People from all sides have expressed shock and anger after the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse, who was shot by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis on Saturday. The reaction quickly went beyond personal grief to a national debate about federal law enforcement and the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement strategy.
In the tech world, the response has been uneven. Some Silicon Valley leaders used their platforms to condemn the killing and called for accountability. CEOs and prominent figures like Anthropic’s Dario Amodei, LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, and AI researchers such as Yann LeCun publicly criticized the incident and the broader policy context. Others, however, remained silent or drew fire for their choices of public engagement.
One of the more discussed reactions—or lack of one—came from Apple’s Tim Cook. Two years ago, Cook publicly denounced the “senseless killing” of George Floyd at Apple’s developer conference. This weekend, while his recent social media post on Martin Luther King Jr. Day filled with angry replies, he was reported to be at a private White House screening of the film “Melania.” That contrast has stirred criticism and raised questions about how tech leaders engage with national crises and confrontations involving the federal government.
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Jeff Dean, chief scientist at Google DeepMind and Google Research, was among the first in tech to condemn the shooting sharply. On social media he wrote, “This is absolutely shameful. Agents of a federal agency unnecessarily escalating, and then executing a defenseless citizen whose offense appears to be using his cell phone camera. Every person regardless of political affiliation should be denouncing this.”
He also paid tribute to Pretti’s character, adding, “This is something we agree on: from all that I’ve learned in the last couple of days, Alex Pretti was a wonderful human being. Thank you for recognizing, @erichorvitz.” His comments reflect a wider sense of alarm among tech staff and leaders about the circumstances of Pretti’s death and the broader implications for civil liberties and law enforcement conduct.
Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of LinkedIn, also weighed in. He echoed a call for empathy beyond political divides, writing, “There is politics but humanity should transcend that,” as he reshared a post from investor Vinod Khosla.
Khosla’s message criticized federal enforcement tactics, saying, “Macho ICE vigilantes running amuck empowered by a conscious-less administration. The video was sickening to watch and the storytelling without facts or with invented fictitious facts by authorities almost unimaginable in a civilized society. ICE personnel must have ice water running thru their veins to treat other human beings this way. There is politics but humanity should transcend that.”
Hoffman followed that by resharing another post urging broader engagement: “Reid, now’s the time for Democratic celebrities and business leaders to stand up collectively and make their voices heard. If not now, when?” These exchanges show both personal outrage and a broader push within segments of the tech community for business leaders to take a public stand.
Yann LeCun, executive chairman at AMI Labs, did not hold back in his reaction on social media, simply writing, “M U R D E R E R S” in a repost of footage from the scene after his original comment was flagged as adult content by the platform.
Alexis Ohanian, investor and co-founder of Reddit, drew on broader themes of American rights in his post on X. He wrote, “I’m old enough to remember when an American’s right to bear arms even while protesting was something the right all believed the federal government must never infringe upon. ICE shot a man in the back while he was restrained. We need our leaders to lead right now—deescalate.”
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James Dyett, senior executive at OpenAI, highlighted what he sees as misplaced priorities within the industry. His post read, “There is far more outrage from tech leaders over a wealth tax than masked ICE agents terrorizing communities and executing civilians in the streets. Tells you what you need to know about the values of our industry.”
Paul Graham, co-founder of Y Combinator, also weighed in, echoing frustrations felt by many in the community. He wrote, “He’s right you know. How bad do things have to get before you say something?”
Chris Olah, co-founder of Anthropic, wrote, “I try to not talk about politics. I generally believe the best way I can serve the world is as a non-partisan expert, and my genuine beliefs are quite moderate. So the bar is very high for me to comment. But recent events—a federal agent killing an ICU nurse for seemingly no reason and with no provocation—shock the conscience. My deep loyalty is to the principles of classical liberal democracy: freedom of speech, the rule of law, the dignity of the human person. I immigrated to the United States—and eventually co-founded Anthropic here—believing it was a pillar of these principles.”
These voices reflect a broader wave of criticism emerging from Silicon Valley and beyond as business and tech leaders grapple with how to respond to a shooting that has drawn nationwide condemnation and intensified calls for accountability and reform.