(NewsNation) — Investigating the funding and organization of paid protesting groups who target federal immigration officers and agents will fall under the purview of a new assistant attorney general role announced by the White House on Thursday.
Vice President JD Vance told reporters the federal government will investigate the financing networks and domestic terrorism networks that “legitimate” violence against Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and Border Patrol agents.
Vance’s announcement was made after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer fatally shot a 37-year-old woman in Minneapolis, where 2,000 federal law enforcement officers are expected to spend the next month. Protests began in earnest over the presence of ICE strike teams, which arrived in the Twin Cities early last month.
Department of Homeland Security officials have accused Renee Good of weaponizing her vehicle and attempting to run over federal immigration officers during a targeted enforcement operation. Vance was asked on Thursday what his message was to protesting groups in Minneapolis and across the country in the wake of Good’s death.
“I don’t think they should feel emboldened because now they have an assistant attorney general who is going to prosecute and investigate their fraud and their violence more aggressively than it has ever been investigated in the United States of America,” Vance said Thursday.
Vance said that federal agencies, including the Department of Justice, are doing “so much” to locate networks that fund and engage in the violence that is taking place against federal law enforcement officers and agents. The vice president said that perhaps for the first time in American history, an administration is in place that “will not tolerate political violence of any kind from anywhere.”
Before Good’s identity was publicly released Wednesday, President Donald Trump described her in a Truth Social post as a “professional agitator” who was driving her car in a “very disorderly” manner, in which she obstructed and restricted federal immigration officers and then “violently, willfully and viciously” ran over the ICE officer.
Good’s mother, Donna Ganger, told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that her daughter was not part of efforts by protesters who were challenging the presence of ICE officers in Minneapolis.
Ganger told the newspaper Good is “not part of anything like that at all.”
“Renee was one of the kindest people I’ve ever known,” Ganger told the Star Tribune. “She was extremely compassionate. She’s taken care of people all her life. She was loving, forgiving and affectionate. She was an amazing human being.”
Protests grew after Wednesday’s fatal shooting as Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz urged Minnesota residents to remain calm and “not fall for the bait” that the Democrat said was being pushed by the Trump administration.
Demonstrations have included protesters carrying signs and telling ICE officers to leave after Frey said in no uncertain terms that they were not welcome in Minneapolis, using an expletitve.
Walz also criticized the Trump administration for defining Good’s role in Wednesday’s fatal shooting before she had been identified. But Walz, a Democrat, said he did not want people to ignore how they were feeling after Good was shot and killed.
“I’m not telling you not to express your anger or your frustrations or the outrage that we have,” Walz said Wednesday. “Look, this was totally predictable as I said (Tuesday), and it was totally avoidable.”
Vance, when asked Thursday about whether the Trump administration’s characterization of Good as a “victim of left-wing ideology” could potentially be damaging, said the Justice Department will be investigating and that DHS’ probe into the incident has already begun.
Minnesota officials criticized a Thursday announcement that indicated that a state investigative bureau was being shut out of the FBI’s probe into Wednesday’s deadly shooting. But Vance said that in his mind, the facts are clear.
“What you see is what you get in this case,” Vance told reporters. “You have a woman who was trying to obstruct a legitimate law enforcement operation …. you have a woman who aimed her car at a law enforcement officer and pressed on the accelerator.”
He added, “I can believe that her death is a tragedy while also recognizing that her death is a tragedy of her own making and a tragedy of the far left that has marshaled an entire movement” that Vance called “a lunatic fringe.”