Mainstream media headlines are (mostly) getting the Good story right

A small, but important, comfort

As I’m sure you’ve already heard, an ICE agent murdered an unarmed civilian this week. Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother of two, posed no threat to agent Jonathan Ross when he fatally shot her three times. The video footage is very clear about this, despite false statements (a.k.a. lies) from Donald Trump, JD Vance, Kristi Noem, and others in the administration.

While intentionally shooting someone in broad daylight is shocking, it is not surprising. It was bound to happen sometime given the increased presence of ICE and other federal agents in cities across the country in our streets. What I find surprising is that for the most part, the mainstream media seems to actually be doing its job for once.

Mainstream outlets will often give the benefit of the doubt (even when there is no doubt) to law enforcement in headlines, either presenting what officials say as fact or putting a spin favorable to police in the headline. You sometimes have to read several paragraphs to see what other sources say, if this information is presented at all. The old addage is that 80% of people read the headline, and only 20% actually read the story itself. (If you made it this far, congrats on being one of the 20%!) So how your headline is framed is extremely important in shaping the national narrative about current events.

I thought that the national media would do their usual pro-law enforcement slant to their headlines, asserting that Homeland Security says Good was a domestic terrorist who was an imminent threat who tried to run over the ICE agent. And there is definitely some of that here and there. But largely, I am also seeing coverage like this:

The Washington Post (1-9-2026)

The New York Times (1-8-2026)

CNN (1-7-2026)

CBS News, which is now led by far-right Trump supporter Bari Weiss, appears to have mostly neutral headlines, but a few headlines specifically challenging the official narrative such as this one (1-7-2026).

Even FOX News, while largely supporting the administration version of events with headlines and stories ranging from blatantly biased to insanely detached from reality, has a few decent headlines I was able to find, like this one. Someone seeing this on the left would likely say “Hell, yeah — it was a state-sanctioned execution!” while for most of their audience, it is probably meant to show Crockett as an anti-American communist or something (1-8-2026).

Since the federal government has stopped cooperating with state and local officials, and with the weight of the White House being put on victim blaming and exonorating ICE of any wrongdoing, I’m very concerned that there will be no justice for Good. Thankfully bystanders took video footage which is clear and irrefutable, which may in part explain the media’s take on this tragedy. That said, the fact that mainstream media is not immediately shaping the narrative towards the law enforcement side of things for once, but instead from the side of the victim and those challenging the official account of events, gives me at least some hope both about people being informed enough to demand justice for this case, and also hope in general about the state of our media when the administration is increasingly just flat-out denying reality.