis for New US OwnersThe technical failure coincided with TikTok’s ownership transition, leading users to question whether videos criticizing ICE raids in Minnesota were being intentionally censored.Redditors Are Mounting a Resistance Against ICEA user from r/Minneapolis was among the first to share footage of federal agents shooting Alex Pretti. 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The rapid mobilization of Reddit communities, particularly r/Minneapolis, following the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti by ICE agents, represents a significant and complex response to perceived injustices within the American legal and immigration system. This event triggered a cascade of actions, demonstrating a previously untapped organizational capacity within online communities and highlighting a growing sense of distrust towards federal law enforcement.

The initial sharing of the 40-second video depicting the confrontation – a clip swiftly and widely disseminated by a user from r/Minneapolis – acted as a catalyst. This wasn’t simply a shared piece of disturbing footage; it became a focal point for collective outrage and a call to action. Subreddits dedicated to seemingly disparate interests— football, cats, and embroidery— quickly aligned in their condemnation of ICE’s actions. This demonstrated a remarkable ability for these online communities, previously occupied with far more niche pursuits, to coalesce around a single, emotionally charged issue.

As journalist Kat Tenbarge notes, the r/Minneapolis subreddit transformed into what the moderator describes as “a de facto hub of information for basically how to fight fascism.” This transformation speaks to a broader shift in how information is consumed and disseminated, particularly amongst younger demographics who increasingly rely on online communities for news and resource sharing. The fact that this subreddit, originally intended for sharing local updates, became a frontline for accountability felt poignant, reflecting a deepening distrust of traditional media outlets.

The intensity of the response was further fuelled by the demonstrable presence of ICE agents in Minneapolis, and the perceived escalation of tactics. The killing of Renee Nicole Good in January 7th only intensified the existing tensions and heightened the sense of vulnerability felt by residents. The actions of the agents, viewed as a brutal display of force, further galvanized the online response.

Crucially, this reaction wasn’t confined to the immediate aftermath. The r/Minneapolis community’s sustained engagement—estimated by the moderators to require “easily 20 hours a week,” unpaid— showcased a remarkable level of dedication and a willingness to take on an active, if somewhat chaotic, role in the unfolding situation. The moderators’ efforts to filter comments, ban problematic users, and control the flow of information mirrored the activities of traditional media outlets but operated within a decentralized, community-driven framework.

The mirroring of responses across diverse subreddits—fans of competing football teams, users in "not safe for work" communities— underscored the deeply rooted nature of the outrage. As Tenbarge articulates, "It’s just like this awareness of the level of injustice taking place.” This suggests not merely a localized reaction but a broader reflection of anxieties regarding immigration policies and government overreach.

Furthermore, the response highlighted the evolving nature of community activism in the digital age. The r/Minneapolis subreddit’s actions were not simply about expressing support for Pretti, but about creating a tangible network for resistance, distributing information, coordinating resources, and applying pressure to both local authorities and federal law enforcement. The use of the subreddit as a "personal soapbox" demonstrated the potent force of online voices in shaping public perception and potentially influencing policy decisions.

The prolonged engagement—despite the inherent challenges of managing online communities— underscored the deep emotional investment of the participants and the potential for online activism to become a sustained, ongoing effort. The involvement of seemingly disparate subreddits further emphasizes the far reaching nature of this resistance, illustrating the way a single catalyst can galvanize a network of disparate users into a collective of resistance.