Santa Barbara Community Holds Vigil for Renee Good and Alex Pretti Following Fatal Shootings in Minneapolis

On Monday evening, hundreds of people showed up with candles, stretching multiple blocks in each direction along Cabrillo Boulevard, stemming out from the Dolphin Fountain at Stearns Wharf: families, seniors, young couples, many honking cars, and even Santa Barbara celebrity couple Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi. They were gathered for a candlelight vigil organized by Indivisible Santa Barbara, mourning the deaths of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Jeffrey Pretti — two U.S. citizens shot and killed this month by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis — and marking a moment that many attendees described not just as grief, but as loss.

Good, a mother of three, was shot and killed by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent on January 7 during a traffic encounter on a residential street in Minneapolis. Federal officials, including President Trump, have described the shooting as an act of self-defense. Minnesota officials have publicly rejected the characterization, calling the federal account misleading and inflammatory. 

Hundreds gathered for a vigil in front of Stearns Wharf to remember Renee Good and Alex Pretti, two U.S. citizens killed by federal immigration agents, and to protest the Trump administration on Monday, January 27. | Credit: Ingrid Bostrom

Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care nurse for the VA, was shot and killed by U.S. Border Patrol officers on Saturday, January 24. A video analysis published by the New York Times contradicts the Trump administration’s claim that Pretti approached federal agents with a handgun intending to carry out a mass shooting. The footage shows Pretti filming agents as they interacted with protesters, holding a cell phone in one hand while the other remained empty. After stepping between an agent and a protester who had been pushed to the ground, Pretti was pepper-sprayed in the face. Agents then grabbed him from behind and forced him to the pavement. 

Although Pretti was legally carrying a firearm in a holster on his hip, the Times found he never reached for it. By the time shots were fired, he was pinned to the ground by multiple agents, and another officer had already removed the weapon. Even so, two agents fired a total of 10 shots in roughly five seconds, including after Pretti appeared motionless. The Times concluded the shooter was not under direct threat — directly contradicting federal officials’ statements that the shooting was defensive. 

Monday night’s vigil in response to the killing came two days after a related demonstration Saturday morning along upper State Street and another vigil that evening at the Santa Barbara County Courthouse, where images critical of President Trump and his staff were projected on the courthouse walls. A similar vigil was held at the courthouse earlier this month following Good’s death.

Nationwide, there have been numerous demonstrations over the weekend, including in San Francisco, where mourners gathered at Sutro Heights Park to memorialize both victims. Healthcare workers were among those in attendance there, underscoring Pretti’s profession and the shock his death sent through medical communities.

“This is about giving people space to grieve together,” said Ian Paige, a member of Indivisible Santa Barbara’s steering committee, of Monday’s vigil. “To be with one another, to acknowledge the loss, and to understand that we don’t have to carry this alone.”

There were no speeches, outside of a brief call-and-response recitation of words attributed to Alex Pretti:

Today
We remember
That freedom is not free
We have to work at it
Nurture it
Protect it
And even sacrifice for it.

“These are the words of Alex Pretti,” a speaker said. “Thank you.”

Paige said the choice not to have a podium was deliberate.

“We don’t need to tell people what to think tonight,” he said earlier. “We need to let them feel what’s happening, together.”

The feeling was heavy but warm. People meandered through the crowd, asking one another how they were doing and handing out candles.

“Everybody’s not trying to pour their heart out in grief,” members of Indivisible Santa Barbara’s steering committee said, estimating the crowd at around 800 people. “It’s also about seeing how many people have the same mindset. A lot of people are angry, but a lot of people are grieving — or just feel like we’ve lost something. And we have. We have lost something.”

Jim Ladner, visiting Santa Barbara from Minnesota with his wife, said he felt compelled to be there.

“Saturday, when I heard, I was shocked — sick that whole day,” he said. “It’s frustrating. Hard to know how to get people to do something. To get the government to act responsibly.”

Still, he said, the vigil mattered.

“It’s just important that we all stand together in solidarity,” Ladner said. “We’re proud of our governor. Proud of our mayor. But this — this is about people.”

An older couple from Goleta, who asked not to be named, stood holding candles a few steps apart. They had been active politically for decades, they said, but this felt different.

“You are young,” the woman said, looking at me, “but what is going on is not normal. I’ve been in politics for more than 70 years. There have been racial issues, transgender issues — but never anything like this. Not since 1942.”

They spoke about their grandsons, about voting, and about fear.

“I don’t think anyone should be feeling comfortable right now,” she said.

Nearby stood Ellen DeGeneres with her wife, Portia de Rossi, who kept a low profile, holding a candle and talking quietly with people around them. DeGeneres said she came because being present mattered more than watching from a distance.

“We are out here to show that we care and this matters,” DeGeneres said.

Monday night also marked her 68th birthday.

“This is how I choose to spend it,” she added.

A couple of blocks down, two women in their mid-twenties — Ella and Claire, from Carpinteria — said showing up felt necessary, and safer than silence.

“We are fed up and angry and sad,” Ella said. “You’ve gotta do something. We don’t have a lot of control over what’s happening. As long as we can be in solidarity with other people — that’s something.”

Claire agreed.

“It’s more cathartic than texting or sharing on social media,” she said. “Santa Barbara is such a bubble, but we have ICE here. People are kidnapped in broad daylight. Business as usual on Monday after state-sanctioned executions — this is not normal. It should never be normal.”

Paige said the vigil was not meant to be an endpoint. It was part of something larger — a response to what he described as a federal enforcement apparatus increasingly untethered from accountability.

“Well, they’ve killed two people to fulfill the mission,” Paige said in an earlier interview. “So you have to question what the mission is. Is it really to go after criminal illegal aliens? Or is it to show people the strength of a totalitarian government?”

In his view, that display of force reveals fragility, not power.

“They can’t win on their thoughts and ideas and programs,” he said. “So they’re trying to control people by making them afraid.”

An older woman stood with an American flag draped across her shoulders. When asked why she came, she didn’t hesitate.

“Reclaiming our country,” she said. “The Constitution says ‘We the People.’ It is our country.”