On Jan. 7, ICE agent Jonathan Ross fatally shot Renee Nicole Good three times in her head at point blank range.
Ms. Good, a 37-year-old mother of three and a trained and peaceful observer of ICE activity, was unarmed, had committed no crime and was trying to drive away when another agent grabbed the handle of her car and Ross opened fire.
If you have any question about the facts, watch the videos yourself, especially the New York Times’ frame-by-frame analysis. For context, listen for the last thing that Good said to Ross. She said, “I’m not mad at you.” The last thing that Ross said to Good, right after shooting her, was “F***in’ bitch.”
Donald Trump, Kristi Noem, Marco Rubio and J.D. Vance claim that ICE acted in self-defense after Good committed “an act of domestic terrorism.” The act of terrorism? Attempting to drive away.
No surprise here. The Trump political playbook says when faced with damning evidence, deflect and lie.
Lie repeatedly. Create an alternative reality in information silos. That alternative reality will then be disseminated by mainstream media, reporting on one hand what happened and on the other hand, the lie.
Candidate Donald Trump, in 2016, proclaimed, “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot someone, and I wouldn’t lose any voters, OK?”
Many pundits dismissed that statement as campaign hyperbole. Others took it somewhat seriously, if not literally. But that was then. This is now.
Now government-sponsored murder constitutes an instrument of United States policy, both foreign and domestic. Literally.
Consider, in addition to Good and the dozens of others who have recently died in ICE custody, the civilians on boats near Venezuela who, charged with no crime, have been killed by the United States deliberately and with premeditation. That’s homicide.
The government’s position? The president can by himself declare war and Trump has — against low level drug couriers generally not headed toward the U.S. Those civilians somehow became soldiers so Trump can order them killed, and the attacks are not murder.
If these contentions were accurate or legal (they’re neither), then Trump and those around him have committed multiple war crimes.
Doanld Trump’s depraved amorality was unleashed by the electorate in 2024. It has been enabled significantly by House Speaker Mike Johnson and Cabinet members and advisers, Steve Miller, Pete Hegseth and the rest.
But we should not elide over the culpability of John Roberts, Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, Brett Kavanaugh, Neil Gorsuch, and Amy Coney Barrett. They are the Supreme Court Justices who in 2024 created a new doctrine of presidential immunity in Trump v. United States.
That decision dismissed the indictment against Trump for his participation in the Jan. 6 insurrection. The court decided that Trump should be cloaked with immunity and thus could not be prosecuted for the crimes he had committed or would commit while acting as president.
Fear of prison, we’re told, may previously have restrained some of Donald Trump’s most overt criminality. Given that the court provided him with unlimited get-out-of-jail-free cards, it’s no wonder that Trump, caught on a hot mic after his State of the Union address, whispered to Chief Justice Roberts, “Thank you, again. Won’t forget it.”
Last week Trump in a New York Times interview said that he was not bound to international or national law, that the only restraint on him was “his personal morality.”
His personal morality? Now, that’s rich.
But there is a ray of light. The death of Renee Good could spark a new movement — a social justice coalition of working people, labor unions and other opponents of authoritarianism and oligarchy joining together to rekindle and restore decency and democracy.
Farfetched?
Consider Rosa Parks, and Emmet Till in his open casket and the courageous Black children and adults standing up to Bull Conner’s attack dogs and high-pressure fire hoses. They helped ignite the Civil Rights Movement.
Remember, too, the haunting photo of Mary Ann Vecchio screaming as she kneeled over the body of Kent State student Jeffrey Miller, killed in1970 at Kent State by the Ohio National Guard. That event, that photo, reignited the anti-war movement
Reflect also on the deaths of George Floyd, Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor and so many others. Their lives and deaths galvanized the Black Lives Matter Movement. Maybe Renee Good’s death will provide a similar spark.
As Congress remains supine and the Supreme Court nestles in Trump’s pocket, the future for democracy is vested more than ever in we the people. We have to be on the streets. In huge numbers. That can be scary, and fear can be debilitating. But courage can be contagious.
In the past few days, the protests across the country and in the places we call home have inspired hope and renewed commitment. All of us at those demonstrations and vigils have felt it.
Massive resistance over time can change policy. As Frederick Douglass said, “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never (has), and it never will.” Our time is now. Rest in peace, Rennee Good.
Bill Newman is an attorney and the co-host of the daily WHMP radio show Talk the Talk.