On January 24, a US Border Patrol agent shot and killed 37-year-old ICU nurse Alex Pretti in Minneapolis after he was held down by multiple federal agents. The Trump administration alleged that Pretti threatened agents with a gun. But videos appear to show Pretti, who was carrying a licensed handgun, holding only his phone in his hand when he was tackled and agents disarming Pretti before he was shot and killed.
The Trump administration has since signaled that it’s scaling back the federal immigration operation in the city. Multiple news outlets are reporting that Gregory Bovino, the top US Border Patrol official, has been demoted and will leave. Tom Homan, the White House border czar, is now expected to manage immigration enforcement in Minneapolis, according to multiple reports.
Following Pretti’s death, thousands of protesters once again flooded the streets of Minneapolis. One of them was Rob Schenck, an evangelical minister who once routinely lobbied legislators to adopt a Christian conservative agenda and worked to persuade Supreme Court justices to rule in favor of the religious right. But Schenck began doubting the movement and his own role in it—especially once President Donald Trump came to power. Since then, he’s made a moral and political 180 and is now working to undo his decades of activism that he believes helped lead to this moment.
On this week’s More To The Story, Schenck sits down with host Al Letson to talk about what led him to the streets of Minneapolis, his emotional visit to Renée Good’s memorial, and why he’s become “guardedly optimistic” about the ultimate direction of this current political moment in America.
Dig Deeper
Listen: A Christian Nationalist Has Second Thoughts (Reveal)
Watch: He Spent Decades Building the Religious Right. Now He’s Marching to Undo It. (Mother Jones)
Read: Confessions of a (Former) Christian Nationalist (Mother Jones)
Read: Tom Homan Is Supposed to Fix Trump’s Minnesota Crisis. His Record Raises Serious Questions. (Mother Jones)
Credits
Producer: Josh Sanburn | Editor: Kara McGuirk-Allison | Theme music: Fernando Arruda and Jim Briggs | Copy editor: Nikki Frick | Digital producer: Artis Curiskis | Deputy executive producer: Taki Telonidis | Executive producer: Brett Myers | Executive editor: James West | Host: Al Letson
Transcript
This following interview was edited for length and clarity. More To The Story transcripts are produced by a third-party transcription service and may contain errors.
| Rob Schenck: | As agonizing as the last several days have been for me here in Minneapolis, I’m actually coming away guardedly optimistic about how this will end. |
| Al Letson: | On this week’s More to the Story, a conversation with Evangelical Minister Rob Schenck. He spoke to us from Minneapolis where he joined clergy from across the country to protest immigration raids in that city. Schenck talks about the fatal shootings of protestors and how he’s trying to undo his own legacy as a former leader of the Christian Nationalist Movement. Stay with us. |
| This is More to the Story. I’m Al Letson. Over the weekend, a federal immigration agent killed another US citizen. 37-year-old ICU nurse Alex Pretti was shot after being held down by multiple federal agents. The Trump administration alleged that Pretti threatened agents with a gun, but videos show Pretti, who was carrying a licensed handgun, was only holding his phone in his hand when he was tackled and killed. Following Pretti’s death, thousands of protestors, once again, flooded the streets of Minneapolis. One of them was Rob Schenck. | |
| You might remember Rob, he was the very first guest I interviewed for what eventually became this podcast, More to the Story. Rob was once one of America’s most influential evangelical leaders. He routinely lobbied legislators to adopt a Christian conservative agenda and worked to persuade Supreme Court justices to rule in favor of the religious right. | |
| But Rob began doubting the movement and his own role in it, especially once Donald Trump came to power. Since then, he’s made a moral and political 180 and is now working to undo his decades of activism that he believes help lead to this moment. | |
| Rob, it is really good to see you. Thanks so much for coming onto the show again. | |
| Rob Schenck: | Likewise. Al, after nearly a week in this Minneapolis cauldron, I can’t think of anyone more soothing to talk with than you. |
| Al Letson: | Wow. Thank you, that’s a beautiful thing to say. So why did you come to Minneapolis? |
| Rob Schenck: | Well, for so many reasons. There was a call to clergy to come to Minneapolis and support our clergy siblings in this city and stand with them and help them, in some cases give them some relief, but certainly support and comradery and increase their numbers. And over 1,000 clergy responded to that call. I couldn’t believe it. I thought I would find 30 or 40 here. When I arrived and we went into a mammoth old sanctuary and I saw it, I just couldn’t believe it. I counted over and over again. It was just amazing to see it. It was across Christian denominations, interfaith. There were Buddhists, Sikh, Jewish leadership, number of Unitarian Universalists on and on. But I’d say the majority were Christian and that was the first reason I came. |
| But underlying that was my thoughts about when faith leaders literally took the front line of defense and led the marches with MLK. And I’ve always thought of Martin Luther King Jr. as what he was, an ordained preacher, pastor, prophet in that movement. So I understand the importance and in many ways clergy are the conscience of a culture. So I thought it was extremely important that clergy be called in response, so I was going to go. | |
