Second Plane

Author: allie - trumpet

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A second plane has hit the towers.

Some 25 odd years ago, at 8:46 AM September 11th 2001, the first plane hit the world trade center. Many continued about their normal daily routine, shocked to hear the saddening news that a terrible accident has occurred. News segments stayed light and professional as they reported the event. It is after all the responsibility of news broadcasters, while on screen, to remain professional while reporting the facts and not invest personally or emotionally in the events of the day.

9:03 AM. A second plane hit. America was under attack. There was no more confusion; the message was clear. News broadcasters let their hair down and leveled their genuine shock and grief to their audiences. Everyone in America became glued to their television sets. New York City might be 1000+ miles away from where you live, but if you were in America, you felt it like it was your backyard. Al Qaeda just sucker punched America, and everyone in the country collectively had the wind knocked out of them.

Donations poured in. Blood drives went through the roof. Everyone found a way to pitch in and help. No trivialities grabbed the news cycle, no other bad news stole the spotlight. We became fixated and singularly focused on the nexus of our pain. September 11th. The twin towers.

For years after, we ritualized the day — we observed it solemnly during school, we remembered our fallen first responders that were buried under rubble. We took time to reflect on the aftermath of the event. It was the cornerstone of a 2000s teenager’s concept of America. 9/11.

ICE killed a woman in her car. She was killed on video by federal enforcers, but we have become all too inured to police violence. There were some novelty factors, like her identity, the circumstances, but the news cycle quickly ate her story up and moved on to the next thing. A shame, a tragedy, possibly even an accident depending on which angle you choose to watch or not watch.

In my circles of protestors and activists, I heard many claim it was clear as day the injustice that occurred, and they expressed optimism this was a turning point due to her being a white mother. But in the back of my mind, I thought she was just a little too plausibly different for her story to connect with certain parts of America. She was a queer woman, her ideology was too woke, she was involving herself in a situation some might say she shouldn’t have involved herself in. I could see in real time how easily her story would be ignored or celebrated by certain parts of America.

Then a second person was murdered on video. Alex Pretti. A white male citizen ICU nurse. A veteran. We don’t know his politics, but we know he was a concealed carry permit holder who lawfully owned his firearm. The platonic ideal of a good guy with a gun that the NRA or other second amendment types assured us existed in the aftermath of countless stories of gun violence. Maybe this time would be different.

Except that’s not what happened. “He had a gun” “he was agitating” “he was a terrorist”. The marching orders were in, the sound bites were set and repeated. Another tragedy swept under the rug.

Even if you accept the most charitable interpretation of law enforcement action, you shouldn’t be ok with people being murdered by law enforcement for conducting themselves in a manner that is legally protected by the constitution. Alex Pretti never brandished his weapon, Jonathan Ross was never in any critical danger and whatever small danger he was in was self inflicted.

Even if you contest these facts, you shouldn’t be ok with the immediate brazenness to which the Vice President or other officials embraced in the aftermath. Officer involved shootings require investigations to determine wrong doing. They require fact finding missions. As of now, no investigation into either shooting has begun at the department level, nor has state police been enabled to participate. The only investigation attempted was one into the wife of Renee Good.

He died not reaching for his firearm, but with hand on cell phone and the other hand in the air empty, protecting a woman that was being beaten and abused by a group of agents. After agents got him to the ground and removed his completely holstered pistol, they shot a compliant, pepper sprayed, concealed carry permit holding American.

A second plane has hit the towers. No doubt about it now, America is under attack.

But this time the attack is coming from within. A large minority of America approves of what’s happening, and a majority has so far demonstrated unwillingness or inability to stop it. The system no longer requires widespread approval, only enough people willing to treat it as background noise. For those who are hesitating to change their behaviors in response to the moment: how many planes, how many towers, until the building you are in is hit?

This is not a metaphor — it’s one connected story. In the wake of 9/11, America was so hurt, it lashed out in a rage with no shortage of xenophobia. We had to get those SOBs back. We were willing to spend a trillion dollars on war, ritualize a useless security theater performance at airports, and form an entirely new federal Department of Homeland Security. The Saudi backed terrorists of the day were here on overstayed visas, unenforced despite them being known to intelligence services as a risk. We created ICE to build a law enforcement arm designed to keep terrorists out of America. The patriot act style surveillance state, the unitary executive, a bumbling president you aren’t allowed to criticize, Immigrations and Customs Enforcement: these are the children of September 11th attacks. What began as a temporary suspension of norms in response to an external threat hardened into a standing architecture of control.

America did not fall over immediately after being sucker punched, but 25 years later and the traumatic brain injury we collectively endured is rearing its head. Did Osama Bin Laden successfully take down America? We are truly at the precipice and the quiet part is getting louder and louder. We’re all thinking it — is America going to make it?

