Stella Carlson, witness to the shooting of Alex Pretti, speaking to CNN./CNN
Last night, CNN’s Anderson Cooper broadcast an exclusive interview with the woman who was first seen in early videos posted of federal agents killing Alex Pretti last Saturday. Stella Carlson was standing close to the deadly skirmish, and ended up as the citizen with the best vantage point to record the shooting—holding her camera phone through it all, and capturing the now-indispensable video that has ripped to shreds the administration’s lies about what happened.
“I am grateful that I was in a position to be there for my community.”
This interview is astonishing. And after watching so many astonishing videos of what has transpired in Minneapolis, this one has stayed with me. Carlson’s bravery is inspiring, as is how she articulates something I hold dear as a journalistic aspiration: the power of bearing witness when no one else will.
“I am grateful that I was in a position to be there for my community,” she told Cooper. “To stop the lies and the madness, and allow there to be proof.”
“Were you scared?” Cooper asked.
“I was terrified, but I was more worried about this not being documented.”
Carlson, who was described by Cooper as a children’s entertainer, a face and body painter, and an airbrush artist, didn’t choose this role. She’s not a journalist or a human rights activist. She is a person who cared about her community. Recording this brutality was foisted on her by Trump’s siege of her city, and she described it as something akin to a calling. She was there to protect her neighbors, she said, “as best I can with my whistle and my phone, which really feels not great.”
“And yet you stood there with a phone, and you documented this,” Cooper gently pressed. “You didn’t run away.”
And then her response, which struck me the most. A gut punch:
“I am not one to run when I’m afraid. I just—no way was I going to leave Alex by himself undocumented, like, that wasn’t an option. I mean, obviously somebody was just executed in the street. I knew I was in danger. We all were, but I wasn’t going to leave… I knew that this was a moment, and we all have to be brave, and we all have to take risks, and we’re all going to be given moments to make that decision… I’m grateful to myself, and I’m grateful to anybody who was supportive to me after to make sure I could get to safety and get that video uploaded to the right people.”
That is heroism, pure and simple. There were other videos of the killing. But Carlson’s was the clearest. What record would have existed had she not been there?
And what record would exist without all the journalism happening in Minneapolis. I’ve been moved while reading comments from you, our Mother Jones community, thanking us after watching dispatches by our digital producer Sam Van Pykeren, who has been relentlessly chronicling the reactions and realities on the ground in a set of emotional, viral videos. This is not to show off, but to double down on the importance of showing up, speaking to real people, and yes, bearing witness, like Carlson.
“Thank you, Sam, for being there and reporting the truth,” one said. Another: “Thank you for keeping our eyes open.”
I hope you can check out not only Sam’s videos, but also the full range of Minneapolis and ICE reporting from the frontlines of Trump’s immigration crackdown on the site right now, documenting both the brutality and the resistance.
Here’s just a sampling from our reporters over the last day or so: Kiera Butler’s look at how right-wing influencers are working to make women love ICE. Russ Choma’s revealing article about Tom Homan’s record as he takes over Minnesota operations. From Minneapolis, reporter Julia Lurie filed a stunning dispatch about the community coming together in the wake of Alex Pretti and Renée Good’s killings (with gorgeous photography by Madison Swart), describing a city under assault but also a resilient city creating mutual aid networks that will outlast federal occupation. She also interviewed a US Army vet, outraged by these new attacks on a country he once defended. Samantha Michaels published a devastating story, with a video on a warrantless ICE raid that tore apart a Memphis family. Noah Lanard analyzed how Greg Bovino proved too openly fascistic—even for Trump.
There’s much more to read and watch and interact with. And there is more to come.
“Nobody’s here for us,” Stella Carlson said during her gripping CNN interview. “So this is what we can do.”