Vance calls media coverage of Minneapolis shooting ‘absolute disgrace’

Vice President J.D. Vance on Thursday offered a scathing assessment of the media’s coverage of the fatal shooting in Minneapolis by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement Officer, accusing outlets of outright lying about the incident.

“This was an attack on federal law enforcement. This was an attack on law and order,” Mr. Vance said at the White House press briefing. “This was an attack on the American people. The way that the media by and large has reported this story has been an absolute disgrace and it puts our law enforcement officers at risk every single day.”

Mr. Vance also issued a fierce condemnation of Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old Minneapolis woman who had been using her vehicle to block ICE agents from moving down a city street. He complained about a CNN headline that said, “Outrage after ICE officer kills US citizen in Minneapolis.”

“Well, that’s one way to put it,” Mr. Vance said. “What that headline leaves out is the fact that that very ICE officer nearly had his life ended, dragged by a car six months ago, 33 stitches in his leg.”

“That woman was there to interfere with a legitimate law enforcement operation in the United States of America,” he said. “What that headline leaves out is that that woman is part of a broader left-wing network to attack, to dox and assault and to make it impossible for our ICE officers to do their job.

“That officer [who shot her] had every reason to think he was under very serious threat or injury, or in fact his life,” Mr. Vance said. “What I’m certain of is that she accelerated in a way where she ran into him. I don’t know what was in her heart, and what was in her head, but I know that she violated the law.”

When asked if he was prejudging the case while an investigation is still ongoing, the vice president shot back, “What you see is what you get in this case.”

The vice president called Ms. Good’s death “a tragedy of her own making” and suggested she was part of a “lunatic fringe” that had marshaled against law enforcement officers.

Mr. Vance also sharply defended the ICE agent, insisting there was no reason to question the agent’s action, even as video footage and eyewitness accounts raise questions and paint a complicated picture of what happened.

“He’s been assaulted, he’s been attacked, He’s been injured because of it. He deserves a debt of gratitude,” the vice president said.