The fatal shooting of Renee Good in her car by a federal immigration officer in Minneapolis last week, an act filmed by multiple bystanders on their mobile phones, has spawned competing narratives about what happened and who was to blame. It has also put a spotlight on the volunteer networks that have sprung up in many cities to monitor and send alerts about immigration enforcement.
Even before any formal investigation had begun into the killing, Trump administration officials referred to Ms. Good as a “domestic terrorist” who had impeded law enforcement and allegedly tried to run over the officer. Speaking on CNN on Sunday, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem repeated allegations that her department made on the day of the shooting.
“If you look at what the definition of domestic terrorism is, it completely fits the situation on the ground,” Ms. Noem said, referring to Ms. Good’s actions.
Why We Wrote This
There’s a difference between constitutionally protected free speech and acts of civil disobedience that could lead to arrests. Still, it’s not clear that Renee Good in Minneapolis was interfering illegally with ICE operations. And civil disobedience isn’t terrorism under traditional definitions.
Witnesses say Ms. Good was shot while driving her car away from a tense confrontation with federal agents, including the Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who fired three times into her vehicle. Administration officials allege that Ms. Good had used her car as a weapon against the officer, who fired in self-defense. Her car was partially obstructing the street before the shooting, though other vehicles had just driven by, apparently unimpeded.
Blocking ICE agents carrying out an operation would cross a line between protected free speech and assembly, such as blowing whistles when agents show up, and acts of civil disobedience that could lead to the arrest of participants. Still, it’s not clear that Ms. Good was engaged in such an action. And civil disobedience isn’t terrorism under any normal definition, says Bruce Hoffman, a professor at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service who studies terrorism and insurgencies.
“Terrorism is really the conscious embrace of violence in pursuit of a political objective, where violence is the centerpiece of everything you’re doing. And that’s different from civil disobedience [and] protest … even protest that crosses the line into illegality,” he says.
Law enforcement officials have long grappled with striking a balance between upholding public order and protecting the constitutional rights of those seeking to make their voices heard. “Protest is one of the core protections that we Americans enjoy as citizens to express our political opinions and beliefs,” says William Banks, a professor emeritus at Syracuse University College of Law.
The United States has struggled to define what domestic terrorism is, says Professor Banks, who studies national security law. Now, this debate has been turned on its head under President Donald Trump, he says: “To respond negatively to Trump administration programs, policies, or decisions is to engage in terrorist behavior. And that, of course, is Alice in Wonderland.”
In recent months, the Trump administration has cast an increasingly wide net in tackling what it calls “domestic terror organizations” such as antifa. That includes anti-ICE volunteers: Federal investigators have begun to scrutinize groups in Minneapolis with which Ms. Good reportedly had loose ties. This comes as the administration has expanded its definition of domestic terrorism after the September assassination of Charlie Kirk, a prominent right-wing commentator and activist.
Prosecutors resign in protest
On Tuesday, six federal prosecutors in Minneapolis resigned after Justice Department officials sought to investigate the wife of Ms. Good, an anti-ICE volunteer, The New York Times reported. The prosecutors also objected to the exclusion of state investigators from the examination of the shooting. (President Trump has defended the exclusion, citing distrust of officials in the state.)
Spencer Reynolds, a former intelligence counsel at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), says the challenge of holding federal law enforcement officers accountable after such incidents predates this administration. He notes that some states, though not Minnesota, have passed legislation to enable lawsuits to be brought against federal agencies for civil rights abuses.
Labeling Ms. Good a terrorist deflects the federal government’s culpability for her killing, says Mr. Reynolds, now a senior counsel for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. “Minnesota state investigators should be involved in this investigation for there to be any hope of it being independent. But we’re seeing already that the FBI’s rhetoric around so-called domestic terrorism has eroded confidence of impartiality” in their investigation, he says.
