Nick Wright addresses ICE shooting of Renee Nicole Good, implores Americans to rediscover ‘shared morality’

While many prominent sports media hosts have either addressed the killing of Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis by an officer with Immigration and Customs Enforcement on social media or not at all, Fox Sports host Nick Wright was one of the lone voices to tackle the somber story head-on in an episode of his podcast on Thursday.

In a 17-minute solo monologue on the What’s Wright feed, Wright expressed frustration with the messaging from the Trump administration in the aftermath of Good’s death before imploring his audience to look deeper than the surface-level “tribalism” or social media chatter and to think critically about whether they are OK with how ICE is operating on the streets of American cities.

Wright, who is openly left-leaning politically, does not often discuss politics or news stories on his podcast or his FS1 show, First Things First. But in the opening moments of the episode as well as a follow-up post on X, the host called this emotional monologue “the best and most important thing I’ll do all year.”

While Wright acknowledged that mass deportations were expected based upon the GOP platform in the 2024 election, he argued that the way ICE is operating in raids like the one that led to Good’s death in Minneapolis was “not put to a vote.”

“Are we OK with giving masked, armed, often badgeless men who have had far less training than your local police force, absolute power over us as American citizens any time we run into them?” Wright asked. “And to further that, are we OK with the growing consensus in some corners of American life that the justifiable penalty for failing to comply with a law enforcement officer very likely may be lethal force?”

And if that is how the administration and other GOP officials want the country to be run, Wright said, they should at least to have to make a case to the American people.

“That was not put to a vote. It appears some people like it. And if that is where we want to be as a country, then I want there to be a vigorous debate,” Wright said. “I want people to make their case, and then we’ll see who we are as a country. But I can’t believe that’s where people actually are. But it is the direction we’re heading, more rapidly than ever before.”

Also not put to a vote, in Wright’s eyes, was “‘domestic terrorist’ being a catch-all term used to describe nearly anyone that the people currently in power dislike.”

“Are we OK with the term ‘domestic terrorist’ losing any meaning whatsoever? Are we OK with that?” Wright asked.

“Because if that woman, if Renee Nicole Good, can be classified as a domestic terrorist, then literally any of us can be. Any of us. And words have to matter. Because not only do they tether us to a shared reality, but they have real legal ramifications. There are protections, theoretically, that we all have as American citizens if we are designated as a terrorist, foreign or domestic. So I want to be on the record: I’m not OK with ‘domestic terrorist’ being a catch-all term used to describe nearly anyone that the people currently in power dislike.”

In the final moments of the episode, a visibly choked-up Wright expressed hope that his viewers and the rest of America is able to believe its eyes rather than the government’s messaging, and come together around what is real and what is right.

“Are we OK with there no longer being any type of shared morality amongst us as Americans that trumps our political affiliations?” Wright questioned.

“Are we OK that we currently live in a world where we can see a 37-year-old mother shot dead in the street, and we know when we see it, that some people, including some of the most powerful people, will not only justify it but try to convince you that you didn’t see what you just saw?

“Are we OK with lying by the world’s most powerful people becoming so brazen and commonplace that even when it’s as black-and-white as the video of the shooting of Renee Nicole Good, that they believe they can create an alternate reality where what we all saw on video is not what we saw on video?

“I’m not OK with any of it. Deep down in your heart, in your soul, in the marrow of your bones, I gotta believe you’re not OK with it either.”

The death of a civilian has taken the response to and coverage of the administration’s platform on immigration to an even more serious place. And Wright is not likely to be the last figure to go outside of his usual lane to address it.