- - Vance says Renee Good was in leftist network. Where's the evidence?

Josh Meyer, USA TODAYJanuary 17, 2026 at 7:00 AM

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WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump and his administration's top officials have claimed the Jan. 7 fatal shooting of Minnesota resident Renee Good by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent was provoked by Good's participation in a left-wing extremist network that directs people to attack federal officers.

But the administration has offered no public evidence tying Good − who was driving her own car when shot − to such a network.

Vice President JD Vance said at a Jan. 8 press briefing that Good’s death was “a tragedy of her own making and a tragedy of the far left who has marshaled an entire movement — a lunatic fringe — against our law enforcement officers.”

killed by an immigration enforcement agent during an incident in south Minneapolis on January 7. Attorneys representing the family of Renee Good say they are launching an investigation into the fatal shooting and intend to take legal action against the federal government

" style=padding-bottom:56%>June Pierce (C) prays during a vigil at a memorial near the site where Renee Good was killed a week ago on Jan. 14, 2026 in Minneapolis. Good was killed by an immigration enforcement agent during an incident in south Minneapolis on January 7. Attorneys representing the family of Renee Good say they are launching an investigation into the fatal shooting and intend to take legal action against the federal government

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June Pierce (C) prays during a vigil at a memorial near the site where Renee Good was killed a week ago on Jan. 14, 2026 in Minneapolis. Good was killed by an immigration enforcement agent during an incident in south Minneapolis on January 7. Attorneys representing the family of Renee Good say they are launching an investigation into the fatal shooting and intend to take legal action against the federal government

">June Pierce (C) prays during a vigil at a memorial near the site where Renee Good was killed a week ago on Jan. 14, 2026 in Minneapolis. Good was killed by an immigration enforcement agent during an incident in south Minneapolis on January 7. Attorneys representing the family of Renee Good say they are launching an investigation into the fatal shooting and intend to take legal action against the federal government

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1 / 12Prayer vigil marks one week since Renee Good was killed by ICE agent

June Pierce (C) prays during a vigil at a memorial near the site where Renee Good was killed a week ago on Jan. 14, 2026 in Minneapolis. Good was killed by an immigration enforcement agent during an incident in south Minneapolis on January 7. Attorneys representing the family of Renee Good say they are launching an investigation into the fatal shooting and intend to take legal action against the federal government

FBI Director Kash Patel went even farther in an interview with the right-wing "Real America's Voice" online show the night of Jan. 15.

"I can tell you, generally speaking, that these protests, whether it's Minneapolis or LA or Portland or where have you, aren't spontaneous," Patel said. "They don't magically appear. ... Somebody has to pay for the transportation. Somebody has to pay for the signs."

He described protests against ICE's recently ramped up enforcement as an "organized, in my opinion, effort to criminally disrupt and cause chaos into our communities."

The FBI declined to comment when asked by USA TODAY for details underlying Patel's claims. The Justice Department and the White House did not respond to several requests for comment. And the White House doubled down on the claims about an organized conspiracy, without offering specifics.

“Left-wing organizations have fueled violent riots, organized attacks against law enforcement officers, coordinated illegal doxing campaigns, arranged drop points for weapons and riot materials, and more — all around the country," White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said. "The Trump Administration is employing a whole-of-government approach to get to the bottom of this vast network inciting violence in American communities.”

Good's family and friends have said she was a devoutly religious mother of three who was doing what she believed was her civic duty in supporting anti-ICE protests in her hometown of Minneapolis, where as many as 3,000 federal agents have swarmed the city looking for undocumented migrants as part of the Trump administration's deportation agenda.

More: Tear gas, snowballs, arrests. Feds and protesters clash in Minneapolis.

"Our legal team is actively addressing persistent false reports circulating online that mischaracterize Renee Good’s background," said Antonio Romanucci, a lawyer who is representing Good's family. "Renee and Becca Good were responsible community members who lived peacefully and did not engage in harmful conduct toward others, including the federal agents involved on January 7, 2026."

