

SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
To donate by check, phone, or other method, see our More Ways to Give page.


Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
The Trump administration has been ratcheting up threats against Europe in the wake of its invasion of Venezuela and the abduction of President Nicolás Maduro.
President Donald Trump finished up a busy week by once again leveling threats against longtime allies over their refusal to hand Greenland over to US control.
While taking questions from reporters at the White House on Friday, Trump was asked about a reported plan to win over Greenlanders on joining the US by giving them annual $10,000 payments.
"I'm not talking about money for Greenland yet," the president replied. "I might talk about that, but right now we are going to do something on Greenland, whether they like it or not."
Trump: "We are going to do something on Greenland whether they like it or not because if we don't, Russia or China will take over Greenland. If we don't do it the easy way we're gonna do it the hard way." pic.twitter.com/Pb29UqBzCC
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 9, 2026
Trump then explained his purported rationale for making Greenland a US territory.
"If we don't do it, Russia or China will take over Greenland," he said. "And we're not going to have Russia or China as a neighbor."
Neither Russia nor China have shown any indication that they want to take over Greenland, which is currently a self-governed Danish territory. Because Denmark is a founding member of NATO, an attack on its territory from Russia or China would trigger a counterattack by all other NATO members, theoretically including the US.
Trump then informed the press that he would "like to make a deal the easy way" to acquire Greenland, before adding that "if we don't do it the easy way, we're going to do it the hard way."
The president then claimed that he was a "fan of Denmark," even though seconds ago he hinted at using military force to seize their territory.
"The fact that they had a boat land there 500 years ago doesn't mean that they own the land," Trump said. "I'm sure we had lots of boats go there also."
The Trump administration has been ratcheting up threats against Europe in the wake of its invasion of Venezuela and the US abduction of President Nicolás Maduro last week.
Top Trump aide Stephen Miller on Monday refused to rule out using the military to take Greenland, telling CNN host Jake Tapper that "we live in a world... that is governed by strength, that is governed by force, that is governed by power."
The video comes "as close as you can get to conclusively disproving" the Trump administration's claims about Renee Good, said one observer.
WARNING: The following article includes graphic footage of the shooting that some people may find disturbing...
New footage taken from the phone of the federal immigration agent who killed Renee Good was released on Friday, and it offers the closest view so far of the deadly shooting that took place on Wednesday in Minneapolis.
In a video first published by Alpha News, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer Jonathan Ross is seen exiting his vehicle and approaching Good's car.
As Ross circles the car while filming it with his phone, Good can be seen smiling at him and gently taunting him.
"It's fine, dude," she says as Ross passes by her on the driver's side window. "I'm not mad at you."
As Ross continues circling the car and captures its license plate, Good's wife, Becca Good, approaches him and tells him that "we don't change our license plates every morning, just so you know."
Becca Good also asks Ross if he was "going to come at us," and then recommends that he "go get yourself some lunch, big boy."
Shortly after this, other immigration officers begin moving aggressively toward Good's car, instructing her to exit the vehicle.
After this, Good can be seen turning her steering wheel completely to the right, which was away from the location where Ross was standing, and trying to drive away.
As the car drives past Ross, it is unclear if it makes any contact with him, although he remains on his feet the entire time and is able to take out his weapon and fire multiple shots at the vehicle.
A man can be heard calling Good a "fucking bitch" as her car crashes into a phone pole.
BREAKING: Alpha News has obtained cellphone footage showing perspective of federal agent at center of ICE-involved shooting in Minneapolis pic.twitter.com/p2wks0zew0
— Alpha News (@AlphaNews) January 9, 2026
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow with the American Immigration Council, argued on Bluesky that the video is "about as close as you can get to conclusively disproving the Trump [administration's] claims that she deliberately attempted to run down the officer."
Reichlin-Melnick cautioned, however, that this does not mean that prosecutors will be able to prove that Ross was guilty of murder when he opened fire on Good.
"The threshold for when police officers are allowed to use force is very low, so I'm not going to offer a definitive opinion," he explained. "And yes; what the law permits and what is justified are two different things entirely."
Appearing on MS Now, former FBI agent Michael Feinberg said that Ross' decision to film Good's vehicle with his phone while approaching her car was "the height of unprofessionalism."
"Why on Earth is a law enforcement officer filming an interaction with a civilian on his cellphone?" he asked. "They're not influencers, they're not social media posters. If you're there to do a job as an agent of the federal government, do the job. You don't need to be making content in the midst of it."
MSNBC's ex-FBI guest just dismissed a vehicular assault on ICE agents as "minor annoyance" and "sass" from a "lightly combative" activist.
In reaction to new video of the Minnesota shooting of anti-ICE activist Renee Good, Michael Feinberg calls it "law enforcement officers… pic.twitter.com/Gv5XL9B5CZ
— Media Lies (@MediasLies) January 9, 2026
Independent journalist Radley Balko noted that Alpha News, which first obtained the video, "is a far-right site run by the wife of the former head of the Minneapolis police union."
