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Vice President JD Vance said on Thursday that Americans outraged by the killing of Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis should actually be thanking, not criticizing, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer who shot the 37-year-old mother of three.
In a press conference in the White House the day after Good was killed, Vance repeated the lie that Good hit the officer, identified as Jonathan Ross, with her car. He said that Good’s death was a “tragedy of her own making,” while the real victim is Ross, who he painted as an essential agent of the law.
“This is a guy who’s actually done a very, very important job for the United States of America,” Vance said, asking for prayers for Ross and condemning the media for reports on the killing. “He’s been assaulted, he’s been attacked, he’s been injured because of it. He deserves a debt of gratitude.”
Vance referred to an incident from June, in which court documents say Ross broke the car window of a man who wasn’t complying with a traffic stop and reached inside. The man tried to drive away, with Ross’s arm reportedly “stuck” inside the car, and Ross was dragged, requiring stitches.
“So you think maybe he is a little bit sensitive about somebody ramming him with an automobile?” Vance said, suggesting that Ross’s past trauma justifies him killing Good, the latter of whom he painted as “a victim of left-wing ideology.”
During the press conference, Vance also said that Ross has “absolute immunity” to act under his job. Experts dismissed this as patently untrue.
But it suggests that Vance believes that not even the slightest amount of accountability — not even just public criticism — of Ross is acceptable, considering that the vice president believes that Ross shouldn’t be prosecuted for his actions. Nothing short of total fealty to Ross is sufficient, Vance’s comments seemingly suggest.
Reporting has found that Good was a poet, wife, and a devout Christian. She was on the way home from dropping off her youngest child at elementary school when Ross killed her.
Analyses from multiple news outlets, including The New York Times, NBC, The Washington Post, and more, have undercut the administration’s narrative that Ross was in danger. They have found that Good was, in fact, moving away from Ross when he shot her — and, further, have shown Good was trying to wave officers by, and that officers instead tried to stop her, with Ross purposefully positioning himself in front of her running car.
Further, CNN reported on Thursday that new footage of the shooting showed that Good had arrived minutes before ICE officers did, and wasn’t blocking any cars from being able to proceed on the street. It also showed that Ross was easily able to move out of the way of the car.
Critics have also noted, however, that Ross’s use of lethal force was unjustified regardless of the details of the incident.
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