The Vermont Senate on Friday adopted a resolution declaring two Minneapolis police shootings “extrajudicial killings”, a term typically reserved for unlawful state killings outside any legal process, and demanding the President of the United States suspend immigration enforcement operations — all before federal or state investigations into the incidents have reached conclusions.

SR 21, sponsored by Senate President Pro Tempore and creative writing professor Philip Baruth and 18 co-sponsors, passed 24-5 after the Senate suspended its normal rules to push the resolution through introduction, amendment, and final adoption in a single session. The resolution condemns the January 7 shooting death of Renée Good and the January 24 shooting death of Alex Pretti — both U.S. citizens killed while interacting with federal agents in Minneapolis — as “grave violations of human dignity, civil liberties, and the constitutional protections owed to all persons.”

Five senators voted against the measure. Twenty-four voted in favor.

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The Narrative

Baruth, who has taught creative writing and postmodern American literature at the University of Vermont, opened floor debate with rhetoric that leaned toward literary construction rather than legal analysis.

He invoked “masked agents committing extrajudicial killings,” followed by “the smearing of the dead and their families,” and “agents being spirited out of the jurisdiction.”

The three-beat construction — killing, smearing, spiriting — is a storytelling technique, not a legal finding. And it was delivered before any court, investigation, or fact-finding body had reached conclusions about either shooting.

The Amendment That Tells the Story

The Judiciary Committee, which Baruth also sits on, recommended two amendments before the resolution reached the floor. The more substantive change inserted the phrase “based on initial and substantial evidence” before the resolution’s condemnation of the shootings as extrajudicial killings.

The addition is revealing. It suggests that even supporters recognized the original language — which flatly declared extrajudicial killings as established fact — overstepped. The qualifier was designed to provide legal and rhetorical cover, but it raises its own questions: What “initial and substantial evidence” did the Vermont Senate evaluate? The body held no evidentiary hearings, reviewed no forensic reports, examined no body camera footage, and heard no witness testimony. The “evidence” available to senators was the same media reporting and social media footage available to any member of the public.

The Dissenters

Five senators voted against final adoption: Steven Heffernan (R – Addison), John Benson (R – Orange), Robert Norris (R – Franklin), Terry Williams (R – Rutland), and Russ Ingalls (R – Essex). Four offered remarks or formal explanations that centered on the same core objection.

Senator Heffernan, delivered the sharpest dissent on the floor: “The deaths referenced in this resolution are deeply troubling and must be thoroughly investigated. Any misuse of force should be addressed through established legal and judicial processes. However, this resolution reaches conclusions and assigns responsibilities before these processes are completed. As legislators, our role is not to determine guilt or innocence. Labeling the incidents as extrajudicial killings through a legislative act risks undermining due process and the separation of powers.”

Senator Benson was equally direct: “The resolution may be perfectly legitimate, but I think it’s premature until the investigations are completed and we know the actual facts in the two cases.”

Senator Norris, who notably voted yes on the amendment adding the evidentiary qualifier but no on final passage, articulated the irony at the heart of the resolution: “I’m voting no because this resolution declares extrajudicial killing before investigations or courts have established the facts. The Legislature should not act as judge and jury in place of due process.”

Senator Williams challenged the resolution’s constitutional footing: “The Vermont Legislature does not have authority to direct, condemn, nor interfere with federal law enforcement operations. Doing so blurs constitutional lines, invites litigation, and weakens — not strengthens — the rule of law.” Williams added: “When we use them to imply powers we do not have, or to pressure outcomes outside state jurisdiction, we risk misleading the public and politicizing matters better addressed through lawful oversight, the courts, or Congress.”

Democrats and Progressives Affirm the Second Amendment

Buried in the resolution’s “Resolved” clauses is a line that passed without a word of floor discussion: “The Senate of the State of Vermont affirms that individuals possess inherent and inviolable rights under the First, Second, and Fourth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, including the rights to free expression, the right to keep and bear arms, and protection against unreasonable searches and seizures.”

All Democrat and/or Progressive Senators voted to affirm the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms as “inherent and inviolable”.

The inclusion was structurally necessary. Pretti was a lawful gun owner with a Minnesota carry permit, and his firearm figures centrally in the circumstances of his death. The Second Amendment language makes the resolution’s narrative work. But the political context is hard to ignore: this resolution was sponsored by Philip Baruth, the senator whose career in the Vermont legislature is most closely identified with gun control advocacy, including the push for an assault weapons ban and the universal background checks bill that became S.55 in 2018. Not a single member of the Democratic or Progressive caucuses remarked on the inclusion during floor debate.

Investigations Are Underway

The resolution’s rush to judgment is particularly striking given that investigative processes are actively in motion. The U.S. Department of Justice has opened a civil rights investigation into Pretti’s killing. Minnesota’s Bureau of Criminal Apprehension has sought access to both shooting scenes, though federal authorities have restricted state investigators’ involvement — a point of significant legal contention that is itself being litigated.

Even President Trump, in an NBC interview this week, said of both shootings: “It should not have happened.”

The Hennepin County Attorney’s office maintains jurisdiction over both cases and has publicly stated it is conducting its own investigation.

In other words, the legal system is doing exactly what the dissenters argued it should be allowed to do — investigate.

What the Resolution Actually Does

SR 21 demands the President “immediately suspend Operation Metro Surge.” It calls on Congress and federal courts to “intervene and restore adherence to due process.” It urges Vermont’s Congressional delegation to oppose ICE funding absent enforceable reforms.

As a senate resolution, it carries no force of law. It binds no one. It compels nothing. It is, by design, a statement of sentiment — which makes the decision to include the conclusory legal term “extrajudicial killings” all the more pointed. The phrase carries specific meaning in international human rights law, implying deliberate state-sanctioned murder outside legal process. Embedding that term in an official legislative document, before investigations have concluded, places the institutional weight of the Vermont Senate behind a verdict that no court has rendered.

The Process Problem

Baruth moved to suspend the Senate’s rules to place SR 21 through all remaining stages of passage in a single session. The motion carried on a voice vote. There was no extended committee process, no public hearing, and no opportunity for the kind of deliberate fact-finding that the resolution itself demands of federal authorities.

The shootings in Minneapolis are being investigated by Hennepin County prosecutors, the DOJ Civil Rights Division, and — when federal authorities stop blocking access — the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. Those processes may well conclude that one or both shootings were unjustified. The facts may ultimately support every word of SR 21.

But the Vermont Senate didn’t wait to find out. It had no jurisdiction, no standing, no firsthand evidence, and no investigative authority. The five no votes argued the Senate should not declare verdicts before courts do.

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Dave Soulia | FYIVT

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