US President Donald Trump dispatched his top border official Monday to Minnesota in a bid to regain control over an escalating crisis sparked by the second killing of a protester against his administration’s militarized immigration raids.Trump said that Tom Homan, his point man for border security, would arrive in the state later and “will report directly to me.”Minneapolis has become ground zero in the clash between Trump and growing numbers of Americans over his nationwide immigration crackdown.Trump’s deputy attorney general, Todd Blanche, described the city on Fox News as a “powder keg.”Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), an agency under the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), has been transformed under Trump into the United States’ most heavily funded law enforcement body. But polls show growing anger over its frequently brutal tactics.A huge rally took place despite bitter cold in Minneapolis on Friday to protest the raids and the point blank shooting by an ICE agent of protester Renee Good, a 37-year-old mother of three on January 7.Then on Saturday, immigration agents gunned down Alex Jeffrey Pretti, also 37, after having already tackled him to the ground. Like Good, the intensive care unit nurse was a US citizen.More rallies erupted after his death in Minneapolis, New York and other major cities.Opening a new front in the crisis, a federal judge in Minneapolis was hearing arguments Monday on whether the deployment of federal officers — often masked, heavily armed and unidentified — violates the state of Minnesota’s sovereignty.And in Congress, Democrats are threatening to hold up funding for the US government unless immigration enforcement agencies are reformed.- Trump defends tactics -Trump has so far dismissed concerns.The 79-year-old Republican’s first reaction to Pretti’s killing was to suggest that the nurse had come intending to shoot at the police.Pretti was carrying a pistol with him at the time but never removed it and had apparently already been disarmed when he was shot multiple times at point-blank range. He was licensed to carry a weapon.Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison on Sunday accused Trump of pushing a “flat-out insane” narrative.Trump repeated the insinuation that Pretti was to blame when he told The Wall Street Journal on Sunday: “I don’t like any shooting… but I don’t like it when somebody goes into a protest and he’s got a very powerful, fully loaded gun.”White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt indicated Homan would not focus on Pretti’s killing and instead lead efforts to arrest “criminal illegal aliens” and tackle alleged fraud by Somali immigrants — racially charged claims fueling the crackdown.Blanche told Fox News “it is extraordinarily important that we do not jump to conclusions,” while describing the incident as “a very violent altercation.”- Republican criticism -In Monday’s court action the judge was hearing arguments from state and city lawyers that the federal deployments amount to an occupying force. Also under consideration was a bid to force federal officials to preserve evidence related to Pretti’s killing.The lawsuits highlight the deep rift between local and federal law enforcement over the deployment, dubbed “Operation Metro Surge.”Trump’s immigration raids have focused deliberately on Democratic-run cities, pitting mayors and governors against the president.Local police have repeatedly confronted federal agents and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz has even suggested he could call out the state’s National Guard to push back against Trump’s forces.Trump will also be watching signs of growing disenchantment from his Republican Party in Congress. The party is usually in lockstep with Trump but it has only a slender majority.One of the most prominent cautions came from House Oversight Committee chairman James Comer, who signaled Sunday that federal agents should withdraw from Minneapolis — an intervention that would normally be unheard of from a figure considered one of Trump’s staunchest loyalists.Trump told the Journal that the immigration agents would leave Minneapolis “at some point.”

The horrific knife attack that almost killed Salman Rushdie was an example of violence unleashed by unscrupulous political leaders, the author said Sunday, warning that “everybody’s in danger now” in the increasingly febrile United States. Speaking at the premiere of the documentary “Knife: The Attempted Murder of Salman Rushdie,” the writer pointed to events unfolding across the country, where a second protester was shot dead by federal agents 24 hours earlier.”The idea of danger and violence is close to everyone now in this country,” he told AFP at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah.”I think everybody’s in danger now.” The film, directed by documentarian Alex Gibney, is the companion piece to Rushdie’s “Knife,” a memoir recounting the harrowing 2022 attack and its aftermath.The British-American author was at an event in Chautauqua, New York when 24-year-old Hadi Matar leapt onto the stage and stabbed him 15 times.The brutal assault left Rushdie with life-changing injuries, including the loss of his right eye.The comments on political violence come as President Donald Trump has surged militarized immigration raids into American cities, notably Minneapolis where federal agents have shot dead two US citizens this month. A man was arrested at Sundance on Saturday after allegedly punching Congressman Maxwell Frost in the face and screaming that Trump was going to deport him, the Florida lawmaker said on X.- Fatwa -Gibney’s film uses graphic video of the assault on Rushdie, shot by event organizers and attendees, as well as intimate footage filmed by his wife, Rachel Eliza Griffiths, over six weeks as the author lay in hospital grievously wounded.It also mixes in archival news reports and interviews with Rushdie detailing the furor in the Islamic world that greeted the publication of his 1988 novel “The Satanic Verses.”The following year, Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a fatwa, telling Muslims worldwide it was their religious duty to kill Rushdie.For over a decade the author lived in hiding, protected by the British government, until a deal was reached in which the fatwa was officially rescinded in exchange for Britain’s granting diplomatic recognition to Tehran.As the immediate risk appeared to recede, Rushdie re-emerged, becoming something of a celebrity and continuing to create successful literary fiction.But the threat against him never vanished, and the animosity some bore him remained. – ‘Authoritarian’ -Hadi, who was sentenced last year to 25 years for attempted murder and assault, told a reporter before his trial that he believed Rushdie had “attacked Islam.” He admitted he had only read two pages of “The Satanic Verses.”Rushdie said the brutal attack on him was an example of a “larger thing.””Violence is that thing, violence unleashed by the unscrupulous using the ignorant to attack… culture.”For the authoritarian, culture is the enemy. Whether that’s journalism or universities or music or writing… the uncultured and ignorant, and the radical don’t like it, and they take steps against it, which we see every day.”Rushdie’s comments come in the wake of a crackdown Trump has launched on higher education, in an effort to stamp out what he claims is a “liberal bias” in university teaching.Trump also routinely derides journalism and journalists, blasting any report he disagrees with as “fake news,” while conservative US states increasingly ban books from school libraries.The Booker-Prize winning author said the film as conceived was not intended as a commentary on the here and now.”When you’re making the film, you’re making the film, and then the world does what it does, and sometimes the two things run into each other,” he said.”I’m now beginning to think that maybe the film is here at a kind of apposite moment, that maybe all of us now are feeling the risk of violence.”The Sundance Film Festival runs until February 1.