People gather during a vigil for Alex Pretti on January 25, 2026 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Stephen Maturen/Getty
A Republican attorney in Minneapolis who gave legal counsel to the ICE agent who shot and killed Renée Good dropped out of the Minnesota governor’s race on Monday, saying he couldn’t win given the Trump administration’s violent campaign in the state.
Chris Madel stated in a Monday announcement video that, “national Republicans have made it nearly impossible for a Republican to win a statewide election in Minnesota.” Despite dropping out, Madel claimed to still support Trump’s “originally stated goals” of going after the “worst of the worst,” meaning people convicted of serious crimes.”
Madel criticized the Trump administration’s justification for the cruelty. “Operation Metro Surge has expanded far beyond its stated focus on true public safety threats,” he said. “United States citizens, particularly those of color, live in fear. United States citizens are carrying their papers to prove their citizenship. That’s wrong.”
He continued: “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.”
Madel also defended his decision to provide legal advice to ICE agent Jonathan Ross, who killed Good earlier this month, saying he helped Ross “fill out a form” because “I believe the constitutional right to counsel is sacrosanct.”
According to the Wall Street Journal, although Madel largely campaigned on his record of going after fraud, many of his cases were defenses of law enforcement.
In 2024, Madel represented Minnesota state trooper Ryan Londregan, who was accused of killing 33-year-old Ricky Cobb by firing several shots at him while in his vehicle. Londregan faced murder, assault, and manslaughter charges, but they were dropped later that year.
At the end of the day, Madel said, “I have to look my daughters in the eye and tell them ‘I believe I did what was right.'”
Madel’s decision comes as some Republicans have publicly voiced opposition to the DHS operation in Minnesota, especially after Border Patrol agents killed Alex Pretti, an intensive care nurse for the Department of Veterans Affairs, on Saturday.
The Department of Homeland Security claims that Pretti “wanted to do maximum damage and massacre law enforcement.” Multiple videos of the shooting refute this framing.
But the Trump administration indicated that it would enforce this brutality well before Operation Metro Surge launched last month. As my colleague Isabela Dias wrote earlier this month, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act made ICE the highest-funded law enforcement agency in the country. ICE is also in a hiring surge, deploying new agents with limited training to meet the administration’s quota of 3,000 arrests by ICE per day.
