🔫“Second Amendment” Edition

The killing of Alex Pretti has done the unthinkable: it briefly compelled the Trump administration to let slip the Second Amendment it usually has draped over it like a campaign poncho.

At first, the White House followed its standard playbook: declare the dead guy a violent menace, insist federal agents were moments from being “massacred,” and move on once the defenestration of the victim’s character is complete and total. Pretti, officials claimed, was “brandishing” a gun, “acting violently,” and possibly auditioning for the role of supervillain. Stephen Miller labeled him an “assassin.” Trump helpfully circulated photos of a scary-looking firearm, just in case anyone forgot guns are scary when the person holding them isn’t MAGA.

Then the videos came out and ruined everything.

Instead of a bloodthirsty gunman, footage showed Pretti holding a cellphone, helping a woman who’d been pepper-sprayed, getting tackled, disarmed, and then shot anyway. In the back. Awkward, especially since Pretti was doing exactly what conservatives have spent decades insisting is sacred American behavior: lawfully carrying a gun.

Suddenly, Trump’s coalition blew a circuit. Gun-rights groups recoiled at the idea that merely showing up armed—legally—was grounds for getting shot. Conservatives who once praised Kyle Rittenhouse and defended armed protesters found themselves staring at an administration arguing, essentially, the Second Amendment is great, just not for critics of Dear Leader.

Cue the scramble. Trump pivoted from “this guy was an assassin” to “very unfortunate incident,” while adding that he “didn’t like” that Pretti had a gun. Or magazines. Or, apparently, the gun rights he’d campaigned on since day one. The NRA, Gun Owners of America, Mike Pence, and assorted Republicans quietly asked for investigations, while Trump’s press secretary tried to reassemble the party line using duct tape and bullshit.

The result: a rare moment of ideological whiplash. Republicans who’ve long advocated for guns as protection against government tyranny suddenly sounded very comfortable with tyrannical government agents killing a lawful gun owner.

In the end, Trump is attempting a political magic trick: Like Schrödinger’s cat, can the Second Amendment be both alive for his base and simultaneously dead for everyone else, especially when his administration is doing the killing? It may be some time before the results of this thought experiment are revealed.

Drew Sheneman - Substack and Tribune Content Agency

Rob Rogers - Tinyview Comics and Andrews McMeel

Adam Zyglis - cagle.com/zyglis

Andy Marlette - Tribune Content Agency

Nick Anderson - Substack and Tribune Content Agency

Lalo Alcaraz - Andrews McMeel

Mike Smith - King Features

Graeme MacKay - cagle.com/mackay

Bill Bramhall - Tribune Content Agency

Washington has discovered a rare, endangered species: Republican senators publicly mad at a Trump Cabinet official, and the object of their fury is Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who has apparently achieved bipartisan consensus by being bad enough that even the people who hired her want a refund.

The mood in the Senate this week was less policy disagreement and more buyer’s remorse. Sen. Thom Tillis, who voted to confirm Noem, said she “should be out of a job.” Sen. Lisa Murkowski went further, announcing she would not support Noem again and suggesting it’s time for her to step down, a surprising statement from a Republican in an administration where loyalty is equivalent to oxygen.

Trump, wielding his signature maturity and decorum, called Murkowski and Tillis "losers" and "terrible senators" in an interview with ABC News.

Democrats, meanwhile, are united on one point: Noem is a mess. They just can’t agree on whether firing her would improve anything or simply replace her with DHS Secretary Stephen Miller, which most of them regard as a horror sequel nobody asked for. Jeanne Shaheen accused Noem of incompetence and lying to the public. John Fetterman called her “inept and absolutely incompetent,” skipping the euphemisms entirely. Maggie Hassan summed it up neatly: "I have said that in a normal administration, she would have been asked to resign by now. This is obviously not a normal administration,"

Even senators who once backed her are suddenly developing acute cases of “I’ll comment later.” And while the White House insists everything is fine, more than three-quarters of House Democrats are now openly backing impeachment.

The takeaway: Kristi Noem has reached the political danger zone where Democrats want her out and Republicans regret letting her in. But would dumping her accomplish anything when the rot is clearly at the top?