CNN's Scott Jennings faced pushback for blaming "Democratic rhetoric" for the fatal shooting of a woman by an ICE agent in Minneapolis.
A federal immigration agent fired three shots into a vehicle during a raid, killing 37-year-old driver Renee Good, who President Donald Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem accused of being a domestic terrorist who was attempting to harm the agent, and Jennings told "CNN News Central" those remarks immediately in the aftermath were not necessary.
"Probably not, but that doesn't mean she shouldn't go out and defend the ICE agent," Jennings said. "It doesn't mean that I wouldn't expect DHS to defend their agents who are routinely under attack around the country. We've seen hundreds of car incidents in ICE operations around the country. The correct question to be asking, I think, today is why was this incident occurring in the first place? Why is there a convoy of vehicles, according to several witnesses, attempting to impede a perfectly legitimate federal law enforcement situation? So I think arguing about the rhetoric perfectly fine to me."
Jennings argued the shooting was incited by criticism of the administration's immigration crackdown by Democratic officials.
"I want to get to the root cause of why there is a group of people in this country who believe it is their responsibility to drive convoys of vehicles into perfectly legitimate federal law enforcement situations," Jennings said. "I think some of this goes back to, frankly, Democratic rhetoric, because that's what they've been instructed to do by the Democrats who are demonizing these ICE agents."
Democratic strategist Matt Bennett strongly disagreed.
"No, the right question is why the president of the United States and the secretary of Homeland Security have labeled a mother of three who was trying to comply with law enforcement instructions, trying to get out of the way – she was steering to the right as she was leaving – a domestic terrorist with no evidence whatsoever," Bennett said, "and that is the rhetoric that is the most problematic. It's the president of the United States that sets the tone, and he's responding to this horrible tragedy, the death of a mother of three with no humanity whatsoever."
"This woman may have been, you know, parked in the wrong place," Bennett added. "She might have been not following law enforcement instructions, but that is not a death penalty offense in the United States, and moreover, she and others are perfectly within their rights to exercise their First Amendment rights to talk about whether or not ICE should be flooding 2,000 agents on the streets of Minneapolis when the people of that city and that state don't want them there. So the most important rhetoric here is from the president."
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