"Whoever leaked this to them thinks it makes Ross look good," Balko wrote. "Which is just astonishing."
Vice President JD Vance nonetheless declared in a post on X that the video showed "the reality is that his life was endangered and he fired in self-defense," even though the video makes it clear that Good was turning the car away from where Ross was standing.
Vance has also falsely claimed that ICE agents have "absolute immunity," which has been rebuked by legal experts including Reichlin-Melnick.
"If you feel that the ICE agent operated within the law, then let there be an investigation so that that can be revealed," said Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison.
Top Minnesota officials are demanding that the Trump administration stop their efforts to "hide" evidence in the probe of an immigration agent's killing of 37-year-old mother Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis earlier this week, which has been met with outrage in the community and demonstrations across the country.
After initially saying that it was cooperating with local law enforcement to investigate the killing, the FBI said Thursday that it assumed sole responsibility for the probe, which the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) said left them without access to evidence needed to carry out a full investigation.
At a press conference on Friday, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, who demanded after the shooting that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) "get the fuck out of Minneapolis," said that the Trump administration and Attorney General Pam Bondi's Department of Justice were seeking to commandeer the investigation because they "have already come to a conclusion" that the ICE officer who shot Good, identified Thursday as Johnathan Ross, should not face criminal charges.
The federal government has claimed that Ross acted in self-defense, shooting Good as she attempted to ram him with her car. But video evidence contradicts this version of events, showing her attempting to avoid hitting the agent, and that he fired the fatal shots into her window from the car's side.
Members of the administration have justified Good's killing repeatedly with attacks on her character. Within hours of the shooting, President Donald Trump referred to Good, without a shred of evidence, as a "professional agitator" who "violently, willfully, and viciously ran over” Ross. The video shows that Ross actually walked away from the incident unscathed.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem later described Good as a "domestic terrorist," while Vice President JD Vance degraded her as a "far-left... lunatic."
"From the very beginning, they're calling the victim a domestic terrorist. They're calling the actions of the agent involved some form of defensive posture," Frey said. "We know that they've already determined much of the investigation."
"If you've got nothing to hide from, then don't hide from it," he added. "Include local experts in the process. We've got nothing to hide from here. All we want in Minneapolis is justice and the truth."
Jason Chavez, a member of the Minneapolis City Council representing the area where Good was shot, noted that contrary to the administration's claim that Good attempted to run over agents, she could be heard shouting "I'm pulling out" before her car was surrounded.
"The video that we have all seen... does not match the false narrative from the federal government," said Chavez, who described Good as "a mother, a wife, and a beloved community member, not a domestic terrorist."
Noem has asserted that Minnesota officials "don't have any jurisdiction in this investigation," while Vance has dubiously claimed that federal agents have "absolute immunity" from prosecution.
Minnesota's Democratic attorney general, Keith Ellison, however, argued on Friday that, given the nature of the incident, the state should be in charge of the investigation.
"This is clearly a homicide. And because of that, the states, traditionally, historically, have had priority and jurisdiction over these kinds of matters," Ellison said in an interview with Democracy Now! "It’s certainly the right thing for local authorities, state authorities, to be intimately involved in conducting this investigation."
"My thought is: What are you hiding?" he continued. "I mean, if you feel that the ICE agent operated within the law, then let there be an investigation so that that can be revealed."
Legal experts have said that Minnesota can investigate and prosecute Ross. Bryna Godar, a staff attorney at the State Democracy Research Initiative, wrote in a piece for Slate on Wednesday:
Contrary to recent assertions from some federal officials, states can prosecute federal officers for violating state criminal laws, and there is precedent for that.
Although federal officers do have immunity in some circumstances, that protection applies only if their actions were authorized under federal law and “necessary and proper” in fulfilling federal duties. When federal officers violate federal law or act unreasonably when carrying out their duties, they can face state charges.
States have a long history of prosecuting federal officials for allegedly using excessive force on the job. And when federal courts agree that the force may not have been legally justified, they have allowed the state prosecution to proceed.
Good was shot shortly after the Trump administration deployed around 2,000 federal agents to Minneapolis. On the day of the shooting, agents were also filmed pepper-spraying students during a raid at a Minneapolis high school, leading it and other schools in the area to cancel classes for the remainder of the week.
"We need a couple things here," said Democratic Gov. Tim Walz. "We need Minnesota to carry out this investigation, to make sure that the professionals at the BCA and that local law enforcement, who’s in charge of law enforcement, make sure we do the investigation, and then to pull back this unnecessary surge."
Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), who has been floated as a possible successor after Walz announced earlier this week that he would not seek a third term as governor, joined Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.) to send a letter to Bondi, calling on her to cooperate with state authorities.
The US senators said the administration’s decision to freeze out state law enforcement "raises serious questions about its objectivity, particularly after administration officials have made statements that conflict with the video and other evidence that has already become public."