Our allies are estranged and pushed into the arms of our global competitors, our international reputation shot with belligerence and extra judicial military action. Our “vibes-based” economy exists only as bubbles and bailouts. (That’s if you’re upper middle class or above and even have any money in the stock market. If you are like most people and your understanding of the economy is money in the bank, food prices on the shelf, credit scores and rent, your economic reality is already one of destitution.) And our political reality is shattered into two polar opposite dimensions, where our ability to understand basic fact and draw conclusions based on the evidence provided to us by our eyes and ears seemingly totally divergent. We are at a crisis point — we are in a 911 emergency.

Reflect on what kind of country you want this to be in ten years, and what you are willing to accept along the way to get there. Political outcomes are not just the result of elections; they are the accumulation of tolerated practices. A nation becomes what it repeatedly allows.

Ask yourself which actions you are prepared to normalize in the present. The detention of children. A permanent, poorly trained enforcement apparatus absorbing public money while operating with minimal oversight. The routine use of state violence against citizens, justified after the fact by narrative rather than evidence.

Many people will tell themselves the tradeoffs are temporary, necessary, or exaggerated. That the costs are worth it to punish an enemy, preserve an identity, or feel secure. But power rarely confines itself to its original targets. Reputations erode, economies hollow, alliances fray, and eventually the tools built for others are turned inward towards the very population that enabled their creation.

Refusal does not require heroism. It begins with moral clarity and intentional living: withholding consent, attention, and resources from institutions that violate stated values; speaking honestly with family, friends and coworkers about the future you fear is taking shape; supporting leaders in any party who prioritize democratic accountability over loyalty to an executive or a faction.

A second plane has hit the towers. A second person exercising their rights has been killed by ICE. America is under attack. What are you going to do about it?

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Author’s Note:
This essay was originally posted on medium, written for a specific audience. For readers encountering it here, I want to be explicit about its broader context. Many people have died at the hands of ICE. For some readers, the fact that Renee and Alex were documented, citizens, or white may make the threat facing the country feel more immediate, and I wanted to use that to drive home a specific point. People who are relying on their privilege to save them while they do nothing to save those around them are making a grave mistake. The extra visibility provided by their identity or circumstances does not make their deaths more important, nor does it make the deaths of others less morally significant. In 2026 alone, ICE has killed at least eight people and injured or wronged many more. The following are the names of the dead:

1) Geraldo Lunas Campos

• Age: 55; Cuban national held in ICE custody at the Camp East Montana detention facility (Fort Bliss), El Paso, Texas.
• Date: January 3, 2026.
• Circumstances: Died while being restrained by guards; El Paso County medical examiner ruled the death a homicide due to asphyxia from neck and torso compression. Witnesses reported he was pinned and choked by multiple guards.

2) Luis Gustavo Núñez Cáceres

• Age: 42; Honduran immigrant.
• Date: January 5, 2026.
• Circumstances: Died in ICE custody at HCA Houston Healthcare in Conroe, Texas. Reported by news outlets as one of the custodial deaths early in the year.

3) Luis Beltrán Yáñez-Cruz

• Age: 68; Honduran immigrant.
• Date: January 6, 2026.
• Circumstances: Died of heart-related issues at John F. Kennedy Memorial Hospital in Indio, California, after being detained and transferred from Imperial Regional Detention Facility.

4) Renee Nicole Good

• Age: 37; U.S. citizen and mother of three.
• Date: January 7, 2026.
• Circumstances: Shot and killed by an ICE agent during a federal immigration enforcement operation in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Autopsy reported she was shot three times; law enforcement characterized the incident as self-defense, but video evidence and local reporting challenge that narrative.

5) Heber Sánchez Domínguez

• Age: 34; Mexican national.
• Date: January 14, 2026.
• Circumstances: Found hanging and later pronounced dead at a Georgia detention center after being transferred from arrest for driving without a license. ICE reported the incident as under investigation.

6) Víctor Manuel Díaz

• Age: Approximately 36; Nicaraguan national.
• Date: January 14, 2026.
• Circumstances: Died at Camp East Montana detention facility in El Paso, Texas. Local reporting notes the death was described as an apparent suicide by ICE, though family disputes that characterization and calls for further investigation continue.

7) Parady La

• Location & Date: Reported to have died in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, January 9, 2026.
• Circumstances: Died after experiencing drug withdrawal symptoms and alleged denial of medical care while in custody; coverage varies by source and formal ICE reporting.

8) Alex Jeffrey Pretti

• Age: 37; U.S. citizen and intensive care nurse.
• Date: January 24, 2026.
• Circumstances: Shot and killed by federal immigration enforcement agents—specifically U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers—during an immigration enforcement operation in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Pretti was filming or observing agents during protests against enforcement activity; multiple videos and eyewitness accounts show him holding a phone and not brandishing a weapon at the moment he was shot. DHS officials stated officers fired after identifying his legally carried firearm during a struggle, though video evidence and reporting contradict the threat narrative. The shooting occurred amid heightened tensions over immigration operations and protests in the city.