Many domestic extremism experts, including former Justice Department and FBI specialists, say that while there may be a kernel of truth to claims about left-wing networks existing, there’s virtually no evidence for the Trump administration claims linking them to terrorism or to Good.

There is little if anything in the court record, or Justice Department prosecutions, to back up the claims of a well-funded national network of radical extremists plotting violent or disruptive confrontations with federal law enforcement.

"There's no Soros Foundation, kind-of master genius strategically dispensing money to all these organizations with some sort of master plan,” said Thomas Brzozowski, the former counsel for domestic terrorism for the Justice Department for nearly a decade until last September.

Brzozowski, the FBI counsel for domestic terrorism from 2010 to 2015 before moving to DOJ, told USA TODAY he found zero evidence while in government of organized left-wing violent extremist networks training people in how to weaponize their vehicles, throw bricks and do some of the other things alleged by Trump and top officials in his administration.

On Jan. 15, as protests over Good’s death continued, Trump threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act of 1807, which gives the president the power to deploy U.S. armed forces to suppress rebellions and civil unrest.

“If the corrupt politicians of Minnesota don’t obey the law & stop the professional agitators & insurrectionists from attacking the Patriots of I.C.E., who are only trying to do their job, I will institute the INSURRECTION ACT, which many Presidents have done…” Trump said in a social media post.

Protesters gather in Minneapolis on Jan. 10, 2026, after the fatal shooting of Renee Nicole Good by a federal immigration agent.What happened to Renee Good?

Trump has dramatically increased interior immigration enforcement, with Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and top Trump immigration aide Stephen Miller demanding in May that immigration agents seek to arrest 3,000 people a day.

Immigration enforcement agents have been mostly sent to Democrat-run cities or states, including Chicago, Los Angeles and Massachusetts. Often wearing masks and full-body armor, some agents have pepper sprayed protesters, manhandled and detained U.S. citizens and shot at least 11 people, including Good.

In Minneapolis, Good served on the board of her young son’s school, which linked to documents encouraging parents to monitor ICE and directing them to training after ICE began ramping up raids there in recent weeks.

Videos of the Jan. 7 Minneapolis encounter show that Good had stopped her Honda Pilot in the middle of a suburban street and then drove off when agents approached. As she did, veteran ICE agent Jonathan Ross shot her three times at close range.

What did Trump, Vance and Noem say?

Within hours of the Jan. 7 incident, Noem described Good’s actions at a news briefing as "domestic terrorism."

Good refused to obey orders to get out of her car, Noem said, and "weaponize(d) her vehicle" and "attempted to run" over Ross, who Noem said fired the fatal shots in self-defense.

Minnesota officials dispute Noem's account, citing videos showing Good attempting to drive away from the agents as Ross fired the second and third shots from the side of the vehicle.

People like Good, Noem said, were being "trained and directed to run over agents." And Good herself, Noem said, was part of a “coordinated” left-wing effort "targeting (agents) with her vehicle."

Vance alleged that Good was part of a “broader left-wing network to attack, to dox, to assault and to make it impossible for ICE officers to do their job.”

Neither Noem nor Vance has publicly identified any named group, legal case, investigative or intelligence finding, training program, funding source or communications network to demonstrate a left-wing extremist operation opposing immigration enforcement in Minneapolis or Good being involved in it.

The departments of Homeland Security and Justice, and the FBI, did not respond to USA TODAY questions about providing evidence to back up the Trump administration assertions. The White House did not respond to requests for comment.

FILE PHOTO: Hands are risen as U.S. Vice President JD Vance speaks to reporters in the briefing room at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., January 8, 2026. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque/File Photo'A dissonance' between Trump rhetoric and the facts?

Experts in extremism and terrorism law told USA TODAY that the administration’s rhetoric doesn’t match the publicly available evidence – or their understanding of how such domestic networks operate.

