The fatal shooting of a woman by a federal immigration officer in Minneapolis on Wednesday has thrust a long-running and deeply contested question back into the national spotlight: When is a law enforcement officer justified in using lethal force against someone in a moving vehicle?

The killing, captured on cellphone video, has exposed sharp divisions between federal authorities and local officials. It has also renewed scrutiny of use-of-force rules that many police departments adopted decades ago to reduce the risk of bystanders being shot or drivers losing control after being hit by gunfire. While federal officials quickly defended the agent’s actions, local leaders called the shooting unjustified.

At the center of the debate are policies that for years have sharply limited when officers may fire at vehicles, generally barring gunfire at fleeing cars unless the driver poses an imminent threat of deadly force beyond the vehicle itself.

Those restrictions, embraced by many large police departments and reflected in federal guidance, were intended to curb what experts long warned was one of the most dangerous and unpredictable uses of lethal force.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem described the episode as an “act of domestic terrorism” and said the agent acted in self defense and to protect fellow officers.

Here’s a look at how and why police agencies moved to restrict shootings at moving vehicles, what those policies typically require, how they are enforced, and how recent incidents, including the Minneapolis case, have tested the limits of rules meant to balance officer safety with public risk.

Why many police agencies limit shooting at moving vehicles

For decades, police departments across the U.S. have limited when officers are allowed to fire at moving vehicles, citing the danger to bystanders and the risk that a driver who is shot will lose control.

The New York City Police Department was among the first major agencies to adopt those limits. The department barred officers from firing at or from moving vehicles after a 1972 shooting killed a 10-year-old passenger in a stolen car and sparked protests.

Researchers in the late 1970s and early 1980s later found that the policy, along with other use-of-force restrictions, helped reduce bystanders being struck by police gunfire and led to fewer deaths in police shootings.

Over the years, many law enforcement agencies followed New York’s lead. Policing organizations such as the Police Executive Research Forum and the International Association of Chiefs of Police have recommended similar limits, warning that shooting at vehicles creates serious risks from stray gunfire or from a vehicle crashing if the driver is hit.

In Wednesday’s shooting, the vehicle can be seen in videos continuing to move down the street before crashing into two other vehicles and coming to a stop. It was unclear from the video if the vehicle made contact with the officer before he steps to the side.

What federal policy says about shooting at vehicles

Federal law enforcement officers operate under similar guidance.

The Department of Justice says in its Justice Manual that firearms should not be used simply to disable a moving vehicle. The policy allows deadly force only in limited circumstances, such as when someone in the vehicle is threatening another person with deadly force, or when the vehicle itself is being used in a way that poses an imminent risk and no reasonable alternative exists, including moving out of the vehicle’s path.

At a news conference Wednesday evening, Noem said any death is a tragedy, but that the shooting was justified.

“Our officer followed his training, did exactly what he’s been taught to do in that situation, and took actions to defend himself and defend his fellow law enforcement officers,” Noem said.

She alleged that the woman who was killed was trying to block officers with her vehicle, had been harassing them through the day and “attempted to run a law enforcement officer over” before she was shot. The FBI is leading the investigation into the shooting, she said.

Geoffrey Alpert, a criminology professor at the University of South Carolina, said officials should take a step back before making any pronouncements.
“There needs to be two thorough parallel investigations,” he said. “First ICE officials should investigate administratively whether this agent violated policy or training. And then state officials should be conducting a thorough criminal investigation as well.”

He said determining whether the use-of-force was justified or criminal is going to depend on many details that have not been disclosed publicly. But he raised concerns about whether the initiating incident was a traffic-related issue, and whether the federal agents had the authority and training to handle that kind of interaction with the general public.

“Local police are trained to deescalate in those kinds of situations, and I have questions about who this person was, was she known to them, why did one of the officers rush the car and yell. There are still a lot of questions,” Alpert said.

The rise in fatal encounters with federal agents

The shooting of the woman, identified by family members as Renee Nicole Good, 37, occurred as Homeland Security escalates immigration enforcement operations in Minnesota by deploying 2,000 agents and officers. It’s just the latest in a growing number of violent encounters between ICE agents and community members, and at least the fifth fatality.

In October, a Chicago woman was shot five times by a Border Patrol agent in a similar incident involving a vehicle. Marimar Martinez, a 30-year-old teaching assistant at a Montessori school, survived, and was almost immediately labeled a “domestic terrorist” by Homeland Security officials, who said in media releases that she had “ambushed” and “rammed” agents with her vehicle.

