Travis Armand
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tjarmand.bsky.social
Travis Armand
@tjarmand.bsky.social
270 followers 580 following 4 posts
LA ➡️ SF ➡️ NY
Die hard fan of : 49ers, Lakers, Dodgers, USWNT, & USMNT
Work : Finance Director @ The Guardian US @us.theguardian.com
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Reposted by Travis Armand
tressiemcphd.bsky.social
Charles Yang of Time for Three absolutely slaying me. I would lose my mind if I heard this live. Even crappy phone speakers made me scream and cry.
January 25, 2026 at 4:36 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
reichlinmelnick.bsky.social
You have to read this. Firsthand affidavit from one of the women who was there and recording the video. She talks about how Alex Pretti was directing traffic when she arrived. She watched him be killed in front of her. She's afraid to go home, worried she'll be arrested.
1. I am a resident of the Whittier neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota. I am over 18 years of age. I am a children's entertainer who specializes in face painting. 2. On Saturday, January 24, 2026, at about 8:50 am, I was getting ready to go to work when I heard whistles outside. I knew the whistles meant that ICE agents were in the area, so I decided to check it out on my way to work. I've been involved in observing in my community because it is so important to document what ICE is doing to my neighbors. Connecting to your local community and knowing who your neighbors are is something I profoundly value. 3. I drove to Nicollet Ave. and 26th where I could hear the whistles coming from. I turned south onto Nicollet. There were already several ICE agents there and they'd set up a sort of vehicle convoy on Nicollet and 28th. There were also about 15 observers there, recording and observing ICE. 4. I saw ICE agents surrounding cars and punching car windows. I also saw them stopping vehicles further down Nicollet, so I backed up because I didn't feel safe continuing on. 5. I noticed a man sort of acting to help traffic move more smoothly. He helped me find a place to park. I got out with my whistle and my camera. I went over to him and said something like, "I'm going to film and use my whistle." 6. It seemed like most ICE activity was happening a little farther down the street from us, near 27th. Someone was being thrown to the ground. 7. I started recording. There was an agent by a car across the street. Two observers were a few feet away from the agent, blowing their whistles. One was wearing a backpack. 8. I and the man who was observing and helping direct traffic were standing in the street. There was a phone in the man's hand recording a video. 9. An agent approached and asked us to back up, so I moved slowly back onto the sidewalk. 10. The man stayed in the street, filming as the other observers I mentioned earlier were being forced backward by another ICE agent threatening them with pepper spray. The man went closer to support them as they got threatened, just with his camera out. I didn't see him reach for or hold a gun. 11. Then the ICE agent shoved one of the other observers to the ground. Then he started pepper spraying all three of them directly in the face and all over. The man with the phone put his hands above his head and the agent sprayed him again and pushed him. 12. Then the man tried to help up the woman the ICE agent had shoved to the ground. The ICE agents just kept spraying. More agents came over and grabbed the man who was still trying to help the woman get up. All three of the observers looked to have been badly affected by the pepper spray. I could feel the pepper spray in my eyes. 13. The agents pulled the man on the ground. I didn't see him touch any of them-he wasn't even turned toward them. It didn't look like he was trying to resist, just trying to help the woman up. I didn't see him with a gun. They threw him to the ground. Four or five agents had him on the ground and they just started shooting him. They shot him so many times. 14.1 don't know why they shot him. He was only helping. I was five feet from him and they just shot him. 15. The video I recorded of what happened accurately depicts the events leading up to the agents shooting him and several minutes afterwards. The video is attached as Exhibit 1. 16. I have read the statement from DHS about what happened and it is wrong. The man did not approach the agents with a gun. He approached them with a camera. He was just trying to help a woman get up and they took him to the ground. 17. I feel afraid. Only hours have passed since they shot a man right in front me and I don't feel like I can go home because I heard agents were looking for me. I don't know what the agents will do when they find me. I do know that they're not telling the truth about what happened. I've heard that other witnesses might have been arrested and taken to the Whipple Building. 18. I am disgusted and gutted at how they are treating my neighbors and my state. I keep alternating between crying and feeling determined it is important to remember the value of documenting injustice. We show up for the people who need us to bear witness, because it can't just be one group of people bearing the brunt of their tyranny. This is a struggle to protect our freedom and democracy, those things are on the line. He lost his life for those values. I declare under penalty of perjury that everything I have stated in this document is true and correct. Dated and signed on Jan 24, 2026 in Hennepin County, State of Minnesota.
January 25, 2026 at 1:15 AM
Reposted by Travis Armand
ianfraser.bsky.social
Guardian investigative correspondent Oliver Laughland and video producer Tom Silverstone report from the front lines of ordinary Americans’ war with Trump’s ICE hit squads in Minneapolis and its Minnesota environs.

