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When I helped organize the fight for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), we put young people in caps and gowns and asked the country to see them as exceptional, college bound, English speaking, worthy of protection in a way that set them apart from the majority of undocumented people, who were not students but workers. It was a strategy built for a specific moment, and it won us what respectability politics ever can: temporary inclusion that separated us from the rest of our community. Many of us also shied away from the economic argument on principle, even though mainstream organizations were already making it, because it had become associated with more middle-of-the-road groups. We narrowed our own lane instead of widening it.
That caution has run its course. Two men were killed on their way to work within a week of each other. No amount of careful language changes it.
What's needed now is to say plainly that this happened to people doing exactly what all workers do every day, and that everyone who depends on immigrant labor, starting with employers and extending through the broader labor movement, has to decide what they owe them.
Employers, unions, and labor organizations cannot afford to look away while businesses that have relied on workers like Lorenzo and Johan for years stay quiet as their own workforce is targeted by the government.
None of this is about making immigrants prove they deserve safety by pointing to what they contribute. Nobody should have to justify their right to exist with a paycheck.
But there's a difference between demanding immigrants justify their worth and simply describing how this economy runs. Construction, hospitality, agriculture, food delivery, garment production, whole industries in this country would not function without an estimated 10 million undocumented workers, most without any union protection at all. That labor isn't a contribution to the American economy. It is the American economy.
My mother came to this country to work, and to build something for her family, and so did the workers I've spent my career organizing alongside. That desire, to work hard and provide rather than be given something, isn't unique to immigrants.
Every night, at kitchen tables across this country, whether the family is undocumented or not, people are asking each other, "How was work?"
Wanting to work and provide for the people you love is one of the most ordinary parts of being human, and there is real pride in the work itself. That labor is an identity, not just the exploitative relationship it's so often reduced to, one that wouldn't change even if our immigration status did.
I organized car wash workers in Los Angeles, in shops where owners stole wages and denied bathroom breaks because workers had no path to citizenship and no union behind them. A boss who can threaten to call ICE on one worker has leverage over the whole shop floor, and in plenty of workplaces that threat is the boss' whole labor strategy, cheaper and more effective at stopping organizing than firing people or hiring anti-union law firms ever was.
Employers have a different kind of leverage too, not the threat they can hold over a worker, but the influence of being a major employer, the kind that gets a phone call to the White House answered, or makes silence too costly to just sit on.
In Minneapolis this year, more than 60 CEOs signed a joint letter calling for "de-escalation" after federal agents killed two residents. The letter didn’t name ICE, and it didn’t ask for anything specific. The letter added to the scrutiny that was already mounting against ICE and Border Patrol after the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. Within a day, the Border Patrol commander was pulled from the city. Within two days, Trump himself was using the language of de-escalation. A vague joint statement helped move that. Imagine what an actual one could do.
The choice to speak up for workers, clearly and specifically, should be harder to dodge in the days since the killings of Lorenzo and Johan.
Rather than address why agents opened fire on unarmed men on their way to work, the administration's border czar, Tom Homan, went on Fox News and warned that there would be more "bloodshed" unless Democrats who criticize ICE stop talking. Homan is trying to make silence about these ICE killings the price of safety, and to put the blame for these two deaths anywhere but on the agents who pulled the trigger.
Every employer, every union, every business owner who has ever depended on an immigrant showing up to work now has to pick a side. Either stand with the workers whose labor built their businesses and industries, or fall in line behind a White House that is driving a white nationalist agenda. There is no third option where staying silent counts as staying out of it.
The administration isn't waiting to see whether employers choose workers or fall in line. The same crackdown that's killing and deporting workers who are already here is also causing real labor shortages in construction, agriculture, and dairy, and the administration has an answer for that shortage that has nothing to do with accountability.
Formerly enslaved people fought for this same principle a century and a half ago, insisting that only full citizenship, not tolerated presence, guaranteed they wouldn't be treated as less than fully human. This summer, the Supreme Court reaffirmed that exact principle when it struck down Trump's attempt to strip citizenship from children born to undocumented parents.
If the labor and immigrant rights movements don’t make the case ourselves, loudly and now, that immigrant workers deserve full rights and not just a job, that’s the model we’ll be handed. The alternative gets built for us either way, one where people are welcome only as controllable labor and for exactly as long as an employer finds them useful.
Employers, unions, and labor organizations cannot afford to look away while businesses that have relied on workers like Lorenzo and Johan for years stay quiet as their own workforce is targeted by the government. Unions and labor advocates also have a responsibility to clearly say that worker safety does not end at the shop door. Workers have the right to get to a job and get home without risking their lives.
Two men are dead because they went to work, and the mistake the immigrant rights movement cannot afford right now is forgetting that it is also a labor movement.
As scrutiny builds over two fatal shootings by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in less than a week, US Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said the Trump administration was only going to keep ramping up its aggressive mass deportation push. Arrests have already reached a record high this month.
Mullin brushed off questions from reporters on Friday about the shootings of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Texas and Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero in Maine—neither of whom was the target of ICE's operations—which have generated calls for investigations and reforms to ICE's tactics, including the traffic stops that led to the fatal shootings.
Earlier this week, acting assistant secretary Lauren Bis called on critical politicians and media outlets to "turn down the temperature" of their rhetoric towards ICE, which she claimed is “fueling vehicle attacks" against agents. The administration has claimed that both men attempted to "weaponize" their vehicles, but video and eyewitness accounts have not backed this up.
In light of the agency's calls to "turn down the temperature," a reporter asked Mullin whether he could assure Americans that ICE officers who violate the agency's use-of-force policy would face consequences and whether he'd commit to making that determination publicly.
"Let me clarify. When I say 'turn down the temperature,' I mean turn down the temperature with you guys," Mullin said, pointing at members of the media. "We're turning up the heat on the streets."
