A welder at a metal fabrication facility needed to fill his to-do list with the components he would be welding and asked the forklift driver to grab them.

At the same time, another welder needs an empty pallet. Just as he begins to reach for it, the forklift surges forward. The second welder didn't have a safety checklist, no pause, no calm voice in his head reviewing options.

Instinct took over because pain or death sits inches away.

Law enforcement lives inside moments like that.

As we've all seen, an ICE agent in Minneapolis learned that lesson the hard way, months before an anti-ICE member tried running him down this week.

What Happened in June

Federal court records describe an incident where an ICE agent tried to stop a suspect during an enforcement encounter in Minnesota. Instead of complying, the suspect accelerated, resulting in the vehicle striking and dragging the agent along the pavement before he managed to break free.

The incredibly hard-working Catherine Salgado, my PJ Media teammate, touched on that situation earlier today.

It is crucial to note that the ICE officer who was the victim of the attack was previously seriously injured in a vehicular assault last summer. The officer “was dragged in June by a child sexual predator trying to evade an immigration enforcement arrest. He suffered severe injuries and required 33 stitches,” the Department of Homeland Security revealed. It is therefore understandable that he would react immediately in self-defense when attacked a second time with a vehicle, especially since cars can absolutely be deadly weapons.

Related: WATCH: Up-Close Footage of Assault on ICE Officer in Minneapolis

Another PJ Media Teammate, Victoria Taft, brought it up during her recent podcast. Begins around the 32-minute mark.

Then, history repeated itself; this week's encounter resulted in the same agent firing his weapon in self-defense, as Catherine described, "Renee Nicole Good, a terroristic leftist activist radicalized by other rioters ..."

Names, Roles, and Responsibilities

The officer serves as a field agent with ICE, operating under the authority of the Department of Homeland Security. DHS publicly acknowledged the June dragging incident and confirmed its relevance by watching footage of the shooting.

Context Isn’t Optional

Public debate, or should I say flapping gums attached to hollow heads on dinosaur media channels, plus the far-left groups promoting terror, love isolated snapshots. 

Unfortunately for them, as the saying goes: my facts trump your BS.

Real life arrives as a sequence, not a single frame at a time. An officer who has already been hit and dragged by a vehicle doesn't experience the next charging SUV simply as a hypothetical threat.

SUVs are measured in tons, but at close range, they are a weapon without warning.

That's a lesson not taught in a classroom; officers learn it when tires grab clothing, asphalt tearing skin.

Heaven forbid the left has that fact smacked along their head.

Context matters.

The Fantasy of Calm Analysis

Armchair critics picture neat decision trees, which provide ample time for reaction. Pfft!

Law enforcement officers work inside chaos, where balance disappears, time compresses, and vision narrows. 

Training doesn't tell officers to absorb impact and hope intentions turn gentle. As officers from all over the country know, things turn deadly in seconds, resulting in the death of a good cop.

In 2019, a jury found Dawnta Harris, 17, guilty of felony murder of Baltimore County Police Officer Amy Caprio.

The idiot left always shares their grief over a person killed by law enforcement. Do a quick search on Rep. Jasmine Crockett's (D-Texas) crying act in the House this week. You'll see what I mean.

To that: Pfft!

Those on the left never talk about the families of those officers killed in the line of duty. Here's Caprio's mother, Deborah Sorrells, reading an impact statement to the judge; she emphasized choices and consequences.

"Can you imagine our lives without Amy? No. Amy is a special patch in each of our quilts. Sharing, talking about Amy keeps her alive in all of us. She's alive in spirit. Crap happens. I will not dwell on the negative. It is a deep, dank, bottomless pit filled with fear, anger, and hopelessness. I can't go there. I'm afraid I couldn't escape," Sorrells said.

This is the part of life that the left will never accept. Bastards.

Meanwhile, the driver, Harris, was convicted of life with parole.

Officers receive training for threat recognition and survival under pressure. The Minnesota ICE agent didn't have the luxury to test motives when, for the second time in his life, a vehicle quickly approached.

Once a person has been dragged by a vehicle, every engine surge sounds different.

Why ICE Agents Face Unique Risk

ICE agents enforce laws passed by Congress, a role that brings hostility, protests, and occasional violence. The rhetoric from activists paints agents as villains, storm troopers, and goons with masks rather than federal officers performing their assigned duties.

Rhetoric doesn't stop vehicles; it doesn't curb their acceleration; and it doesn't cushion impact.

The ICE agent isn't there to chase danger for sport; he showed up to do his job, which nearly cost him his life.

Force Under Real Conditions

Standards for use of force rely on reasonableness, not perfection. Courts evaluate an officer's perception in the moment, not what critics assemble afterward with distance and anger.

An officer, already struck and dragged by a vehicle, reasonably perceives a second charge as potentially lethal, a perception that doesn't come from ideology.

It comes from an unfortunate experience.

Outcomes are decided in split seconds; hesitation invites funerals.

Final Thoughts

The forklift never meant to harm, the SUV never asked permission, but once machines move and bodies collide, theories go out the window.

The Minneapolis ICE agent carried the memory of pavement and steel into the subsequent encounter. When another vehicle surged, survival took command.

Judging that moment, a blink of an eye, without acknowledging the earlier one, asks human beings to forget how pain teaches.

The man was there in harm's way. An unbalanced activist tried running him over while he stood a few feet in front of the driver's side.

Threat, assess, react. The time it took you to read those three words was longer than it took for him to act. The officer fought back in self-defense.

No badge ever asks for those lessons: Their job delivers them anyway.

Stories involving force deserve context, sequence, and honesty rather than reflex judgment. PJ Media VIP digs into the moments that shape decisions before headlines harden opinion. Join here.