@eirrann.eth

Earlier today, I saw video from several different angles on X (now also circulating here on Farcaster) that shows somewhere between a half-dozen to maybe a dozen federal agents tackle a man, appear to remove a holstered weapon from his hip, and then shoot him repeatedly to death. They fired a volley even after he was motionless on the ground: first what sounded like a double-tap; then what sounded like a quintuple-tap. The video clips showing this span less than a minute. I’m not going to share those videos here. If you don’t want to watch what looks like a public execution, you shouldn’t have to scroll into it (and be warned before going to any of the media links cited below). I also don’t know the details before the clip starts. But I’m already watching the same familiar pattern: the state moves faster than the facts. DHS almost immediately posted on X framing meant to portray the man as deserving of death: before the public has any meaningful timeline, before an independent investigation, before a clear accounting of commands, decisions and rounds fired. One of the video angles makes something even more disturbing seem plausible. It looks like the first shot might have been a negligent discharge: an agent yanking the victim’s weapon away and the gun going off during the disarm. I’m not claiming that’s confirmed. I’m saying that’s what the angle appears to show, and it underscores why we need full, unedited footage and real accountability: because “split second” narratives collapse when the shooting may begin as incompetence and then roll forward into fatal certainty. From a self-preservation standpoint, I cannot imagine why anyone would voluntarily put themselves in proximity to aggressive, trigger-happy federal agents operating in the street with administration-asserted impunity right now. Not because the person “deserved it”, but because despite being a firearm owner with a concealed carry permit who firmly believes that my Constitutional rights empower me, I’m also a realist. I can foresee the outcome when armed agents told they have absolute authority decide they’re threatened first and justify later. And here’s the part that should terrify people across ideologies: even if you were perfectly within your rights, those rights don’t protect you if the people with guns treat anything less than immediate, unwavering compliance as domestic terrorism, and the exercise of Constitutional rights as provocation. People in America have constitutionally protected rights that my forebears – who have lived on this land for more than ten generations – fought and died for: paid for in blood. Not vibes. Rights. 1st Amendment: speech, press, assembly, petition. In practice, we’re watching federal operations where the public is told to disperse or face violent suppression, where information is managed through rapid official spin, and where the practical effect is to chill speech and assembly: especially when bystanders filming and protesting are met with escalation and crowd control, branded as “domestic terrorists” for acting as legal observers. 2nd Amendment: the right to keep and bear arms. Reporting indicates this man was a lawful gun owner with a permit to carry. If the state can treat lawful possession as an on-the-spot death sentence, then the “right” is a slogan, not a safeguard. 4th Amendment: security against unreasonable searches and seizures; warrants based on probable cause. The word “seizure” includes your person. When federal agents can violently seize someone in public space and then kill them during that seizure, and the first official move is PR rather than transparency: the spirit of the 4th is being selectively hollowed out in real time. What makes this feel especially grotesque is the hypocrisy: a lot of the people who sign up to work for ICE are staunchly vocal, Gadsden-flag-waving “Don’t Tread On Me” proponents of their 1st, 2nd and 4th Amendment rights: yet they’ll bend themselves into knots to justify trampling those same rights when the person on the ground is someone they’ve been indoctrinated to unquestioningly view as a threat. Zooming out, it’s hard not to feel like this administration is deliberately creating the preconditions for violent confrontation: unleashing heavily armed federal teams that appear poorly trained and poorly advised on their constitutional responsibilities and our constitutional rights; operating in a posture that predictably triggers panic, resistance and righteous public outcry; and taking advantage of every remote opportunity for extreme escalation. And in a state like Minnesota – where permit holders can legally carry a handgun in public without concealment, and where the modern record includes public armed right-wing and anti-government activity showing up around unrest – the “someone will come out armed” outcome feels less like a risk and more like an inevitability. If you wanted a pretext to claim there’s an “armed insurrection” and justify extraordinary measures under the Insurrection Act, this is what the setup looks like: provoke, escalate, then declare the crisis you manufactured. It’s difficult not to see hardliners in Trump-world, including Stephen Miller, as having waited for an opening like this since the first term (see my earlier thinking about these accelerationist tendencies in the administration in the QC below; relevant sources cited in that thread). I can’t wait for the mental gymnastics from the “Don’t Tread on Me” crowd. Sources linked in this cast: Reuters (24 Jan 2026); Financial Times (24 Jan 2026); The Guardian (24 Jan 2026); my QC about accelerationism in the current administration Sources linked in second cast of thread: Minnesota DPS on Permit to Carry and no concealment requirement; Minnesota open-carry summary; DOJ/ABC documentation of “Boogaloo” armed anti-government activity tied to Minneapolis unrest Sources linked in third case of thread: reporting from WaPo that the Insurrection Act has been explicitly floated in the Minneapolis context https://www.reuters.com/world/us/minnesota-governor-says-federal-agents-involved-shooting-minneapolis-2026-01-24/ https://www.ft.com/content/3d855ba7-3e96-4512-b34c-6ff87ade6c12 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/24/minneapolis-shooting-federal-agents https://farcaster.xyz/eirrann.eth/0xed29cd6d

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