@oliverlaughland.bsky.social @tomsilverstone.bsky.social
@atrupar.com
The occupation of Minneapolis: resisting Trump’s ICE 'invasion' | Anywhere but Washington
YouTube video by The Guardian
youtube.com
January 24, 2026 at 12:22 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
ohheyjenna.bsky.social
“He wanted to help people. He was a super nice, super helpful guy," said @dimitridrekonja.bsky.social, who worked with ICU nurse Alex Pretti.

Pretti's dad recalls that his son "was very upset with what was happening in Minneapolis."

@melodyschreiber.com reports:
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...
Man killed in Minneapolis by federal agents identified as VA nurse Alex Pretti: ‘He wanted to help people’
Alex Pretti, 37, worked in the ICU at the Minneapolis VA Health Care System and had assisted on scientific research
www.theguardian.com
January 24, 2026 at 9:31 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
thetnholler.bsky.social
NBA star Tyrese Halliburton speaks out
January 25, 2026 at 1:49 AM
Reposted by Travis Armand
sahilkapur.bsky.social
Rare NRA pushback against the Trump administration regarding law enforcement shooting Americans with guns
January 25, 2026 at 1:49 AM
Reposted by Travis Armand
jeffrueter.bsky.social
Kare 11 local news just read, in full, this statement from Michael and Susan Pretti, the parents of Alex Pretti.

"Please get the truth out about our son."
Statement from Michael and Susan Pretti Parents of Alex Jeffrey Pretti “We are heartbroken but also very angry. Alex was a kindhearted soul who cared deeply for his family and friends and also the American veterans whom he cared for as an ICU nurse at the Minneapolis VA hospital. Alex wanted to make a difference in this world. Unfortunately, he will not be with us to see his impact. I do not throw around the ‘hero’ term lightly. However, his last thought and act was to protect a woman. The sickening lies told about our son by the administration are reprehensible and disgusting. Alex is clearly not holding a gun when attacked by Trump’s murdering and cowardly ICE thugs. He had his phone in his right hand and his empty left hand is raised above his head while trying to protect the woman ICE just pushed down, all while being pepper sprayed. Please get the truth out about our son. He was a good man. Thank you.
January 25, 2026 at 12:43 AM
Reposted by Travis Armand
gaildrakes.bsky.social
I truly understand the pleas for ICE to leave Minnesota. But leaving MN to go terrorize other states isn’t what anyone wants.

ICE/DHS is kidnapping and murdering people in the streets AND IN DETENTION CENTERS.

Abolishing ICE - and holding its leaders & agents accountable- is the absolute minimum.
January 25, 2026 at 1:50 AM
Reposted by Travis Armand
clairewillett.bsky.social
block immediately everyone
January 16, 2026 at 11:56 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
normcharlatan.bsky.social
I don’t think people quite understand that the occupation by ICE in the Twin Cities has more or less erased non-white people from public life. They cannot safely exist in any space accessible to the public and moving between private places leaves folks vulnerable to kidnapping by armed masked goons.
January 16, 2026 at 10:15 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
leahmcelrath.bsky.social
Another data point indicating that Polymarket is not a “prediction market” but a public persuasion operation—here it spreads disinformation about Minnesota and DHS signals boosts the disinformation:
Homeland Security @DHSgov X.com Electoral power is being transferred from the hands of criminal illegals, back into the hands of American citizens. Polymarket * @Polymarket • 4h BREAKING: Trump has deported so many people from Minnesota they're projected to lose a Congressional seat after next census. 2:54 PM • 1/16/26 • 2.3K Views
January 16, 2026 at 9:01 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
donmoyn.bsky.social
"Officers threw flash bangs and tear gas in my car. I got six kids in the car"
"His wife, Destiny Jackson, told FOX 9 their 6-month-old infant stopped breathing and lost consciousness. She then performed CPR on her baby."
January 15, 2026 at 8:22 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
thetnholler.bsky.social
💯
January 13, 2026 at 10:37 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
ericumansky.bsky.social
This is 10th-grader Arnoldo Bazan.