She was charged with assaulting a federal officer, but federal prosecutors were later forced to dismiss the case after security camera video and body camera footage emerged showing a Border Patrol agent steering his vehicle into Martinez’s truck.

What training experts say about moving vehicle policies

The debate over shooting at moving vehicles has been sharpened by high-profile cases, including a 2023 shooting in Ohio in which an officer fired through the windshield of a car in a grocery store parking lot while investigating a shoplifting allegation. The pregnant driver was killed; the officer was later charged and acquitted.

John P. Gross, a professor at the University of Wisconsin School of Law who has written extensively about officers shooting at moving vehicles, said while more departments have added explicit policies regarding use-of-force and moving vehicles, officer training also needs to improve.

“If this woman was blocking the street and a law enforcement operation, they are entitled to arrest her. What they are not entitled to do is to use deadly force to arrest her,” Gross said. “From just watching the video, this seems like an egregious example.”

He said officers need to consider the totality of a situation, the crime or allegation being made against someone, whether they can be found at a later date or whether they are an actual danger.

“From the video, the officer seems to fire as she’s moving past him. At that point, she’s not a threat, so why fire?” he said.

This might be Republicans’ last big year to get things done for a while. President Donald Trump is in the second year of his second term — his last before reaching lame duck status. His party is unlikely to hold Congress after the midterms if history is any indication.

What do Republicans want? As 2026 begins, I’m not sure they know. Last year was the big push: the DOGE cuts; the reconciliation bill; tax relief; deportations; tariffs; securing the southern border. It was a four-year term shoved into one.

It almost feels too soon to ask, “What now?” But we are in a moment in history where time is speeding up, not slowing down, as the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife underscores. But what about policy on the home front?

I called some Washington insiders for their take. A long-time operative: “They want to win the House again in 2026. They just don’t know how to keep it.” A former Hill chief: “The GOP are excited for a tax season when people get bigger refunds and Trump Accounts start being seeded.”

In other words, 2026 is about the tailwind from the 2025 whirlwind. But is it blowing in the right direction?

More than three-quarters of Americans rang in the New Year thinking that the country is going in the wrong direction, according to Gallup. Approval for President Trump is at 36%. Approval for Congress fell to 17%, the lowest in over a decade. (Recall that Trump won the popular vote a mere 14 months back; the party punch didn’t taste as good as it looked.)

Time is ticking for the GOP to pass landmark legislation, and with it, their long-shot dream of preserving their Washington trifecta. Certainly, there’s interest in the MAGA base in advancing an affordability agenda and rightfully so, given that prices for housing, education and healthcare remain high. The tax rebates in April will help. Trump Accounts, too, are something new and fully branded to the GOP’s benefit.

But food prices have gone up partly because of President Trump’s tariffs. And much of the affordability stress is also around healthcare. Reducing healthcare costs has been a thorn in the GOP’s side ever since the party failed to come up with a convincing alternative to the Affordable Care Act a decade ago.

Perhaps there will be a surge in bipartisanship around supporting working Americans. I am usually bullish on bipartisanship, but that’s because it tends to represent prudence and compromise. If there is bipartisanship in 2026, it seems more likely that it will represent a uniting of extremes — like the photo op of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Trump in the Oval Office in November. Or the idea floating around policy circles to turn tariff revenue into stimulus checks, which is about as progressive as it gets.

But it’s my sense that it’s hard to have a sustained agenda in the midst of an identity crisis, which the GOP is most certainly in.

The transition from free-market orthodoxy and limited government to populism and protectionism has been anything but smooth or complete. Contradictions in the modern GOP include: extolling American patriotism while vilifying the civil service; obsessing over military “lethality” while disparaging allies; claiming to be pro-growth while restricting capital and labor; arguing against the “Deep State” while mandating MAGA loyalty pledges; decrying the deficit while passing unfunded spending bills; embracing social conservatism while distancing itself from pro-life causes. And the latest: military interventionism versus America first and only.

This all will take years to sort out. In the interim, there are other areas of low-hanging policy fruit that the GOP could advance this year.