| I don’t have the resources that I used to have, so I put out a little test to a small circle of people that helped me in many ways. And I said, “If you have any inclination to help me to get there, here’s a way you can do it.” Within an hour, I had raised all the funds needed to get here to Minneapolis and stay here for however long. And I’m very, very grateful to the folks for doing that. | |
| But I’d like to tell you that it’s all altruistic. That was certainly a big part of it. My concern after seeing the slaying of a mom, a wife, a community, certainly a neighbor to many, and a vibrant part of her community, Renee Good. I have a daughter about her age who’s been doing some of the things that Renee has done and cares deeply about her neighbors, particularly of color. So it was personal for me and that drove me here. | |
| But then while being here, to have another state killing in the street, a summary extrajudicial execution, and that’s clear now from the images, both video and still photography, crystal clear. This man was executed in the street after he had been disarmed, after he had been fully subdued, and was literally on his hands and knees, shot in the back. It’s impossible to justify that. When that happened, it just solidified my resolve that I had to be here with my fellows. And it’s been a torturous week, but I am so happy I came. | |
| Al Letson: | Tell me about that. What have you experienced this week in being in Minneapolis? |
| Rob Schenck: | Oh, a roller coaster ride because at one moment there’s every temptation to give into despair, into fear. But at the same, almost simultaneously, you look over and you see people being so courageous. Now, I had no close encounters with ICE agents, but plenty of the people around me did. |
| And in one case, we were at a church where we had stopped just for a soup, simple soup lunch. They were serving us. The people here have just been overwhelmingly hospitable, just beautifully hospitable, and they were serving a few hundred of us. And while we were in, we were told the church was in lockdown, ICE was outside. There had been an incident where one of the laypeople, not a clergy member, but there were two women in a car coming to the church. They were stopped. I don’t know all the details except that their side window was shattered. | |
| And when I moved into the lobby of the church, I saw them escorting a woman in. I thought she had chemical burns on her face, but it turned out they were injuries from the glass fragments. And she was bleeding. Oh, man. And they were taking her to a clinic that had been set up in the church and staffed by volunteers because their own members, being many immigrant members in that church, they won’t go to emergency rooms or urgent care facilities because they are afraid that ICE will hunt them and capture them there. So this church provides urgent services for their urgent medical services, and she was taken in and cared for there. And again, this was just a neighbor. | |
| So you go through highs and lows. So it’s exhilaration and despair, and then despair and exhilaration. But I know you speak the lingo, so I don’t mind saying that in some ways this has felt like a spiritual revival. It’s been amazing. | |
| Al Letson: | Can you tell me about visiting the Renee Good memorial? What was that like? |
| Rob Schenck: | Wow. I visited Renee Good’s death sight. On the same day, I visited for the first time George Floyd’s death sight. So I went to George Floyd Square, went to the exact location where he took his last breath under his killer’s knee. So I had that. I was holding that when I approached two spots on the road where Renee Goode was killed. One was where she was first shot. Then you walk a little stretch where she was shot two more times, and then where her vehicle careened off the street, the roadway, and struck another car, which then was jammed up against … I guess her car was against a tree there, and the other car went into a telephone pole. Right there is where this beautiful memorial has been erected. |
| And I looked at her because there were some photos. There was a beautiful, I think it was a pen and ink rendering of her beautiful face. And I prayed for her, her loved ones, and for the same courage, that I would find somehow the same courage she had in that moment. | |
| And as I opened my eyes after praying, it was like I was looking at my daughter because of how close they are in age. So it was waves. I almost, in that sense, I felt grief because this is the world my adult children are now inhabiting, and that brought me grief. I have a beautiful grandson, my first grandchild, who’s a little brown boy, beautiful brown boy, and his parents are so afraid of the world that he inhabits and they shield him for a lot of reasons. And all that came at me while I was there. But we were told to hurry, there was a lot of police presence there and we were told to quickly return to our bus. | |
| And I was on my way back to the bus when I realized I hadn’t done what I really wanted to do there, which was to leave a meaningful token of some kind. So I ran back and police were on alert, and I realized running at them was not the best idea. So I had to slow down, pace myself, walk safely. I was wearing my stole as I usually do in public settings like that, my minister’s stole that indicated I was clergy. So they were a little … They weren’t sure what to make of me, but I slowed down and I approached and I went back to that pen and ink rendering of Renee’s face. | |
