Image depicting Renee Good mocking Charlie Kirk is fake
- Published on January 15, 2026 at 22:18
- 3 min read
- By Bill MCCARTHY, AFP USA
As protests sweep the United States following the fatal shooting of Renee Good by an immigration agent in Minneapolis, an image is spreading online that appears to show the Minnesota mother mocking the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk by holding her hand to her neck in the shape of a gun. But the picture is manipulated, superimposing Good's head onto the body of another woman who made the gesture during a "No Kings" rally in October 2025.
"Here is her is celebrating Kirk getting shot," says text beside the image, shared to Facebook on January 11, 2026. "Karma..."
Similar posts spread the same visual across Facebook and other platforms, including Threads and X.
The image emerged after a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent shot Good at point-blank range as she apparently tried to drive away from officers who were crowding her vehicle, which they said was blocking their way. President Donald Trump's administration has insisted the agent who fired three times acted in self-defense, while analyses of bystander footage from outlets including the New York Times have shown Good's car turning away from the officer.
Misinformation about Good surged online as protesters hit the streets in several US cities to rally against Trump's aggressive deportation policies.
AFP previously debunked an AI-generated video that purported to show Good and her wife pointing finger guns at a camera and laughing in response to the killing of Kirk, who was shot in the neck while speaking at a university event in Utah in September 2025.
AFP could not verify what commentary, if any, Good had made on Kirk or his assassination.
But the image claimed to show Good holding her hand to her neck in the shape of a gun is inauthentic.
Altered image
Reverse image searches indicated that the Minnesota mother's head was lifted from another picture that was taken during a maternity photoshoot in 2019 and shared on Facebook following her death by the photographer (archived here). The image has been widely published in reports covering the incident.
Further reverse image searches revealed that the surrounding image -- into which Good's head was added -- is a still from a video of a different woman.
The clip was posted to Instagram stories and Threads on October 18, 2025 (archived here). It shows a man driving by an anti-Trump "No Kings" protest and waving a flag memorializing Kirk as a "hero," to which the woman responded with a movement mimicking a gunshot to the neck, while others made middle-finger gestures.
That same day, the poster said on Instagram that he was "ragebaiting." His Threads post called for others to "help me find the women" and "send that clip to her job" (archived here). It added that the clip was filmed in the West Beverly neighborhood of Chicago.
The user's call to expose the woman came as online vitriol and grassroots persecution exploded after Kirk's assassination, with some conservatives doxxing and calling the employers of social media users they accused of criticizing the right-wing podcaster.
AFP geolocated the footage to the area outside a Walgreens pharmacy near the intersection of Chicago's West 103rd Street and Western Avenue, confirming the incident took place far from Minneapolis (archived here). Local media published an image of a crowd gathered on the same block during one of the thousands of "No Kings" protests that took place across all 50 US states on October 18 (archived here).
AFP has debunked other misinformation about the ICE-involved shooting here, here, here and here.
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