Political debate over a deadly immigration enforcement operation in Minneapolis has spilled into the upper ranks of Silicon Valley, where partners at a high-profile venture capital firm publicly separated themselves from a colleague who defended the use of lethal force.
The man who died was 37-year-old Alex Pretti. His death was one of five shootings this month involving federal agents carrying out immigration enforcement, and at least six immigrants have died in federal immigration detention during the same period. Another fatality this month involved Minnesota resident Renee Good.
The incident in Minneapolis has provoked anger across the U.S. political spectrum, in part because administration officials backed the immigration agents even as video footage appeared to contradict the official account. The public conversation has underscored a growing political divide within the U.S. technology sector, where some executives who historically championed progressive causes have publicly embraced positions aligned with the Republican administration.
At the center of the intra-firm controversy was a social media post by a partner who asserted that law enforcement had not shot an innocent person and that illegal immigrants commit crimes daily. Following the post, the firm’s founder and another partner explicitly disavowed those remarks.
The venture firm is known for early backing of companies such as OpenAI, DoorDash and Instacart. In response to the partner’s comments, the founder wrote on social media: "ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) personnel must have ice water running thru their veins to treat other human beings this way." He added, "There is politics but humanity should transcend that."
Several technology figures publicly praised Pretti, who worked as an intensive-care nurse at a Veterans Affairs hospital. Among them were the chief scientist at Alphabet’s Google DeepMind AI lab and the chief scientific officer at Microsoft, both of whom acknowledged Pretti’s work and sacrifice.
The episode illustrates a broader fracture within Silicon Valley. Billionaire Elon Musk has been a prominent mover toward the conservative end of the political spectrum, making hundreds of millions of dollars in campaign donations to the 2024 presidential campaign and supporting anti-immigration policies. That stance has produced public clashes with other tech leaders, including a noted major Democratic donor.
Musk did not comment on the Minneapolis shooting. One prominent tech investor echoed the venture founder’s appeal that humanity should supersede partisan politics.
Over the last year, many technology executives have been cautious about publicly opposing policies that affect their businesses, including the chaotic situation around the H-1B visa program and U.S. tariffs. Rather than confront the administration, some executives have worked to cultivate relations with it. They contributed millions to the presidential inauguration a year ago and pledged tens of billions in spending to support the administration’s manufacturing agenda, a set of commitments that some analysts have criticized as largely symbolic.
The current controversy has also prompted action from within technology companies. More than 450 employees at firms including Google, Meta Platforms, Salesforce and OpenAI signed a letter urging their CEOs to press the White House to withdraw ICE from U.S. cities, to cancel all contracts with ICE and to publicly condemn what the signers described as ICE’s violent actions. The letter stated: "The wanton brutality ... has removed any credibility that these actions are about immigration enforcement. Their goal is terror, cruelty, and suppression of dissent."
The worker activists pointed to a recent instance in which the president said he refrained from deploying federal agents to San Francisco after the chief executives of two major technology companies advised against such an action.
The clash inside the venture capital firm and the broader industry reaction reflect an intensified struggle over how technology leaders should respond to contentious federal enforcement actions. The dispute has the potential to influence corporate reputations, internal employee relations and the public posture of companies that have become deeply entwined with federal policy through lobbying, hiring practices and government contracts.
For now, the firm at the center of the incident and many of the industry’s largest figures remain publicly engaged in a debate that mixes questions of civic responsibility with strategic calculations about ties to government and the regulatory environment that affects technology businesses.