MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — The investigation into the fatal shooting of a woman by an immigration officer in Minneapolis shouldn’t be overseen solely by the federal government, two of the state’s leading Democrats said Sunday.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and U.S. Sen. Tina Smith both said in separate interviews Sunday that state authorities should be included in the investigation because the federal government has already made clear what it believes happened.
“How can we trust the federal government to do an objective, unbiassed investigation, without prejudice, when at the beginning of that investigation they have already announced exactly what they saw — what they think happened,” Smith said on ABC’s “This Week.”
The Trump administration has defended the officer who shot Renee Good in her car, saying he was protecting himself and fellow agents.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem deflected questions about the moments surrounding the shooting during an interview with CNN on Sunday and dismissed complaints from Minnesota officials about local agencies being denied any participation in the investigation.
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“We do work with locals when they work with us,” she said, criticizing the Minneapolis mayor and others for not assisting Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations.
Frey and Noem each pointed fingers at the other for their rhetoric after Renee Good’s killing, and each pushed their own firm conclusions about what video of the incident shows. The mayor stood by his assertions that videos show “a federal agent recklessly abusing power that ended up in somebody’s dying.”
“Let’s have the investigation in the hands of someone that isn’t biased,” Frey said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
The killing of Good on Wednesday by an ICE officer and the shooting of two people by federal agents in Portland, Oregon, led to dozens of protests across the country over the weekend.
Trump administration officials have said both shootings were acts of self-defense against drivers who “weaponized” their vehicles to attack officers.
Thousands of people marched in Minneapolis on Saturday where Homeland Security called its deployment of immigration officers in the Twin Cities its biggest ever immigration enforcement operation.
