Jan. 11, 2026, 5:06 a.m. ET
- A feud between President Trump and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz has intensified following the fatal shooting of Renee Nicole Good by an ICE officer.
- The Trump administration is blocking state investigators from evidence, citing a need for federal oversight and highlighting a separate Minnesota fraud scandal.
- Minnesota officials, including Gov. Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, are demanding an independent review and criticizing the administration’s defense of the officer.
After months of trading insults, President Donald Trump and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz‘s feud has reached volcanic heights since a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis on Jan. 7.
The Trump administration is refusing to allow state investigators to examine the evidence and spotlighting Minnesota’s recent welfare fraud scandal, while Walz and allies, such as Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, are responding by seeking an independent review. They have harsh words for the administration, which has vigorously defended ICE agent Jonathan Ross and alleged that Good provoked the killing by driving toward Ross.
Walz launched into the fray with criticism in the initial hours of the incident, casting the administration’s depiction of the event as being a “propaganda machine” in a Jan. 7 post on X.
“Tim Walz is a joke. His entire administration is a joke,” Vice President JD Vance responded in a Jan. 8 White House press briefing. On Jan. 9 Trump called Walz “an incompetent governor, fool.”
“I mean, he’s a stupid person,” added Trump, who previously used a slur for the intellectually disabled to describe Walz.
Frey, who won a third term last fall, demanded ICE leave the city in expletive-laced remarks hours after Good’s death.
Now Good’s death is set to be turned into another political football with the Land of 10,000 Lakes once again being the possible ground zero of civil unrest ahead of a critical election, political observers say.
“It’s one of the most shocking and high-profile instances of ICE’s highly aggressive tactics and approaches, and it’s on video,” said Matthew Dallek, a historian and professor of political management at George Washington University.
“I don’t know if it’s a turning point, but the gloves are off and as terrible as it is, this concentrates everybody’s minds on the dangers of deploying thousands of ICE agents, many of whom are untrained and often masked, in the interior (of the country).”
‘At war’: Walz, Minnesota Democrats raising bigger alarms than in 2020
Minneapolis is experiencing a dark sense of deja vu local, activists tell USA TODAY.
The city was thrust into the spotlight after the May 2020 murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin that was watched by millions. It resulted in nationwide demonstrations and ignited a divisive partisan debate, much like Good’s killing.
“We’re a blue state, we’re a progressive city and we have liberal policies that (Trump’s) administration doesn’t like,” said Shannon Gibney, an English professor and member of Minneapolis Families for Public School, a grassroots group that has joined opposition to the Trump’s immigration enforcement campaign.
“So it does feel like a political battle, and we’re sort of stuck in the crosshairs here.”
But unlike that saga six years ago, the clash between Trump and Minnesota Democrats has been building months before Good’s death, punctuated by the president’s longstanding disdain for Walz, dating back to his criticism of the governor’s handling of the 2020 Floyd protests.
As would be expected, both men traded jabs during the 2024 campaign when Walz was the Democratic vice presidential nominee, but the tensions have risen since Trump came back to the White House.
In March 2025, Walz outraged the president’s supporters when he described ICE as “Trump’s modern-day Gestapo” during a commencement address. The animosity grew later that year when after a the targeted shooting of two Minnesota Democratic state legislators, Trump dismissed calling Walz to offer condolences, calling the former VP nominee a “whacked out” governor.
But the president has done more than engage in name-calling and has used his vast executive powers to exert pressure on Democratic-led states such as Minnesota.
On Jan. 7, the Trump administration froze more than $10 billion in federal child care and family assistance funds to Minnesota and other states, such as California, Colorado, Illinois and New York over unspecified fraud concerns. A judge temporarily blocked the move on Jan. 9.
“There’s a reason why Trump is concentrating his forces in places with governors that he hates, because it’s not just Minnesota − it’s Illinois, California, etc.” Dallek said. “He’s kind of exerting his desire to be dominant in states and with governors that he feels have treated him horribly.”
White House blasted Walz, Minnesota over fraud scandal before shooting
Trump and his allies have a different take, arguing that federal intervention is needed across the board due to Walz running an “incompetent” liberal state, riddled with corruption.