Most domestic extremism networks are fueled by right-wing grievances, and include groups of “nihilistic violent extremists,” white supremacists, neo-Nazis and anti-government agitators, Brzozowski and other extremism researchers and former federal law enforcement officials said.

For decades, right-wing domestic extremism and acts of terrorism has far outpaced those from left-wing groups, according to the FBI, Justice Department and outside groups.

Terrorists inspired by Islamist ideology are responsible for 87% of those murdered in attacks on U.S. soil since 1975, mostly from the September 11, 2001, attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people.

"Right-wingers are the second most common motivating ideology, accounting for 391 murders and 11 percent of the total," said a report last September by the libertarian CATO Institute. "The definition here of right-wing terrorists includes those motivated by white supremacy, anti-abortion beliefs, involuntary celibacy (incels), and other right-wing ideologies."

A report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies found an unusual uptick in incidents attributed to left-wing motivations in 2025, "although such violence has risen from very low levels and remains much lower than historical levels of violence carried out by right-wing and jihadist attackers."

“So there's a dissonance between what you hear the law enforcement folks saying under oath during congressional hearings, and this rhetoric” being used by the Trump administration, Brzozowski said.

The one notable left-wing exception, Brzozowski said, was the "Black Bloc" anarchist collectives that made headlines during the 1999 Seattle World Trade Organization summit and more recent events like the 2020 protests after a Minneapolis police officer murdered George Floyd, for setting fire to buildings and cars and attacking police.

Protests and sporadic violence following controversial law enforcement incidents are not, by themselves, evidence of a professionalized or centrally directed terror organization, Brzozowski said. If such a left-wing network did exist, there would be arrests and charges associated with it, he added.

When officials start using terms like "domestic terrorism" without evidence of planning, coordination or organizational structure, “it strips the term of its meaning,” Brzozowski said in an interview.

Some evidence of 'coordinated organized anti-ICE' groups

Some analysts say there is indeed something to the Trump administration's claims of a coordinated organized network, though they stop short of describing them as violent agitators or domestic terrorists.

"There appears to be coordinated organized anti-ICE groups who are spearheading the protest movements around the country, and who provide the demonstrators with propaganda and material support, although I would downplay the Soros connection," Joshua Sinai, a national and international counterterrorism security analyst with more than 30 years of experience, told USA TODAY.

Sinai, who spent several years working at the Department of Homeland Security's National Operations Center during the George W. Bush administration, said he is currently studying all the politically motivated violent assailants in the U.S. and Australia since 2014.

Looking for connections that don't exist

Michael German, a former FBI agent domestic terrorism agent and Brennan Center for Justice terrorism and civil liberties analyst, said the Trump administration has been trying to gin up fake left-wing terrorist conspiracies since the beginning of Trump's first term, without success.

"There are the same accusations that were made against Black Lives Matter back in 2020 and against environmental groups" and against a broad range of other left-wing protest groups, German said.

German said law enforcement agencies in the Trump administration, and in past administrations too, have made "extraordinary efforts to identify these networks and has failed to produce indictments that reveals that such a network exists."

During the 2020 protests after the Floyd's murder, FBI agents went into New York Police Department detention facilities to interview arrested protesters in an effort to undercover such networks, German said. During protests around wildfires in Oregon and Northern California, officials from state, local and federal agencies at government "Intelligence Fusion Centers" reported "van loads of anarchists going into fire zones to either start fires or delay the response." The reports were later debunked.

German said he is "not aware of any" evidence of domestic terrorism connections to Good or other anti-ICE protesters.

"This is what they do, and how they've used this radicalization theory they've adopted, even though there's no empirical evidence to suggest it's accurate," German said, of the Trump administration's allegations about Good and an unspecified radical network. "It's an effort to criminalize protest and criminalize any political organizing that opposes existing government policy."

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Was Renee Good part of a 'left-wing network' as Trump team alleges?

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