Hundreds march in Fresno to protest killing of Renee Good. ‘Stop ICE terror’
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Hundreds gathered outside an ICE center to protest Renee Good’s killing and seek answers.
- Protesters linked Good’s killing to U.S. strikes, Maduro operation and Portland shootings.
- Organizers demanded ICE accountability, cited training failures and community mobilization
Hundreds of people protested outside the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement processing center in downtown Fresno on Thursday evening a day after an ICE agent shot and killed a mother and U.S. citizen in Minneapolis.
Protesters denounced the killing of Renee Nicole Good, 37, who was fatally shot after dropping off her 6-year-old son at an elementary school in south Minneapolis. Demonstrators said the incident highlights broader concerns about state violence, lack of accountability and inadequate training among law enforcement and federal agents, including ICE.
Protesters also denounced shootings in Portland involving federal agents, as well as U.S. military strikes on Venezuela and the capture of President Nicolás Maduro by U.S. forces during a Jan. 3 operation.
As dusk settled, protesters held signs that read, “Justice for Renee Nicole Good,” and, “From Fresno to Minneapolis, Stop ICE terror,” framing the demonstration as both a vigil and a call for justice.
Fresno native Ryan Hewuer, 22, said he was compelled to protest after seeing video footage of Good’s killing and drew parallels to the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer in 2020, which was also captured on video.
“There are people who can’t walk and march and be here, so I feel like it’s my civic duty to be here,” he said. “Also hearing the government saying that Good was a domestic terrorist and just the complete distortion of reality is what motivated me to be here. I’m here so that the textbooks deny what they said.”
Kelsey Lester, who moved to Fresno from the Bay Area five years ago, said she decided to join the protest after she heard federal agents shot two people in Portland on Thursday during a traffic stop.
“It’s too much. We have to start mobilizing, and we should’ve started mobilizing a long time ago,” she said.
As protesters marched down Van Ness and Tulare streets, Jesus Garcia, a photographer with KSEE 24 was hit by a white Dodge. Paramedics and Fresno police immediately showed up. Garcia was transported to the hospital for precautionary treatment of minor injuries, police said.
Longtime civil rights activist Gloria Hernandez said Thursday’s protest was meant to denounce Good’s killing and advocate for immigrant communities living in fear of ICE and the Trump administration’s deportation crackdown.
“I’m a human rights activist. This woman was a human being. She was a mother. And even worse — she was a poet. When you silence a poet, you silence a voice meant to tell the truth. Labeling her a terrorist right away shows how far this administration has gone,” she said.
Hernandez believes the apparent lack of training of ICE agents is in part to blame for Good’s death.
“They didn’t allow a doctor to help her, they didn’t let the ambulance in for fifteen minutes — even the police don’t do that. That’s not law enforcement, that’s a complete disregard for human life.”
Over the past year, Fresno has seen a series of immigration-focused protests driven by heightened federal enforcement actions by ICE and related agencies.
Thousands of people have protested in Fresno’s downtown and surrounding neighborhoods to oppose ICE raids in California and call for protections for undocumented residents, often waving Mexican and American flags and chanting anti-enforcement slogans.
Local activists and organizations have rallied outside the ICE office in downtown Fresno and urged businesses not to cooperate with ICE as plainclothes federal agents have reportedly detained individuals outside courthouses and during routine ICE check-ins in the Central Valley.
Leonel Flores, a longtime immigrant rights advocate, said the main objective of the protest was to denounce Good’s killing.
“It doesn’t matter if she was a volunteer, a lawyer, or a mother dropping her children off at school. First and foremost, she was a human being — a mother whose child is now left without her,” he said. “What we saw shows that these ICE agents are not trained to respond to these situations.”
This story was originally published January 8, 2026 at 10:13 PM.