President Trump has said that his immigration enforcement is targeted at dangerous criminals who threaten public safety. He has accused left-wing groups of funding violent anti-ICE activities and labeled Ms. Good and her wife, Becca Good, as paid agitators.
The two women volunteered in their neighborhood. In Minneapolis, as in Chicago, Charlotte, North Carolina, and other cities targeted by ICE, grassroots monitoring groups have used encrypted apps to share information and to coordinate their actions, which include filming ICE agents in public, protesting their presence, and using whistles to alert communities. Some have reportedly received training from more experienced political activists.
Angelina Katsanis/Reuters
There’s no evidence that the protesters are centrally directed, though, says Sidney Tarrow, an emeritus professor of political science at Cornell University who studies social movements. What appears to be happening, he says, is that new groups and networks are emerging in response to ICE deployments and that many volunteers are new to political protests.
“What is striking about this wave of protests is that even though they were not centrally controlled, there has been almost no violence,” he adds.
Violent incidents against ICE personnel
ICE agents have faced violence: A pair of shootings occurred at different ICE detention facilities in Texas in July and September. During the September attack, in Dallas, two detainees died. DHS says its agents are frequently attacked, including assaults by vehicles, and are subjected to death threats. It says “violent rhetoric” by politicians in cities that don’t cooperate with ICE – overwhelmingly Democratic-run jurisdictions – encourages these attacks.
Under the Trump administration’s definition of “domestic terrorism,” ICE could also be shielded from what has been protected speech: publishing information that identifies individuals who work for ICE or other agencies. A December memo on combating domestic terrorism by Attorney General Pam Bondi treats doxing as a crime, putting it in the same category as violent crimes. (Impeding law enforcement officers is also singled out for prosecution.)
Legal scholars say that, though doxing is controversial, it’s also constitutionally protected.
“The ability to share facts about public employees in the execution of their duties in public spaces is not a gray area under the First Amendment; it’s protected speech,” wrote Adam Goldstein, an attorney for the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a nonpartisan watchdog group, in December.
Civil rights groups say ICE and other federal agencies involved in immigration enforcement have aimed weapons toward and assaulted individuals who exercise their rights as public monitors, including filming agents and capturing their license plate numbers.
Josh Blackman, a constitutional law professor at the South Texas College of Law in Houston, says anti-ICE protesters shouldn’t be treated as domestic terrorists. The label “isn’t terribly helpful because it doesn’t mean anything.”
But, he says, their tactics are often to intentionally impede federal law enforcement and go beyond the bounds of political protests. “I think they are trying to obstruct law enforcement. Their express purpose is to take their cars and block ICE agents from making arrests,” he says, referring to the positioning of Ms. Good’s vehicle when the confrontation began.
Claiming to confront “vast” terror network
The Bondi memo from last month is designed to implement a national security order directive by Mr. Trump. It takes aim at what it says are radical groups and ideologies associated with the left, including opposition to immigration enforcement and to conservative views about gender and family formation. The directive was issued in the wake of Mr. Kirk’s fatal shooting on Sept. 10 on a college campus in Utah.
Tim Evans/Reuters
White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller said at the time that the administration would root out what he called a “vast domestic terrorist movement” behind the murder of Mr. Kirk, an ally of Mr. Trump, his family, and his administration. Only one individual, however, has been charged in Mr. Kirk’s death.
Immigration agents have continued to detain migrants in Minneapolis – and protesters have continued to track their movements. On Monday, the state attorney general, Keith Ellison, filed a lawsuit in federal court to block ICE’s deployment, calling the agency’s actions dangerous and unconstitutional. (Illinois has also sued to block ICE deployments.)
Tricia McLaughlin, a DHS spokesperson, said Mr. Ellison’s lawsuit prioritized politics over public safety.
“President Trump’s job is to protect the American people and enforce the law – no matter who your mayor, governor, or state attorney general is,” Ms. McLaughlin said in a statement. “That’s what the Trump administration is doing; we have the Constitution on our side on this, and we look forward to proving that in court.”