An Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent shot and killed a woman in Minneapolis on Wednesday.
Although the killing was caught on camera, the Department of Homeland Security, led by Kristi Noem, claimed the woman who was shot “weaponized her vehicle, attempting to run over our law enforcement officers in an attempt to kill them,” said Tricia McLaughlin, a DHS spokesperson.
This account directly contradicts what bystanders have attested to and what can seen on the video.
ICE agents are in Minneapolis conducting what the agency calls a targeted operation when the shooting occurred. The mayor, Jacob Frey, immediately contradicted the DHS’s account of the incident in a press conference later the same day.
“They are already trying to spin this as an action of self defense,” Frey said, referring to ICE. “Having seen the video of myself, I want to tell everybody directly that is b—s—.”
The video, which has been shared widely on social media, shows agents approaching an SUV in the middle of the street, ordering the woman to get out of the car and one agent tries to open the car’s door. The car then reverses and drives forward.
An agent who was standing close enough to the car to be face-to-face with the driver, drew his weapon and shot it three times at the driver. The SUV crashes into a car and light pole shortly thereafter.
McLaughlin called the shots “defensive shots.”
“He used his training and saved his own life and that of his fellow officers,” she said.
In another video, a man who identifies himself as a physician asks one of the agents if he could check the victim’s pulse. The agent denied his request and said EMS was en route to the scene.
Noem herself has said that the ICE vehicles were stuck in snow and they were trying to push them out when the victim “attacked them.”
“It was an act of domestic terrorism,” Noem said.
“What they are doing is causing chaos and distrust. They are ripping families apart, sowing chaos in the streets and, in this case, quite literally killing people,” said Mayor Frey. “This was an agent recklessly using power that resulted in somebody dying, getting killed.”
Law enforcement has described the victim as a “middle-aged white woman” who did not appear to be the target of the ICE operation.
“I do not know the exact circumstances of the shooting, but I would tell you, in any professional law enforcement agency in the country … it’s obviously very concerning whenever there’s a shooting into a vehicle of someone who’s not armed,” said Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara.
He added that while shooting an unarmed driver could be justified, “most law enforcement agencies in the country have trained very intensely to try and minimize the risk” of using deadly force.
Aidan Perzana, 31, who witnessed the incident said that it did not appear that the woman was trying to run over the agent.
“I heard that Noem is trying to say they were trying to run down an officer. There was plenty of space between the officers at that point for the vehicle to make it through,” he told NBC News.
Mayor Frey has been succinct and direct about his wishes for the ICE operation
“To ICE, get the f— out of Minneapolis,” the mayor said. “We do not want you here.”
