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Early Start with Rahel Solomon

Top Border Official Leaving Minneapolis; Minneapolis Community Bonds Through Song; U.S. Lashed By Brutal Winter Cold; Ukraine: Latest Russian Attacks Hit Kharkiv, Odesa. Aired 5-5:30a ET

Aired January 27, 2026 - 05:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[05:00:24]

RAHEL SOLOMON, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning and welcome to our viewers joining us from the U.S. and all around the word. I'm Rahel Solomon. It is Tuesday, January 27th, 5:00 a.m. here in New York.

And straight ahead on EARLY START.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Top Customs and Border Patrol official Greg Bovino will be leaving Minneapolis.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Good riddance. Couldn't have came sooner.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: Last Saturday, hours after Alex Pretti was shot to death by Border Patrol agents, some 1,400 people came to the Hennepin Avenue United Methodist Church to sing.

(SINGING)

CHRIS WARREN, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Dangerously cold wind chills once again will be with much of the U.S.

GOV. TATE REEVES (R), MISSISSIPPI: We are praying for everyone that has been affected by this storm, and certainly those who have lost their life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(MUSIC)

SOLOMON: We begin this hour in Minneapolis, where outrage over the deadly shooting of Alex Pretti and Renee Good is leading to a change in immigration enforcement leadership. Top Border Patrol official Greg Bovino is expected to leave the city today, along with some of his agents.

The White House announced that Border Czar Tom Homan will be taking over ICE operations in the city. Police say that more than two dozen people were arrested Monday night during a protest outside a hotel, where protesters believed Bovino was staying. Protesters say that ICE presence in the city is impacting daily life. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's not our community that's causing the damage. Clearly, we've had more heart than that, but him and his troops have caused the damage and we don't deserve that. Our kids don't deserve to witness that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SOLOMON: The White House is now attempting to distance itself from the fallout surrounding Alex Pretti's killing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Nobody in the White House, including President Trump, wants to see people getting hurt or killed in America's streets. This has obviously been a very fluid and fast-moving situation throughout the weekend. As for President Trump, whom I speak for, he has said that he wants to let the investigation continue and let the facts lead in this case.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SOLOMON: This comes as President Trump claims that he had, quote, very good phone calls with the Mayor of Minneapolis and Minnesota's governor about de-escalating the crisis. Governor Tim Walz says that there was a definite change in tone during his conversation with the president, and that he agreed to look into reducing the number of federal agents in the state.

And CNN has been analyzing new video that shows the timeline and adds context to the events leading up to the shooting of Alex Pretti.

CNN senior investigator Kyung Lah walks us through key moments. But first, a warning that the video you are about to see is disturbing.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KYUNG LAH, CNN SENIOR INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In new witness video, we are getting our earliest look at the moments before Alex Pretti is shot and killed. We can now piece together six minutes before the shooting.

This new video and multiple others analyzed by CNN do not capture any violent actions by protesters or Pretti. And Pretti's handgun, legally owned and carried, was removed by a federal officer just before Pretti was killed.

As officers cluster on the sidewalk outside a donut store, Pretti is across the street with two officers. Seconds later, one of those officers pushes Pretti.

Pretti's family and friends say he was a V.A. nurse and someone deeply connected to the community. He joined the citizen effort to protest in the wake of Renee Good's death.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem claims Pretti's motivation was this.

KRISTI NOEM, HOMELAND SECURITY SECRETARY: This looks like a situation where an individual arrived at the scene to inflict maximum damage on individuals and to kill law enforcement.

LAH (voice-over): The multiple videos, interviews and witness statements so far do not support that claim. Pretti has a cell phone lifted, appearing to be recording.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They're legal observers.

LAH (voice-over): A witness says about 15 observers were on the street watching the officers after that first exchange with the officer. Seconds later, someone standing near Pretti is on the ground. Agents appear to restrain that person. Then several officers run across the street.

For a couple more minutes. Pretti, seen in a separate video, continues moving traffic and helps this witness find a parking spot.

[05:05:00]

But then, another confrontation.

An officer shoves a woman wearing an orange backpack to the ground. Pretti steps in between the woman and the officer and is sprayed in the face. This is the account from a top Border Patrol official.

GREG BOVINO, BORDER PATROL COMMANDER: He brought a semiautomatic weapon to a riot, assaulted federal officers, and at some point, they saw that weapon.

