To longtime immigrant rights activists, the reckoning around the fatal shooting in Minnesota may feel familiar
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s mass protests erupted over the past week after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent killed Renee Nicole Good, thousands of Americans hoisted signs and marched to thunderous chants of “abolish ICE”.
The mantra has quickly captured the bursting anger and grief of a nation; activists and progressive lawmakers like the representative Ayanna Pressley, and even the conservative commentator Bill Kristol have embraced the demand. Shri Thanedar, a Democratic representative from Michigan, said he plans to introduce the “Abolish ICE act”, a bill that would dismantle the federal agency and its current enforcement authority. For the first time, more US adults now support eliminating ICE than those who oppose it, according to a new Economist/YouGov poll.
It wasn’t just the 7 January shooting of Good, a mother of three and US citizen, in Minneapolis, that has sparked outrage over Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown. In 2025, 32 people died in ICE custody, making it the agency’s deadliest year in two decades. Worksite raids in cities like Los Angeles, Portland and Chicago have led to the arrest of thousands of immigrants without due process and triggered massive protests demanding that federal agents leave their communities and be held accountable for alleged human rights abuses.
