Vice President JD Vance said Thursday that a Minneapolis woman who was killed by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Wednesday was responsible for her own death as part of a “larger, sinister left-wing movement that has spread across our country” — and said the Trump administration would redouble its crackdown on the left in response.
“I can believe that her death is a tragedy, while also recognizing that it’s a tragedy of her own making and a tragedy of the far left who has marshaled an entire movement, a lunatic fringe, against our law-enforcement officers,” Vance said of the fatal shooting of Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother of three.
He also echoed rhetoric from Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who accused Good of “domestic terrorism.” Vance said she was part of a trend of “left-wing radicals … sometimes using domestic-terror techniques” to block immigration agents from deportation efforts.
Vance didn’t present evidence that Good was tied to any particular group; video footage of the incident mostly begins just prior to the shooting and does not feature her engaged in protest activity. Her mother, Donna Ganger, told The Minnesota Star Tribune that Good was not involved in such protests.
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Vance’s comments about the left are part of a broader, monthslong push by the Trump administration to crack down on leftist groups and protesters they say are fomenting violence in the United States.
“We are doing so much to try to find the financing networks and the domestic-terrorism networks that legitimate this violence, that fund this violence, and then, of course, engage in the violence,” Vance said. “These people should not feel emboldened because they have, for the first time maybe in American history, an administration that is not going to tolerate political violence of any kind from anywhere.”
Around the same time as Vance’s remarks, Attorney General Pam Bondi posted a message on X to protesters in Minnesota, warning them against “obstructing, impeding, or attacking federal law enforcement” and “damaging federal property.”
“If you cross that red line, you will be arrested and prosecuted,” she wrote. “Do not test our resolve.”
Vance, like other administration officials, said the officer who shot and killed Good was acting in self defense while on an enforcement mission going door-to-door to seek out unauthorized immigrants. He said Good was driving toward the agent who fired the shots and that the car struck him.
“The idea that this was not justified is absurd,” he said.
Eyewitnesses have argued that the officer did not appear to be in immediate danger. According to analysis by The New York Times and The Washington Post, the ICE agent that Vance described was not in the vehicle’s path, and footage shows him on his feet after the vehicle passed him.
Vance repeatedly said the officer was injured on the job months earlier. The vice president made no mention of injuries sustained by the officer in connection to the events Wednesday. He also did not know whether or not the officer was under investigation or on leave.
“That very nice officer nearly had his life ended, dragged by a car six months ago, 33 stitches in his leg,” Vance said. “So you think maybe he’s a little bit sensitive about somebody ramming him with an automobile.”
The Trump administration has for months been engaged in a back-and-forth with Minnesota and officials from the state, including Gov. Tim Walz and Rep. Ilhan Omar. In addition to allegations of widespread social services fraud in the state, the administration has been conducting immigration enforcement operations there, which its leaders have opposed.
Wednesday’s killing has only intensified calls from Democratic leaders demanding ICE withdraw from areas where they are not wanted.
“We’ve been warning for weeks that the Trump administration’s dangerous, sensationalized operations are a threat to our public safety and that someone was going to get hurt,” Walz said Wednesday.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey told ICE: “Get the fuck out of Minneapolis. We do not want you here. Your stated reason for being in this city is to create some kind of safety, and you are doing the exact opposite.”
But the Trump administration has only doubled down. According to reporting from The New York Times, it intends to send more Border Patrol agents to Minnesota.
Vance suggested the fact that immigration agents were there at all was the fault of Democrats, including former President Joe Biden, who he blamed for undocumented immigrants living in the U.S.
“The Trump administration will redouble our efforts to get the worst of the worst criminal illegal-alien killers, rapists and pedophiles off of American streets,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said at the briefing with Vance.
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