LEILA FADEL, HOST:
Let's go deeper now on this killing with Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison. Good morning, and welcome back to the program.
KEITH ELLISON: Good morning, Leila.
FADEL: So we've heard the administration now defend the officer who killed Renee Nicole Good. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem said Good weaponized her vehicle in an act of domestic terrorism. Here she is.
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KRISTI NOEM: It's very clear that this individual was harassing and impeding law enforcement operations. Our officer followed his training, did exactly what he's been taught to do in that situation, and took actions to defend himself.
FADEL: You've seen the videos. Is this what you saw?
ELLISON: What I saw is an escalation by the officers. What I saw is a person in the vehicle trying to evade and get away, not be aggressive. And what I saw is the use of deadly force. And so at this point, normally, when there's an official use of deadly force, we try to figure out what happened through an investigation.
FADEL: Right.
ELLISON: That is what we should be doing now. I can tell you what it looks like to me. I can also tell you we need an investigation. Both are true. And as I think you noted in your earlier segment, the question's going to be, is this a reasonable use of force? And I think the use of force I saw raises such serious questions that there needs to be an intense investigation, and perhaps this officer should face charges. But that needs to be determined through an investigation.
FADEL: If this officer were to face charges, would the state - would you bring those charges?
ELLISON: You know, these are some important legal questions that need to be determined. And I can tell you that there are a number of parallel prosecutorial authorities that could be employed here, including the county and the state and even the federal government if - but, you know, we're looking at the reality of - the Homeland Security secretary has already said, we did nothing wrong, even though there's been no investigation, which is really disturbing. You know, you would think that the Homeland Security secretary would be the first to say, let's suspend judgment and look into it. That's not what we saw. We saw the Homeland Security secretary defame, you know, Miss Good by calling her a domestic terrorist. She was anything but that. She was a compassionate neighbor trying to be a legal observer on behalf of her immigrant neighbors. That's what she was doing at the moment of her death. And she was a poet. She was a mom. She was a daughter. And I'm deeply saddened by what happened to her and her family. And so I think that it is important for us to investigate this matter thoroughly. We need to keep our legal options open, and we must have transparency and accountability from the government.
FADEL: Given what you just said, I mean, the state is collaborating with the FBI in this investigation. Do you believe that federal authorities will be involved in a good-faith investigation?
ELLISON: Well, I can tell you this. Good practice is that the agency from which the questioned behavior comes - that the investigation should be in another agency altogether. Right now, it appears as though - I mean, and look, the ICE and the federal - and the FBI are both feds. And I think that in order for there to be real confidence in this investigation, there must be - I mean, ideally, it will be turned over to the state. But, you know, if it - if that doesn't happen, at least it should be joint, and the state should be a full partner.
FADEL: And at this point, you don't know if you intend as a state to bring charges?
ELLISON: No prosecutor ever should know this early, right? In the history of prosecution, if the prosecutor says, yeah, I'm going to prosecute this person before there's an investigation, that would be irresponsible. And the one thing that I don't want to do is to be like Trump or Noem. I want to be - I want to maintain my professional conduct as I look at this case. So at this point, I think there must be a robust investigation. It should be independent. It should be independent. Nobody from this agent's agency should have any role in the investigation at all. And it should be - and then we make a prosecutorial decision. That's what should happen.
FADEL: And that includes the FBI?
ELLISON: Well, I mean, ideally, I think that, you know, they should not be involved, but they are. So that might be the reality. I know that ICE and FBI are different agencies, but I think in order for public confidence to be at its best, there is some legitimate question as to what role the FBI should be playing. I can tell you that I think the local FBI agents are professional people. I also know that they have a boss in Washington who is extreme partisan, and that matters.
FADEL: Governor Tim Walz - Minnesota Governor Tim Walz in a press conference called the ICE actions in the Twin Cities, quote, "a war that's being waged against Minnesota." Do you, as attorney general, see the deployment of 2,000 ICE agents to Minneapolis as a war on the city?
ELLISON: I do. It's clearly a hostile act. It's clearly unwarranted. It clearly is injecting fear. It is injecting terror. And it is really - at the end of the day, Leila, we can talk like lawyers about whether the force was reasonable or unreasonable, as I believe there's facts to support. But the real problem here is the decision from the chief executive of this country, the president, to escalate ICE agents in Minneapolis and all over the country. We've seen this in LA, Portland, Illinois, and it has done no one any good. And now it has cost somebody their life. So apart from the individual decisions in those critical moments of that car, the policy call to escalate in this dramatic fashion with the questionable recruiting, training, with the attitude that we have seen displayed against immigrant people - calling people garbage, things like that - I mean, if you're an ICE agent and your boss is saying that immigrants are garbage and they're rapists and they're dealing drugs and they're all bad, then you're going to carry a certain attitude into your work. That is at the very heart of this. This is undeniably the fault of Donald J. Trump. No doubt about it.
FADEL: Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison. Thank you for your time.
ELLISON: Thank you.
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