A citizen.

Immigration agents grabbed him and put him in a chokehold.

"We're from the United States bro!' he screamed.

Agents took and sold his phone

And when he finally got home hours later, his shirt was ripped, he neck had angry, red welts, and he sobbed.
January 13, 2026 at 10:20 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
newseye.bsky.social
A teenage boy was walking home in Minneapolis yesterday when four masked men jumped out of a van & questioned him - with no parent or guardian present.

He was bundled into the van & taken away.

Bystanders heard the boy say: “Can I just go home?”

I don’t know how America comes back from all this.
The boy holding a bag of haribo confectionary is questioned by a masked IcE agent while three others with weapons stand by The boy has head bowed, holding his confectionary, as he is taken away.
January 13, 2026 at 5:56 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
gaykwon.bsky.social
430k of us vs. 2k of them, we're gonna win this

Cedar & 31st I think
January 11, 2026 at 8:02 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
factpostnews.bsky.social
Rep. @AOC: I understand that Vance believes shooting a young mother of three in the face three times is an acceptable America that he wants to live in, and I do not. That is a fundamental difference between Vance and I. I do not believe that the American people should be assassinated in the street.
January 9, 2026 at 7:49 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
normcharlatan.bsky.social
My anger at having to stand outside my kid’s school for two hours to ensure none of their classmates, parents, or teachers get kidnapped by my own government is only slightly tempered by the amazing outpouring of support from other parents and especially neighbors who stand against this bullshit.
January 9, 2026 at 12:41 AM
Reposted by Travis Armand
skyspider.bsky.social
This is the ICE agent who murdered a woman by shooting her multiple times in the face.
January 7, 2026 at 7:14 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
donmoyn.bsky.social
They will murder unarmed citizens and then accuse them of wrongdoing. Zero sense of accountability or shame.
atrupar.com Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 19d
Kristi Noem accuses the woman who was killed by ICE in Minneapolis of committing an act of "domestic terrorism"
January 7, 2026 at 7:30 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
bencollins.bsky.social
Abolish and prosecute ICE. They did a murder in broad daylight today. Imagine what they're doing in the closed facilities we're somehow not even allowed to see.
January 7, 2026 at 6:20 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
viamarsala18.bsky.social
I need people to wrap their minds around the fact that here in Minneapolis, ICE broke the window of a vehicle yesterday, pepper sprayed the occupants, and arrested them, and shot another observer in the face today, and OBSERVERS ARE STILL GOING OUT TO PROTECT THEIR NEIGHBORS AT MASSIVE PERSONAL RISK
wellgoshacs.bsky.social AC @wellgoshacs.bsky.social · 19d
I’m eating lunch, I’m having a panic attack, I’m charging my phone, and then I’m going back out to try and keep my neighborhood safe.
January 7, 2026 at 5:47 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
zeets.bsky.social
That video of ICE killing the woman is horrifying. The most gutless and cowardly group of people empowered by a psychopathic administration. And even when the video clearly shows an execution, they’re already lying about the context of the killing. Evidence doesn’t matter. They just kill and lie.
January 7, 2026 at 6:52 PM
Reposted by Travis Armand
atrupar.com
Frey: "Beyond leaving the scene, they should also leave our city and our state ... crime is down. What this federal administration is doing right now is not about creating safety. Do not let them tell you that what they are do is about creating safety. It is not. It is having the opposite impact."
January 7, 2026 at 6:56 PM