For example, there’s no question that America’s children are not healthy or well. Food dyes and Tylenol are red herrings. The party should create a National Commission on Children and Families that looks at — among other things — how we are going to protect children in the age of social media and artificial intelligence. That would be forward-looking and legacy-building, like President Ronald Reagan’s war on drugs or President Lyndon Johnson’s war on poverty.

Chase affordability the conservative way: Declare the Southern border secure (it is) and the world at attention (they are) and relax the erratic restraints on goods and labor that are anything but conservative. Usher in regulatory relief. Get the schools performing again. Take a page out of the second-term Reagan playbook and use this as a chance for some budget control; limit the federal debt to a percentage of GDP. Future generations will say thank you.

And it’s worth saying again what has been said many times before: America is a big, diverse country. We are split almost down the middle politically. Popular mandates are slim and short-lived, as polling confirms. Shouting about the radical left or Bidenomics is not a legacy, it’s a reaction.

Over the last decade, no Democrat has held more political power than Trump does now. So please, stop disparaging previous presidents. Stop pitting Americans against each other. The political leaders who have risen above America’s deepest divisions are the ones we honor.

2026 is our exceptional country’s 250th anniversary. There’s no better time for the GOP to make a change in direction.

Abby McCloskey is a columnist, podcast host, and consultant. She directed domestic policy on two presidential campaigns and was director of economic policy at the American Enterprise Institute. She wrote this column for Bloomberg Opinion.

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Outdoor hockey is coming to Utah.

The Utah Mammoth will host the 2027 Winter Classic at Rice-Eccles Stadium against the Colorado Avalanche. The date has not been announced for the game at the home of the University of Utah football team.

It’s set to be the first outdoor game for the franchise formerly known as the Phoenix and Arizona Coyotes and before that the Winnipeg Jets. The other 31 active teams had all taken part, making Utah the last to participate.

Owners Ryan and Ashley Smith have been praised by Commissioner Gary Bettman for just about everything they’ve done since buying the team and relocating it to Salt Lake City in 2024.

“This is a dream,” Ryan Smith said. “We actually came up here early in the process of even getting the team because we said this is what we want. We wanted our players to be able to have it.”

Rice-Eccles Stadium hosted the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2002 Winter Olympics and is scheduled to do so again when the Games return to Salt Lake City in 2034. It has a seating capacity of 51,444.

“This stadium sets up very well from a sight line perspective,” Bettman said. “There’s an intimacy here. We expect to have 50,000-plus here.”

Colorado is making its fourth outdoor appearance. The Avalanche are 1-2-0 in previous outdoor contests.

“The Avalanche organization is always proud to be in consideration for marquee events like this,” Colorado president of hockey operations Joe Sakic said in a news release. “We’re looking forward to being matched up with a great team and represent the Rocky Mountain region in a game that appeals to these two markets in this part of the country.”

Utah’s legacy as a winter sports destination makes the Winter Classic a natural fit for the state and a natural draw for the community, according to Ryan and Ashley Smith.

“We don’t hide from the winter here. Ashley Smith said. “We live in the mountains. It’s what we breathe. It’s very authentic to us and all of Utah.”

Alcohol sales will be permitted in the stadium during the Winter Classic because it is considered a private event. Athletic events involving the University of Utah prohibit alcohol from being sold inside the stadium during those events.

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Videos circulating on social media and verified by The New York Times show the shooting of a woman by a federal agent in Minneapolis on Wednesday, as well as the moments immediately before and after.

A maroon Honda Pilot is stopped on Portland Avenue, apparently blocking one lane of the snowy residential street. The driver rolls forward slightly, then stops and waves at approaching vehicles, signaling that they should drive past.

The videos show the driver wave one vehicle by. When a truck with flashing lights approaches, she waves again, but the truck stops and federal agents emerge.

Two step out and move toward the driver’s side. The agents tell the driver to get out.

One of the agents tries to open the driver’s side door and reaches through the window. A third agent crosses in front of the Honda, as the driver begins to reverse, turning to drive away from the agents.

Immediately after the Honda shifts from reverse into drive and begins to move ahead, that agent at the front of the vehicle, standing near the driver’s side headlight, pulls out a gun and aims at the driver.

The Honda moves forward, turning to the right. The agent aiming the gun fires, and continues to shoot as the vehicle moves past him.

The Honda accelerates, colliding with two parked vehicles and a light post. The agent who fired approaches the vehicle, then walks away and tells other agents to call 911.