LAH (voice-over): Video analyzed so far does not support that there was a riot or that Pretti assaulted federal officers as the officers pulled Pretti to the ground. He has one hand in the air and the other holding his cell phone. Pretti did have a legal permit to carry and had a handgun in his waistband.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Gun, gun, gun.

LAH (voice-over): When we freeze the video, you can see the gun visible on his back. This agent, wearing a gray jacket, removes his gun. A moment later, the first gunshot this officer, wearing a black beanie and a green shirt, has his gun aimed at Pretti. Pretti is kneeling, looking down. There are a total of ten gunshots.

A second officer wearing a brown hat also has his gun drawn, but it's unclear if he fired.

A full minute after Pretti was shot, agents search Pretti in confusion, trying to locate the gun.

OFFICER 1: Where's the fucking gun? Where's the gun? You've got the gun?

(VIDEOTAPE) LAH (on camera): A witness of the shooting says in a court affidavit that they didn't see Pretti touch any of the agents, and they don't know why they shot him. A licensed pediatrician who ran to administer medical aid to Pretti also says in another court affidavit that the officers appeared to be counting bullet wounds instead of checking for a pulse and administering CPR. That doctor says Pretti had three bullet holes in his back, one to his upper left chest, and possibly another gunshot wound to his neck.

Kyung Lah, CNN, Los Angeles.

SOLOMON: All right. Joining us now to discuss is Attorney Margaret Donovan, visiting clinical lecturer in law at the Yale Law School and former assistant U.S. attorney for the District of Connecticut.

Margaret, good morning. We appreciate you being here.

Look, there's some confusion and some concern about the investigations now into Pretti's death, leading the federal investigation is the Department of Homeland Security with the FBI investigating as well, and assisting. How unusual is it for homeland security to be the lead agency for use of force investigation like this?

MARGARET DONOVAN, VISITING CLINICAL LECTURER IN LAW, YALE LAW SCHOOL: So, it isn't necessarily unusual to have an internal entity investigating use of force in any law enforcement agency. What is unusual in this case is that you have the secretary of that agency, Secretary Noem and Greg Bovino, who was in charge of the operation, that where this occurred, already making conclusive statements about how the investigation will play out.

In other words, why you have HPSCI that's Homeland Security investigations. It's basically an investigative agency of DHS, Department of Homeland Security. You have these people who already have their marching orders from the secretary as to the facts that happened. You heard that from Secretary Noem statement immediately after the event that this was a domestic terrorist and that he was trying to assault officers. You heard it from Commander Bovino saying that he was showing up to massacre law enforcement.

So it's very difficult for the public to believe that an agency's own investigators are going to be impartial and fair and neutral and not unduly influenced when the lead of that agency has already made a conclusion on national television about what the facts of the case are. So, it would be crucial here to have somebody outside of Secretary Noem influence, outside of Greg Bovino's influence to be leading this investigation.

Now, it's even more problematic because you had Stephen Miller calling this person an assassin. You have Kash Patel misstating the law in terms of being able to carry a firearm. So really, you want somebody outside of the federal government looking into this, and this is really an unusual scenario. This isn't typically how we see these types of cases play out. Usually there is some type of use of force or deadly, event that occurs at the hands of local law enforcement. And so, you have the federal government coming in as that sort of

neutral arbiter to conduct an investigation. That's not true here. The roles are basically reversed. And the problem with that is that, as we know from ongoing litigation in federal court in Minnesota, the state and the local police departments are very concerned that they are not going to have access to the evidence that is currently in possession of the federal law enforcement agencies.

SOLOMON: Yeah. I mean, to that point, we've seen a federal judge over the weekend ordered the DOJ to preserve evidence related to the shooting of Alex Pretti. Your reaction to that when you saw that come down?

DONOVAN: I was -- I thought that was extraordinary. I mean, first of all, you have the state and local government going into federal court to get a court order that the DOJ and DHS and FBI do not destroy or alter evidence, which means that they had to convince a judge at some point that there was a chance that the government would destroy or alter evidence.

So I think it's absolutely extraordinary. And think about the evidence that might be out there so far. You have the body cam video because reports are saying that certain officers may have been wearing body cam. You have reportedly Mr. Pretti's cell phone. You would have witness statements.

And remember, we don't even have the names of the officers. And there's no reason to think that local pd or the state has their names either. So, these are very basic, types of evidence. Basic, you know, pieces of the investigation that the state doesn't have access to.