| And I took a whistle that we were given. Each of us were given whistles to sound the alarm if we saw ICE activity and to alert others. And I took that whistle because I knew she used a similar one in her work, and I laid it as my token, my offering. So it was a very intense, very emotional, but very meaningful moment. | |
| I did something similar at the site where Alex died. And that was beautiful in a different way because I knelt to pray there again for him, for his loved ones, especially his parents. I read the public letter that they had put out about their son and their love for him and who he was. And I prayed for them, kneeling. But just as I started those prayers silently, the crowd, maybe 75 people or so surrounding that sight, started chanting Alex’s name. And there was a call for it that was almost plaintive. It was a beautiful cry. “Say his name.” And the woman putting that call out had a voice that was otherworldly. “Say his name.” | |
| And I chanted his name with the crowd and it became a litany for me. When we pray, sometimes we use a repetitious litany, a repetitious line, and this was just perfect to pronounce his name as a litany of prayer. | |
| So both of those, I have to say, one was as meaningful as the other, but in different forms. Look, I came here with a lot of baggage. I helped construct the platform this has been built on. It wasn’t just me, of course. I was part of thousands upon thousands of religious right operatives who constructed a certain platform on which the Tea Party, then MAGA built the Trump monstrosity. So I came here loaded with that. I came here with the evangelical label. That’s how I’m known. | |
| And there were different reactions to that. Some people, most warmly embraced me, welcomed me, extended grace to me in a way, 20 years ago, I would not have extended to them. But others are angry with me and understandably so. And I get that. I don’t need to give them permission for that, or I just say, “It’s there. I honor it. I understand it.” So I came with a lot of baggage. | |
| Al Letson: | Coming up, Rob says there is more work to do. |
| Rob Schenck: | As more and more people find their conscience and then act on their consciences, and they step away and they condemn this, it could fracture Trump’s capacity to pull this off in the end. |
| Al Letson: | More with Evangelical Minister Rob Schenck in a minute. But before we continue our conversation, I want to remind you there is a really easy way that you can keep up with all the important work we’re doing here at Reveal. You can sign up for our free newsletter. Just go to revealnews.org/newsletter to receive your weekly email reminding you about all of our good reporting. We have to stay connected now more than ever. All right, thank you. And we’ll be back in a minute with Rob Schenck. |
| This is More To The Story. I’m Al Letson and we’re back with Evangelical Minister Rob Schenck. You would probably know better than most that this administration has built a firewall around itself. This administration has the Supreme Court in its pocket. They currently have the House and the Senate in its pocket. So I’m just curious if you believe that sleeping giant, the power that the people have that is being awoken is a strong enough adversary for the administration and will actually make change out of it. | |
| Rob Schenck: | Well, I guess I’m a realist like you. And again, you were asking about the range of experience and feeling, and I have to kind of give myself a moment of sobriety because you feel the uplift when you’re marching with 50,000, when you see 1,000 clergy coming into the city from all points in the United States, when you see these neighbors and friends being so brave, so courageous in the streets and you think, “Wow, this is going to do it.” And then I have to kind of give myself a gentle slap on the cheeks and say, “Wait, we are still here. This is still happening.” |
| But I think we’re starting to see, for example, the FBI agent who was tasked with investigating Renee Good’s wife resigning. When the GOP candidate here in Minnesota just said, “I can’t associate myself with this,” and for all the proper reasons that he articulated, and so he’s withdrawing from candidacy, from the gubernatorial race. | |
| And when people discover their conscience within the administration, in Congress, the Legislative Branch, and maybe, maybe, we’ve certainly seen some courageous and moral ethical federal judges taking action, speaking boldly against this. We haven’t seen any change at the court. From my encounters with Chief Justice John Roberts over a number of years, I would guess that he’s burying at least portions of his conscience, that he’s likely having a little trouble sleeping at night. He may be tossing once or twice before he falls off, and who knows? But as more and more people find their conscience and then act on their consciences, and they step away and they condemn this, it could fracture Trump’s capacity to pull this off in the end. | |
| There is a bumbling incompetence. You can see it in the streets here in Minneapolis. You can see it in the behavior of these ICE agents. They are not a professional, disciplined law enforcement operation. It’s clear some of them, they’re looking for the brawl. They’re like guys in a beer hall looking for any provocation to get somebody out in the alley and punch some faces. You just see that. And some of them have eyes that look like they want to kill and they’re just looking for their moment to kill. | |
