A Republican congressmen suggested that more people will die at the hands of Immigration and Customs Enforcement after an agent shot and killed a woman in Minneapolis.
“If you impede the actions of our law enforcement as they seek to repel foreign invaders from our country, you get what’s coming to you. I do not feel bad for the woman that was involved,” Rep. Randy Fine said Thursday on Newsmax.
“It’s time for Americans to say ‘enough,’ and if you get in the way of the government repelling a foreign invasion, you’re gonna end up just like that lady did yesterday,” the MAGA lawmaker, who was elected in April, argued.
The Florida congressman added that “the left believes they can do anything they want, and we’re just supposed to sit down and take it.”
When asked by the Daily Beast for further comment, Fine, through a spokesperson, said, “ICE is not a threat to Americans. Criminal illegal invaders and violent left-wing agitators are. The only people who should fear ICE are those breaking the law or attempting to assault and kill our brave ICE officers. Americans have had enough of this foreign invasion.”
Republicans have largely stood by ICE and the Department of Homeland Security’s claim in the wake of the fatal shooting that Renee Nicole Good who was shot and killed in her car by an ICE agent, was committing “an act of domestic terrorism” and attempting to ram agents.
Video footage and eyewitness accounts of the lead-up to the shooting, however, show a different story. The victim is seen in her car, waving to a car to pass her as she idles in the road. ICE agents then approach her vehicle and yell at her to get out of the car. Good slowly backs up, turns her wheel, and accelerates forward, and one agent shoots her three times. The car crashes into a parked car and comes to a stop.
Other Republican lawmakers expressed similar sentiments to Fine.
Rep. Wesley Hunt, who is running for Senate in Texas this year, went so far as to argue that disobeying the feds is grounds for them to kill someone.
“The bottom line is this: when a federal officer gives you instructions, you abide by them and then you get to keep your life,” he said on Newsmax.
Rep. Derrick Van Orden posted on X, “The REAL question you should be asking is ‘What would drive a 37-year-old suburban woman to violently attack federal law enforcement?’”
“Let’s be clear. This woman never had to die,” he continued. “The left’s constant demonization of our officers, calling them ‘American Gestapo’ and vile slurs, is brainwashing and fueling this type of radicalization.”
President Donald Trump claimed in a Truth Social post that the victim of the fatal shooting “was very disorderly, obstructing and resisting, who then violently, willfully, and viciously ran over the ICE Officer.” The president also made the unfounded claim that one bystander was “obviously, a professional agitator.”
Rep. Nancy Mace echoed the president’s comments about protesters being “paid,” telling Fox Business, “These were, it appears, paid agitators.”
State and local officials have said the incident was “predictable” given ICE’s routine violence when detaining people or dealing with protesters.
“We recognize quite obviously that this has been building over the course of several weeks,” Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara told CBS News on Thursday.
“I would hope no matter what side of politics people are on we can recognize that the loss of a human life is a tragedy and that we do not want to compound that by having a situation which can result in destruction or further harms this community, which has been through so much over the last five years,” O’Hara said.
Several local elected officials have demanded that ICE leave the city, with Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey telling the agency in a fiery press conference on Wednesday to “Get the f--- out of Minneapolis.”