Two days before Ross, a U.S. Army veteran and former Border Patrol agent, fatally shot Good, the administration was spotlighting reports about dozens of Somali immigrants being charged with allegedly bilking billions from Minnesota programs, such as COVID-19 pandemic relief programs.
“The Department of Homeland Security is on the ground conducting door-to-door investigations of suspected fraud sites in Minnesota, with hundreds of (federal) officers in the state and more on the way,” the White House said in a Jan. 5 statement to USA TODAY.
The same day the Trump administration announced about 2,000 ICE agents would be flooding into Minneapolis, a city with roughly 600 sworn police officers.
Walz simultaneously made headlines when he announced Jan. 5 that he was forgoing a third term amid mounting pressure over the fraud scandal, which elated conservative activists but the Trump administration hasn’t relented.
“I think Tim Walz should resign because it’s very clear either that he knew about the fraud in Minneapolis … or at the very least he looked the other way,” Vance, who jousted with Walz during the 2024 VP debate, alleged during the Jan. 8 White House press briefing.
At the same briefing, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt came out swinging at Minnesota Democrats in defense of the ICE agent while touting the Medicaid fraud investigation, which dates back to the Biden administration.
“The Department of Homeland Security will continue to operate on the ground in Minnesota, not only to remove criminal illegal aliens, but also to continue conducting door-to-door investigations of the rampant fraud that has taken place in the state under the failed and corrupt leadership of Democrat Gov. Tim Walz,” she said.
Minnesota Democrats express lack of trust in Trump’s DOJ
One of the first signs that Trump and Walz’ beef would be impacting the ICE shooting case came within a day of the deadly incident when the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension said the FBI notified them that they would no longer have access to any evidence after the state agency initially said it was partnering federal investigators.
The state agency shut down its probe as a result, much to the delight of Trump, who told reporters at the White House on Jan. 9 that Minnesota is filled with “crooked officials” before falsely claiming without evidence that he won the last three presidential elections in the state.
“It’s got an incompetent governor, fool,” Trump said. “I mean, he’s a stupid person.”
Democrats in the state aren’t bowing a knee, however, with several city council members, state legislators and activists joining Frey, the Minneapolis mayor, at a Jan. 9 press conference, where they pressed for a fair probe including state investigators into Ross’ actions. He and others argue that the state agency has a record of being impartial in law enforcement shooting cases, and must be involved in order for Minnesotans to have faith in any outcome.
Many of the officials present expressed that there will be significant skepticism of the FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice, pointing to comments by Trump, Vance and Homeland Security Sec. Kristi Noem, who’ve all said Ross acted in self-defense.
“It is important and critical to our community to have a sense of trust in this process by having an independent investigation to present to the county attorney so the adequate charges can be made,” Minneapolis City Council member Jason Chavez, a son of Mexican immigrants, said during the press conference.
Those calls prompted a response by Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, two of the state’s top prosecutors, who in a joint appearance told reporters they’re launching independent review into Good’s killing.
Moriarty called on members of the public to share any video or other evidence surrounding the shooting with her office, and specifically pushed back at Vance’s assertion at the White House press briefing that the ICE agent had “absolute immunity” from state prosecution.
“We do have jurisdiction to make this decision with what happened in this case,” she said at a Jan. 9 news conference. “It does not matter that it was a federal law enforcement agent.”
Asked if federal authorities might reconsider blocking Minnesota investigators from participating, DOJ officials pointed to Frey’s comments, such as saying that claims of self-defense by the ICE agent were “bulls–t,” as an indicator that state officials have no intent to pursue a good-faith investigation.
“Federal agents risk their lives each day to safeguard our communities,” Deputy U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche told USA TODAY in a statement, adding that following any officer-involved shooting, “standard protocols ensure that evidence is collected and preserved” properly.
“They must make decisions, under dynamic and chaotic circumstances, in less time that it took to read this sentence,” Blanche said. “The law does not require police to gamble with their lives in the face of a serious threat of harm. Rather, they may use deadly force when they face an immediate threat of significant physical harm.”