President Donald Trump says he “felt horribly” about the fatal shooting of Renee Good by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in Minnesota and claimed her father was a supporter of his.
“I felt horribly when I was told that the young woman who had the tragedy. It’s a tragedy. It’s a horrible thing. Everybody would say – ICE would say the same thing,” Trump told reporters at a White House press briefing Tuesday marking one year since his second inauguration.
“But when I learned that her parents, and her father in particular… I hope he still is, but I don’t know, [he] was a tremendous Trump fan,” he said. He was all for Trump. Loved Trump, and it’s terrible.”
The president had previously described the 37-year-old woman, who was shot three times by ICE officer Jonathan Ross earlier this month, as a “professional agitator,” while administration officials have repeatedly accused her of “domestic terrorism.”
“I was told that by a lot of people,” said Trump, referring to his comments about Good’s father. “They said, ‘Oh, he loves you’ … I hope he still feels that way.”
Moments earlier, the president claimed he understood “both sides” of the incident, which has sparked political outrage and civil unrest across the country. He also pointed to other people he baselessly alleges are “professional agitators” who he claims are partly responsible for the volatile demonstrations against Good’s killing and his mass deportation campaign.
“There was another woman that was screaming: ‘shame, shame, shame, shame’ … like a professional opera singer,” he said. “She was so loud and so professional … These are professional agitators and professional people that want to see our country do badly. But that’s not happening because we have the hottest country.”
In remarks to CBS News earlier this month, Trump said he believed Good was likely “a very solid, wonderful person.”
“But, you know, her actions were pretty tough,” he said.
“She behaved horribly,” he told The New York Times earlier this month. “And then she ran him over. She didn’t try to run him over. She ran him over.”
The Department of Justice has issued criminal grand jury subpoenas to Minnesota Governor Tim Walz and Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey as well as at least three other Democratic officials in the state accused of obstructing federal immigration officers.
Legal experts have noted that such their public statements, including calls to demonstrators to not engage and remain peaceful with their protests, are protected by the First Amendment.
Writing in response to initial reports of the Justice Department investigation last week, Walz called out Trump for “weaponizing” the justice system against his political opponents “a dangerous, authoritarian tactic.” Frey said the probes were “an obvious attempt to intimidate me for standing up for Minneapolis, local law enforcement, and residents against the chaos and danger this administration has brought to our city.”
A decision to launch federal investigations and issue subpoenas to Democratic leaders in a state that did Trump did not win in 2024 elections follows a massive surge of immigration officers in Minnesota, resulting in thousands of arrests and accusations that law enforcement is violently targeting immigrants and citizens alike.
