After a U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement officer shot and killed Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis last week, rival GoFundMe campaigns emerged. One raised $1.5 million for the family of the slain mother of three. Another has pulled in nearly half a million dollars for Jonathan Ross — the ICE agent who killed her.
Among the donors to the Ross GoFundMe was billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman, who shared a post about the fundraiser on Saturday and donated $10,000.
A Facebook page for Clyde Emmons was using an extremist meme as a profile picture.
The fundraising campaign for Ross was created by an account using the name of Clyde Emmons, of Michigan. Other online accounts, linked to the GoFundMe and bearing the same name, posted white supremacist imagery and called Good “a stupod bitch who got what she deserved.”
At the time the GoFundMe page popped up, a Facebook page for Emmons was using an extremist meme as a profile picture. According to the Anti-Defamation League, the image used by the Emmons account depicts a Nazi salute and is a hate symbol. The “paper beats rock” symbol shows a Hitler salute hand over the Black Power fist and is considered an allusion to white supremacy, the ADL says in its explanation of the image.
GoFundMe is investigating the campaign, the company told The Intercept in a statement. (Neither Emmons nor Ackman responded to requests for comment.)
The campaign for Ross has raised over $400K — with Ackman’s donation being the largest to date. On Saturday, Ackman shared a right-wing influencer’s post about the fundraiser for Ross, and around the same time, a $10,000 donation from “William Ackman” appeared on the page.
In a Sunday post on X, Ackman confirmed that he made the donation, saying he wanted to also donate to the fundraiser for Good but it was closed by the time he went to give.
“The whole situation is a tragedy,” he wrote. “An officer doing his best to do his job, and a protester who likely did not intend to kill the officer but whose actions in a split second led to her death.”
A Friday post to a Facebook page identified as belonging to Emmons gave a very different explanation for starting the GoFundMe.
“The stupid cunts wanna make a go fund me for the stupod bitch that got what she deserved,” said the since-edited post, which linked to the Ross campaign. “i made one for the ice officer that did his job lets get this man some money.”
When Ackman donated to the campaign for Ross, the description included a reference to Ross’s legal fees.
The description, which was later removed, said: “After seeing all the media bs about a domestic terrorist getting go fund me. I feel that the officer that was 1000 percent justified in the shooting deserves to have a go fund me. Funds will go to help pay for any legal services this officer needs. I am currently in contact with his father and awaiting the officers response so I can send him the link to hand this over to him personally.”
GoFundMe’s terms generally prohibit fundraising for the legal defense of violent crimes, and “any activity in support of terrorism, extremism, hate, violence, harassment, bullying, discrimination, terrorist financing, extremist financing, or money laundering.”
Other images on Emmons’s Facebook depict apparent images about race, like one from the movie “Blazing Saddles” showing a joke about the Ku Klux Klan. “When everyone wasn’t offended by every little fucking thing,” the Emmons account wrote as a caption.
After Emmons’s fundraiser began going viral on social media, he changed his profile picture from the hate symbol to an image from the TV show “The Simpsons.”
The GoFundMe was still live and accepting donations on Monday. GoFundMe is investigating the organizer and if the campaign falls under their rules, a spokesperson for the company told The Intercept in an email Sunday.
“Our Trust & Safety team is currently reviewing all fundraisers related to the shooting in Minneapolis to ensure they are compliant with our Terms of Service,” the company said. “We are also working to gather additional information from the organizer of this fundraiser. During the review process, all funds remain safely held by our payment processors. GoFundMe’s Terms of Service prohibit fundraisers that raise money for the legal defense of anyone formally charged with a violent crime. Any campaigns that violate this policy will be removed.”
Ackman has been an outspoken critic of what he alleged was antisemitism on American university campuses, often aligning with ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt on the issue. Ackman supported the ADL’s defense of what many observers thought was a Nazi salute by Elon Musk; ADL called it an “awkward gesture.”
The Trump administration has defended Ross’s killing of Good as justified, while Minnesota state leaders call for an investigation. Video obtained by The Intercept shows events that contradict the administration’s accounts of that morning.
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