Trump border czar Tom Homan has quickly abandoned his own advice to “let the investigation play out” into the ICE killing of a U.S. citizen in Minneapolis to embrace the president’s version of events.
President Trump and his top officials were quick to claim the victim, 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good, was a threat to federal agents when she was shot Wednesday as numerous bystanders looked on. Trump went so far as to claim the young mother was a “professional agitator” who “viciously ran over” an ICE officer, leaving the agent no choice but to shoot her in the head at point-blank range.
But after footage of the fatal shooting dramatically contradicted that claim by Trump, Homan, speaking to CBS Evening News host Tony Dokoupil, had initially adopted a more pragmatic tone.
“I’m not gonna make a judgment call on one video when there’s a hundred videos out there. I wasn’t on the scene, I’m not an officer that may have bodycam video. It’d be unprofessional to comment on what I think happened in that situation. Let the investigation play out and hold people accountable based on the investigation,” he said.
It wasn’t long before he changed his tune to fall in line with the president and other Trump officials, however, joining Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Vice President JD Vance to blame Good, who leaves behind a 6-year-old child.
Noem claimed agents had acted in self-defense to an “act of domestic terrorism,” a version that has since been echoed by other White House officials.
Homan soon struck a similar tone on X, painting the officer as a victim: “The incident in Minneapolis today is yet another tragic example of the results of the hateful rhetoric and violent attacks against the men and women of ICE and BP.
“These brave men and women are forced to conduct law enforcement operations in heightened threat environments every day. Like all Americans, our officers have a right to self defense,” he wrote, adding that the CBS News interview had been filmed before he had all the “facts.”
“This interview was taped earlier today before I had the opportunity to see all the footage and learn the details of the incident. I do not comment before I have the facts,” he said in a separate X post. “As I repeatedly have said, the brave men and women of ICE are heroes. Like all Americans, our officers have a right to self defense. Full stop.”
His reversal comes as a campaign to oust Noem is reportedly being led by his supporters.
The two are said to have been at each other’s throats for months, with Noem reportedly attempting to place a “comms blackout” on Homan back in September.
“Things are f—ed,” one former DHS official has said.
According to Axios, “The exact cause of the tensions between Noem and Homan isn’t clear”—but insiders say that Noem spending millions of dollars from the DHS budget on a self-promoting and “controversial campaign-style ad blitz” has angered career immigration officers loyal to Homan, a 30-year veteran of immigration enforcement.
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