So, I thought that order was extraordinary. First, in that the state had to go and obtain it. And second, that a judge actually thought, yeah, you might be right here. There may be a risk that DOJ is going to destroy or alter evidence.

SOLOMON: And, Margaret, our reporting is that at this point, the DOJ has not launched a civil rights investigation, but said that it will if the evidence presents itself. When you look at that video from your legal lens, do you see enough video evidence to warrant opening a civil rights probe?

DONOVAN: Yeah. I mean, of course, look, I can't -- how many different constitutional rights were violated just in that one incident, right? The First, Second, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, 10th Amendments. I think you've got plenty there to open an investigation. And even that statement that you just cited of the DOJ is confusing. So, you know, do you think the evidence is just going to materialize out of nowhere? You have to start an investigation and be looking for these things.

As of what we know right now, it looks like it's just a use of force investigation to determine whether or not the agent who fired the shot was within the basically the bounds of the agency rules for using force. But I think the state and local PD are going to be looking at this from a criminal perspective. And the Minnesota murder statute does not have a statute of limitations. So, the sort of worst case scenario that I think we're looking at here

going forward is there may be a basis for a criminal investigation on the federal side. And I would not be surprised if we see this administration issue preemptive pardons on its way out the door. Now, that wouldn't preclude a state conviction. But the problem with these types of cases and how I mentioned that the rules are sort of reversed, it makes this tricky, is that if the state were to bring criminal charges, if federal officer could get it, what's called removed, he could get the case removed to federal court so that he could invoke the immunity that he enjoys as a federal officer.

So it could just morph into a federal case, notwithstanding that the state may have started a criminal investigation on their end.

SOLOMON: Wow. Margaret Donovan, we appreciate all of the perspective and insight this morning. Thank you.

DONOVAN: Thank you.

SOLOMON: Turning to extreme weather snow, ice and now bone chilling temperatures. More than 200 million people are under cold alerts for states east of the Rockies in the wake of a massive winter storm. Temperatures in New York are expected to stay below freezing for at least the next 10 days, something the city has never seen before. Already, the brutal cold has set record daily lows in the plains, and more records are expected in the south and east as the cold stretches through the week.

More than 15 deaths have been reported and more than 500,000 customers in several states remain without power, and that includes Tennessee, where ICE has been a major issue. Efforts are now underway to restore power, but officials warn it could take some time.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRENT BAKER, COO, NASHVILLE ELECTRIC SERVICE: This is going to be a historic event. It has, you know, gotten us up to 230,000 outages yesterday. This will be a week-long event at a minimum that were going to be working on this. But we think if we make it through today's cold weather and the trees continue to fall as our vegetation crews come in and clear some of that other risk, we'll start to make more progress as the days continue on.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SOLOMON: CNN meteorologist Chris Warren tracking developments and has more now on the forecast for the day and week ahead.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRIS WARREN, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Dangerously cold wind chills once again will be with much of the U.S. in the morning.

Here's Tuesday at 6:00. It's going to feel -- when you walk outside. It's going to feel like it is 12 degrees below zero in Minneapolis. It's going to feel like six in Atlanta. And in the south, where it is so cold, unusually cold. This is where many communities have been extremely hard hit with power outages. Some of the most widespread power outages in Mississippi and in Louisiana, where temperatures dropping down.

This is what the actual temperature is going to be. Again, the wind makes it feel even colder. Single digits in Nashville down to the teens in both Tupelo and in the Shreveport Bossier City area. Now for Oxford, Mississippi. This is going to be the coldest night in 40 years.

[05:15:02]

And for Memphis, it's going to be the coldest night since 1989. So, this is some serious cold that's going to be with us for a couple of days. Record breaking cold. These are possible record cold low temperatures going all the way down to the Mexican border. And spanning several states here in the south, mid-Atlantic and the Ohio Valley.

Now, there's going to be dangerously cold conditions to the north, but the alerts are for areas that usually don't see it this cold. And again, it has been decades for some to have as cold of air mass that we're going to see with us.

So, this is what we're going to be seeing in terms of a that's slightly milder afternoon temperatures. And then this weekend back in it locked in to more cold air. The south in the afternoon will eventually be warming up into the upper 40s and even the 50s at times, but overnight still getting below freezing in most areas. When we look at the mid-Atlantic and the Northeast from D.C. to New York, it's not going to be until middle of next week before we have a chance of getting the temperatures back above the freezing mark.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SOLOMON: And still to come for us, the U.S. could be at risk of a partial government shutdown. Why Democrats are willing to go there to rein in the Trump administration's immigration crackdown.

