ICE agents are living in fear as the public turns against them in record numbers after one of their colleagues shot a mom dead in the street.
The killing of unarmed Renee Nicole Good, 37, has sparked international outrage. She was blasted three times in her car by federal agent Jonathan Ross during an immigration protest in a residential part of Minneapolis on Jan. 7.
Good’s killing has heightened tensions nationwide—but particularly in Minnesota, where, the Daily Beast has learned, drivers are increasingly making a “gun sign” with their hands as they pass by ICE patrols in the street.
The public revulsion towards the heavy-handed approach of ICE under President Donald Trump, and the administration’s efforts to cover its own tracks as it did in the wake of Good’s shooting, is already said to be causing problems securing the criminal convictions that are a key part of the agency’s work, one agent told the Daily Beast. They said that, anecdotally at least, it is becoming more common for juries not to believe evidence they are presenting to the court, leading to collapsed trials.
Separately, according to a report published Monday, Border Patrol—the agency working with ICE on the ground—is struggling to find agents willing to join the administration’s “Operation Metro Surge” in Minneapolis pledged by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in response to last Wednesday’s deadly incident.
The hostility is such that polling suggests many Americans now wish to see the agency scrapped altogether.
Now, two agents who decided to leave ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) in the past six months due to the changing nature of their job under Trump—who in his second term has prioritized civil immigration enforcement over immigrant criminal investigations—have told the Beast they are terrified of the impact this is having on the force and their former colleagues.
“Talking to colleagues in Minneapolis, they say it is not uncommon for people to drive past them and make gun signs with their fingers,” said one, speaking on condition of anonymity amid fear of reprisals, adding that it was not a huge stretch to think this could eventually translate into real violence of the kind that saw an ICE agent fatally shot in Dallas in September.
Another said: “We used to be respected and liked by the public, who understood the role we played in a functioning society and appreciated that we investigated and deported criminal illegals. That’s gone now.
“If this situation continues, many of us fear that when the Dems get back in, they will dissolve ICE altogether,” they said. “For those of us who care about the good work ICE has done in the past three decades, that’s a very sad state of affairs.”
YouGov polling cited by the influential Migrant Insider Substack supports such fears. It reported a massive swing in public opinion since Trump came to office, with the agency’s approval rating going from +16 last February to -13 today. “You don’t see numbers move like that unless something has gone very wrong,” Migrant Insider noted.
The poll also found 52 percent disapproved of how ICE does its job, while 51 percent said the agency uses too much force. Given that the poll was conducted at the same time Good was killed, that number, Migrant Insider said, is likely to be higher now.
The outlet noted that 56 percent of the independents “who decide elections” disapprove of ICE. “Independents gave Trump his victory in 2024. Now a majority of them have turned against his signature enforcement agency,” it said. Migrant Insider also reported that support for abolishing the agency altogether stood at 42 percent by January, up from 19 percent in summer 2024, with that number at 69 percent among Democrats.
The situation is also bleak for federal agents operating on the ground in Minneapolis, according to leaked internal Border Patrol documents revealed by independent journalist Ken Klippenstein, which called for 300 volunteers to join the push by last Sunday. “We do have personnel but some just don’t want to go,” one agent is reported to have said.
As one senior Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official told Klippenstein: “There is genuine fear that indeed ICE’s heavy-handedness and the rhetoric from Washington is more creating a condition where the officers’ lives are in danger rather than the other way around.”
The Daily Beast has contacted DHS for comment.
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