A woman was shot and killed by a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent in Minneapolis on Wednesday, sparking outrage. The shooting took place during a tense confrontation on a city street. The victim has been identified as 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good.
According to Axios, the shooting took place near 34th Street and Portland Avenue, where ICE vehicles were parked as part of a major enforcement operation in Minneapolis. Drivers were trying to move around the federal vehicles when a confrontation broke out.
Video footage shows ICE agents approaching an SUV that was blocking the street. As the vehicle began to move away, an ICE agent standing near the front of the SUV fired three shots into the driver’s side window. Renee Good was hit and later died from her injuries. Reports say she was shot three times in the face. Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara said the woman who was killed was not the target of any enforcement action.
Who was Renee Nicole Good?
Renee Nicole Good was a resident of Minneapolis who was present at the site of an ICE raid on Wednesday, just as protests began to break out. She was reportedly with her spouse at the time. In videos shared after the shooting, a person can be heard screaming, “She’s my wife,” as people rushed to help Renee.
Good was a mother of three children, according to court records cited by the Kansas City Star. In October 2023, she filed papers in Missouri to change her last name so it would match her partner’s. At the time, her children were 13, 10 and 3 years old.
Renee’s family says they are still in shock over what happened. Her mother, Donna, told the Star Tribune that the claims being made about her daughter do not make sense to her. “That’s so stupid,” she said. “She was probably terrified.” Donna described Renee as one of the kindest people she had ever known. She said her daughter spent her life caring for others. “She was loving, forgiving and affectionate. She was an amazing human being,” she added.
According to reports, Renee was shot three times in the face. Federal officials said the shooting happened after she did not step out of her car when ICE agents asked her to do so.
According to Axios, Good lived in the Twin Cities with her partner. She was previously married, and the couple had a son who is now about four or five years old. Videos shared online also captured a woman who said she was Renee’s wife, crying out in shock and saying they had a six-year-old child who was at school at the time.
Trump defends ICE agent
US President Donald Trump weighed in with his first public comments on the shooting, blaming “the Radical Left” and defending the ICE agent who fired the shots. In a post on Truth Social, Trump said he watched the video of the January 7 incident. He described the woman screaming in the footage as a “professional agitator” and accused Renee Good of obstructing officers and violently running over the agent.
“It is a horrible thing to watch,” Trump wrote. He said the officer fired in self-defence and added that, based on the video, it was hard to believe the agent survived. “The woman screaming was, obviously, a professional agitator, and the woman driving the car was very disorderly, obstructing and resisting, who then violently, willfully, and viciously ran over the ICE Officer, who seems to have shot her in self-defence,” Trump wrote.
Trump claimed the officer was recovering in the hospital, though videos show no visible injuries. DHS later said injured officers are expected to make full recoveries. Trump argued that such incidents are happening because law enforcement officers and ICE agents are being threatened and attacked daily.
ICE and DHS give their version
The Department of Homeland Security said the agent fired “defensive shots” after Good ignored orders to exit the vehicle, reversed it, and tried to drive away. According to DHS, she deliberately drove her SUV toward the agents in an attempt to hit them.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said the woman was harassing officers and blocking law enforcement operations. Noem also said the same ICE officer had been attacked before. She claimed he was previously dragged by a car during an anti-ICE protest in June. In this latest incident, she said Good hit the officer with her vehicle. He went to the hospital. A doctor did treat him. He has been released, but he’s going to spend some time with his family,” Noem said. “It was an act of domestic terrorism,” she added.