Plus, a shakeup in the Minnesota governor's race after the latest shooting in Minneapolis. Hear why the top Republican candidate has decided to drop out, straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:20:57]

SOLOMON: Welcome back.

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is scheduled to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Senator Dick Durbin says the hearing will take place on March 3rd. Noem's appearance follows her defense of the federal agents who shot Alex Pretti in Minneapolis and her unfounded claims that Pretti intended to harm officers.

And after the second fatal shooting in Minneapolis, the clock is ticking for Congress to avoid a partial government shutdown. Democrats agreed to end last year's shutdown when Republicans promised to consider extending important health care subsidies. But now the holdup is a bill funding the Department of Homeland Security.

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer says that his party will not provide the votes to pass a package of six appropriations bills unless DHS funding is separated. Schumer says it is woefully inadequate to rein in the abuses of ICE. The White House is against separating the funding. The deadline to pass any new -- any new legislation is Friday.

A rising Republican candidate for governor of Minnesota has dropped out of the race. Chris Madel, a lawyer who ran as a fierce defender of law enforcement, made a name for himself after representing the ICE agent who fatally shot Renee Good earlier this month. But he says he decided to end his campaign just two days after the killing of Aalex Pretti by a federal immigration officer.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS MADEL, FORMER MINNESOTA GOP GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: I cannot support the national Republican stated retribution on the citizens of our state, nor can I count myself a member of a party that would do so.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SOLOMON: In his first national interview since dropping out, Madel spoke to CNN about the Republican retribution going on in his state.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MADEL: The president posted something on truth social, saying that it was a time of reckoning and retribution on the citizens of my state, and I've seen that happen, and I cannot be a part of it. This has just gotten to a point where it's just so incredibly out of hand. We need to treat everybody with a measure of humanity, and that's what it really means to be an American. That's what we are. We are a nation of immigrants.

And when we're treating United States citizens for their hiding in their homes right now in Minnesota, they're afraid to go outside. We have United States citizens because of their color, of their skin, are carrying papers, their passport with them, pictures of their passport because they're afraid of being picked up by the federal government. That is antithetical to everything our country is about.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SOLOMON: Madel also told CNN that his family influenced his decision, saying, quote, I want my daughters to know that I stood up and said, no.

Still ahead, talks involving the U.S., Russia and Ukraine have not stopped the fighting. Assessing the damage from the latest attack on Kharkiv, straight ahead.

And the body of the last hostage was recovered from Gaza. What this means for the ceasefire, coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:28:16]

SOLOMON: NATO secretary general is painting a bleak picture for the future if the U.S. decided to leave the military alliance. He says that member nations would need to increase defense spending to 10 percent of their GDP and invest billions building up their nuclear capability.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK RUTTE, NATO SECRETARY GENERAL: So, when President Trump is doing good stuff, I will praise him. And I don't mind him publishing text messages. And if anyone thinks here again that the European Union or Europe as a whole can defend itself without the U.S.? Keep on dreaming. You can't, we can't. We need each other.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SOLOMON: The NATO chief says that the alliance will take more responsibility for defending the Arctic from Russian and Chinese influence. And he encouraged the U.S., Denmark and Greenland to continue negotiating over Greenland's future.

Meantime, the latest Russian attack has left 80 percent of Ukraine's second largest city without electricity and freezing temperatures. The regional governor in Kharkiv says that Moscow also hit two schools, leaving two people injured. A drone attack has also injured dozens of people in the Odesa region.

Ukraine's president says that talks with Russia and the U.S. will resume this week in Abu Dhabi. A top Russian envoy insists that Ukraine's withdrawal from the Donbas region is the path to peace.

Let's now bring in CNN's Clare Sebastian, following all of these developments from London.

Clare, a short time ago, Zelenskyy took to X to talk about Russia's latest massive attack, pointing out that each strike erodes diplomacy and undermines efforts to end the war. So where do talks go from here?

CLARE SEBASTIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, look, Rahel, all sides involved in this latest spate of talks in this trilateral format seem willing to keep them going. U.S. officials are saying that they will restart on February 1st, which is this coming Sunday. So it seems that there is still momentum, but I think Zelenskyy look, he talked about Groundhog Day in his speech in Davos. And this is really --