| So as people call that out who are inside government and step outside of government, maybe that together with their incompetence could at least weaken this and maybe in the end we get a correction, first in the midterms, then in the presidential, and we begin to repair the damage, the catastrophic damage that’s been done to our culture, to our government, and in my world, to religion, which has been almost mortally damaged. | |
| Al Letson: | I’m just curious now, after you had your moment when you realized that your push for right wing fundamentalism or maybe a right wing version of Christianity, like when you had that moment where you kind of came out of it and realized that you didn’t believe any of that stuff anymore, did you ever think that it would get to this point that we’re in right now, like where we are with ICE kind of ripping the country apart? And I say ICE, but it’s probably proper to say with President Trump, with the backing of the Supreme Court, kind of ripping the country apart. |
| Rob Schenck: | I’m afraid I did. I did worry that it would come to this point, but I suppressed it. I did my best to manage it. The thought of it was overwhelming. Of course, for me, my exit from what I think of now as the right wing religious cult that has become MAGA, that was a decade long process for me. And the closer I got to my awakening, my full awakening, the more I became almost resigned to the fact that we would get to the level of state ordered killings. And I based that mostly on my study of what happened in Germany in the lead up to the Nazi horror that was the Third Reich and how the churches behaved in that period. And the churches in Germany and the 1920s and ’30s were very close culturally and historically and even doctrinally to the evangelical church in the United States today. |
| Al Letson: | The one thing that does give me hope is that Hitler was extremely popular. If we look at where we are today, there is an uprising around what this administration is doing and President Trump’s poll numbers are in the toilet. So we do have that difference between the two things. |
| Rob Schenck: | I agree with you completely. And frankly, as agonizing as the last several days have been for me here in Minneapolis, I’m actually coming away guardedly optimistic about how this will end, although I’m not fooling myself into thinking there … That there’s still a lot of suffering going on in this moment. There’s a lot of violence being perpetrated in this moment as we’re talking, and there will be more before there’s any cessation of this. There may be much more. But still, in seeing the response of the people here from the 50,000 person march or however many were there, it looked incalculable to me. It was just a sea of humanity that I marched with on Friday, all the way to a little corner Lutheran church you would drive by and not even notice. |
| And I dropped in there for a vigil. And at first there were just a dozen people in an evening prayer service and I thought, “This is nice. They’re coming out to support one another in this time and to speak out against the horrors being perpetrated against them here.” And then they opened the front doors and 200 people marched in with candles in their hands. And it was emotionally overwhelming for me to see this. These were just ordinary folks. | |
| And I talked to many of them afterwards and several told me, “I don’t go to church, but I knew I had to be here for this and I wanted to come and I wanted to lend my support.” Or they said, “This isn’t my church. I only go on Christmas, but I came tonight. This is so important.” And a lot of them spoke during the service and said they had never done anything like this. Never had they gone out into the street to make a statement against anything, but they had to with this. | |
| So when you see that kind of organic flow of humanity, I find it very, very hopeful. And history would teach that when movements gain that kind of force and participation, the outcome is inevitable victory. | |
| Al Letson: | Reverend Rob Schenck, thank you so much for talking to me. And we are definitely talking again because there’s so much more to unpack and the world unfortunately keeps giving. We keep having reasons to come back together, so hopefully one day we’ll have a good reason to talk. |
| Rob Schenck: | I look forward to that, Al. |
| Al Letson: | That was Evangelical Minister Rob Schenck. If you like this show, be sure to check out our interview with Rob back in 2024 called A Christian Nationalist Has Second Thoughts. It was an emotional conversation about his decades of activism for the religious right and the regrets he has today. |
| Lastly, a reminder, we are listener supported. That means listeners like you. You can help us thrive by making a gift today. Just go to revealnews.org/gift. Again, that’s revealnews.org/gift and thank you. | |
| Today’s show was produced by members of the Justice Society, Josh Sanburn and Kara McGuirk-Allison. Brett Myers edited the show. Special thanks to Jamila King and Marianne Szegedy-Maszak for coordinating this interview. Theme music and engineering helped by Fernando, my man yo, Arruda and Jay Breezy, Mr. Jim Briggs. I’m Al Letson, and you know, let’s do this again next week. This is More to the Story. |