Wintry mix spreads across Minnesota

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

Renee Macklin Good’s wife, Becca Good, said that the 37-year-old poet and mother of three was made of sunshine. 

“She literally sparkled,” Becca Good said in a statement. “I mean, she didn’t wear glitter but I swear she had sparkles coming out of her pores. All the time.”

Related coverage

across the Twin Cities, call on ICE to go

among Minnesota families, students amid ICE operations

was shot and killed by an ICE agent, what happens now? Your questions answered

But behind that light was a well of deep values that Macklin Good lived by, including a conviction that every person — regardless of “where you come from or what you look like” — deserves compassion and kindness. 

“Renee was a Christian who knew that all religions teach the same essential truth: we are here to love each other, care for each other, and keep each other safe and whole,” Good said. 

Those were the values that brought the Goods to stop during an ICE operation in south Minneapolis on Jan. 7. Though they were relatively new in town, Becca Good said they wanted to support their neighbors.

“We had whistles,” she said. “They had guns.”

Bystander videos show a federal agent grabbing the handle of Good’s car and demanding she open the door. As she begins to pull away, footage shows another officer — since identified as Jonathan Ross — pointing his gun at her and firing through the windshield of the car. 

A video taken by Ross that began circulating Friday also shows Macklin Good saying to the agent, “That’s fine dude. I'm not mad at you.”

The Trump administration has cast Macklin Good as a “domestic terrorist” who tried to run over federal agents, though that is not supported by eyewitness accounts or footage from the scene.

Macklin Good was born in Colorado Springs as Renee Nicole Ganger. She graduated from Old Dominion University in Virginia in her early 30s, with a degree in English. In 2020, she won a prize from the Academy of American Poets for a poem called 

MPR newscaster and poet Emily Bright reads Renee Macklin Good's poem "On Learning to Dissect Fetal Pigs."

While at Old Dominion University, she took a fiction workshop with associate professor Kent Wascom. That class with Macklin Good was the first class he taught there. 

He said he could still clearly remember how her warmth and positivity shaped the experience for everyone as they shared their own writing with the class. 

“She was incredibly warm with her peers, generous with their work, and was just a bright and engaging presence that made folks feel good,” he said. “When the temptation to offer a biting critique might have fallen on another student, she was there with something kind to say, something positive to say about the work or something insightful that might be helpful.”

He said at the time that she was taking his class, she was pregnant with her son. It was the early days of the pandemic too, and despite all she was balancing, she stood out in how she continued to uplift others, even remotely. 

Along with her son, who is now six years old, she was also a mother to two other older children. Her wife described them as “extraordinary children” and said the youngest had already lost his father. 

The Minnesota Star Tribune quoted Macklin Good’s mother Donna Ganger, who described her as “extremely compassionate.” 

“She’s taken care of people all her life. She was loving, forgiving and affectionate,” she said. 

Macklin Good and Becca Good had moved recently to Minneapolis, in search of a new home. 

When Macklin Good, her wife and their six-year-old son road-tripped to Minnesota for the chance to make a better life, the couple held hands the entire car ride, Becca Good said. Their son made drawings on the windows as the miles stretched on toward Minneapolis. 

When they arrived, they found a vibrant and welcoming community and a “strong shared sense here in Minneapolis that we were looking out for each other.” Becca Good said she finally found peace and safe harbor. 

But “that has been taken from me forever.”

Each night since Macklin Good was killed, thousands of people have shown up to protest ICE and hold candles in support for Macklin Good and her family, locally and in other cities. Online, a GoFundMe that aimed to raise $50,000 in support of the family, has surpassed $1.5 million and has since closed.

The support has come in from out of state and out of the country. 

“I’m sorry that you lost your life so senselessly simply because you were brave enough to stand up for your neighbors,” one donation read. “Please rest in peace knowing that we will take it from here. Tyranny will not stand, Good will prevail.”

“Renee, your death weighs heavily on my heart. You stood up for your neighbors and for immigrants like me, a Somali who knows how much that protection matters. I am heartbroken for your children, who must now live without you,” another read.

“I’m truly sorry for your loss, we all know the truth and I hope you get justice,” read another.

Becca Good expressed gratitude for the wave of support and called for honoring Macklin Good by living her values and coming together “to build a world where we all come home safe to the people we love.”

“The kindness of strangers is the most fitting tribute because if you ever encountered my wife, Renee Nicole Macklin Good, you know that above all else, she was kind,” Becca Good said. 

“In fact, kindness radiated out of her.”

Here’s the full statement from Becca Good: 

Editor's Note: MPR News reporting originally referred to Renee Macklin Good by her full legal name. As of April 2, 2026, MPR News reporting will refer to her as Renee Good. Representatives of her family say both versions are accurate and acceptable.

Crime, Law and Justice

Homepage

Immigration enforcement in Minnesota

The fatal shooting of Renee Macklin Good

Cari Spencer

Author

MPR News Staff

On Wednesday, Renee Macklin Good was fatally shot by a federal ICE agent. Becca Good, her wife, shared the following statement with MPR News.

Renee Macklin Good’s wife says she nurtured kindness

Go Deeper.

Like this?

News you can use in your inbox