A cellphone video made public on Friday appears to show the moments leading up to the fatal shooting of a woman in Minneapolis from the perspective of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent who killed her.
The footage, published by Alpha News, a conservative news outlet, appears to come from a cellphone held by the agent who fatally shot Renee Nicole Good on a snowy residential street on Wednesday morning. The Department of Homeland Security confirmed that the video was taken by the agent and posted the clip from Alpha News on X.
The 47-second video shows the agent getting out of a vehicle and approaching the S.U.V. that Ms. Good is driving, which is partly blocking the street. A black dog sits in the rear seat of Ms. Good’s Honda, its head sticking out of the window.
The agent walks around the hood of Ms. Good’s vehicle, and the car begins to move slowly in reverse. Ms. Good, wearing a knit cap and a plaid jacket over a sweatshirt, is heard saying, “That’s fine, dude. I’m not mad,” though it is not clear from the footage whom she is addressing or to what she might be responding. She continues talking, but her words become less clear as the agent moves toward the vehicle’s rear.
The footage pauses when the agent reaches the back of the S.U.V., which is adorned with several travel bumper stickers and a Missouri license plate. The agent’s reflection can be seen briefly in the footage. He appears to be holding a cellphone, and his face is partly covered.
A person standing near the car, believed to be Becca Good, Renee Good’s wife, begins talking when the agent reaches the rear of the vehicle and films the license plate. “That’s OK, we don’t change our plates every morning, just so you know,” that woman says. “It’ll be the same plate when you come talk to us later.”
That woman, wearing sunglasses and an orange whistle around her neck, is then shown on camera holding up a phone, apparently filming the agent.
“That’s fine,” the woman adds. “U.S. citizen. Former fucking veteran.”
The agent then walks toward the front of the vehicle, as the woman stands between him and Renee Good’s S.U.V.
“You want to come at us?” she asks. “I say go get yourself some lunch, big boy. Go ahead.”
At that point, additional federal agents can be heard approaching Renee Good’s car on the other side. “Get out of the car,” one of them says. “Get out of the fucking car.”
The Honda moves in reverse, and Renee Good can then be seen turning the steering wheel to the right. By then, the agent who is filming is in front of the vehicle. Someone can be heard saying, “Drive.”
As the Honda begins to move forward, the cellphone camera suddenly points toward the sky, and gunshots are heard. It is not immediately clear from the new video whether the Honda made contact with the officer or exactly where he is standing when he fires the shots. Other videos appear to show him just to the side of the vehicle when he fires.
The White House and the Department of Homeland Security have repeatedly defended the shooting as a lawful act of self-defense and accused Renee Good of escalating the situation and endangering agents. Democratic officials in Minnesota have used words like “bullshit” and “propaganda” to describe the federal government’s narrative of the shooting.
Conservatives pointed to the new video, saying it was evidence that Renee Good was not an innocent bystander and that the officer had reason to fear for his life.
“Many of you have been told this law enforcement officer wasn’t hit by a car, wasn’t being harassed, and murdered an innocent woman,” Vice President JD Vance said in a social media post that included the video. “The reality is that his life was endangered and he fired in self defense.”
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said on social media that the video vindicated President Trump, who has said the driver tried to “run over” the ICE agent.
State Representative Aisha Gomez, a Minneapolis Democrat, said she watched the new video and remained convinced that the shooting was unjustified.
Ms. Gomez said the release of the footage was “clearly designed to be like, ‘Look at these terrible people who are interfering with law enforcement. Don’t they deserve to get executed in the middle of the street in the United States of America?’”
“The answer,” she said, was “no, they don’t.”
Mitch Smith is a Chicago-based national correspondent for The Times, covering the Midwest and Great Plains.
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