"We're out there working harder than we ever have because we've empowered law enforcement to do their jobs," he said. "What I'm trying to do is remove us from the headlines every single day."
Mullin added that "everybody will be held accountable," and that he would enforce the law "with our own agency" and "with the criminals on the streets."
Facing pressure from senior White House adviser Stephen Miller to reach a quota of 3,000 arrests per day, ICE has overwhelmingly prioritized going after individuals without criminal convictions during President Donald Trump's second term, despite the administration's claims that it's targeting "the worst of the worst."
A leaked Department of Homeland Security report published in February showed that just 14% of the nearly 400,000 people taken into custody by ICE in 2025 had been charged with or convicted of violent criminal offenses, while 40% have never been charged with any crime.
The Washington Postreported on Friday that ICE is on track to arrest more people in July than any previous month of the second Trump administration. Arrests dropped for a short time in February after immigration agents shot two US citizens—Renee Good and Alex Pretti—in Minneapolis, but spiked to a new high of over 39,500 in June.
None of the agents involved in January's pair of fatal shootings have faced federal charges, and the Trump administration has actively sought to obstruct state-level investigations into the shootings by withholding evidence, some of which was finally turned over on Monday.
In light of all this death, we must seriously ask ourselves: Are we, as a nation, greater because a 3-year-old girl will never know her father? Are federal agents murdering people working hard to provide for their families making any of our lives better? Are we safer because of ICE?
On July 13, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent in Biddeford, Maine murdered Joan Sebastian Durán Guerrero, a Colombian national authorized to work in the US. One of his neighbors described him as “an excellent person, a good father, good husband.”
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) alleged that Guerrero “attempted to flee the scene and, fearing for public safety, an officer discharged his weapon.”
Yet, footage obtained by The New York Times shows Guerrero slowly driving in a circle as he is confronted by multiple agents—there is no evidence that he endangered anyone. One of their vehicles is clearly shown ramming into his. Afterwards, three agents surround the car with one pointing his gun at the driver’s side window. While not shown in the video, five gunshots can be heard. After the incident, there were four visible bullet holes on the front windshield.
Such excessive and unnecessary violence is the new norm. Last October, Marimar Martinez, a US citizen, was shot five times in her car. In December, Isaias Sanchez Barboza, a Mexican national, was shot at least three times. In January, Renee Nicole Good, a US citizen, was also shot three times, including one to her head. The same month, Alex Pretti, another US citizen, was shot at least 10 times in the span of five seconds.
So long as ICE exists, it will continue to kill.
This latest shooting comes less than a week after ICE agents in Houston murdered Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a Mexican national who had lived in the US for 35 years. Here too, DHS blamed the victim. A DHS spokesperson alleged that Araujo “weaponized his vehicle in an attempt to run over an ICE law enforcement officer resulting in our officer firing his weapon in self-defense.” DHS used the same story to justify the murder of Good and shooting Martinez. As in those cases, video evidence and eyewitness accounts dispute the Trump administration’s narrative.
A week after Araujo’s death, the FBI filed a warrant application claiming that the agency has reason to believe that there were illegal drugs in the vehicle he was driving. FBI Special Agent David McNeilly alleged that he observed small plastic bags “with a white crystal-like substance” in the cargo van. The application cites probable cause for “distribution, manufacturing, or possession with intent to distribute a controlled substance and simple possession of a controlled substance.”
Domingo Garcia, the president of the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) Adelante PAC, accused federal investigators of trying to “change the public discourse and prejudice a jury in Harris County.” He further remarked, “It just smells of a smear campaign and a cover up.”
Garcia is right to be suspicious. There are many documentedcases of law enforcement planting drugs on victims. The Trump administration has also demonstrated time and time again that it is incapable of holding itself accountable. After shooting Martinez five times, Border Patrol agent Charles Exum was congratulated by then-Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino. Good and Pretti were immediately smeared as “domestic terrorists” by several members of the Trump administration, including by then-DHS Secretary Kristi Noem.
Moreover, this administration has actively sought to manipulate federal investigations into past ICE killings—this includes launching an investigation into Renee Good’s wife, Becca Good, while actively stopping probes into her murderer, Jonathan Ross. They have also intentionally delayed turning over key evidence to state prosecutors.
It is worth further emphasizing that, by DHS’ own admission, Araujo was not the target of ICE’s operation. Even if there were drugs in the van (and there is no evidence that there were), those agents did not know that. They did not kill him because of drugs; they did not kill him to protect public safety; they did not kill him in self-defense. ICE agents killed him and Guererro because they knew they could.
Guerrero and Araujo were not the only people to die in ICE-related incidents this month. On July 14, a 28-year-old man in Florida died while fleeing ICE agents.
A day prior, Jesús Manuel Arenas-Silva, a Venezuelan national, died while being transferred between detention centers in Georgia. In a press release, his sister and immigrants’ rights groups reported that, despite their repeated pleas, ICE deprived him of medication he desperately needed. Including Arenas-Silva, at least 22 people have reportedly died in ICE custody this year.
Importantly, this figure does not include the deaths of people like Nurul Amin Shah Alam and Daphy Michel. Shah Alam, a nearly blind refugee who did not speak English, was abandoned by immigration enforcement agents alone on a cold winter night in New York state. He was found dead a few days later. A state medical examiner ruled his death a homicide.
Similarly, Michel, a Haitian asylum-seeker “suffering from untreated severe mental health issues and a significant language barrier,” was arrested by ICE in late February. Agents put an ankle monitor on her, drove her 25 miles away to Pittsburg where she was then abandoned. She died of hypothermia days later. Her death was also ruled a homicide.
On June 4, ICE announced it would no longer investigate or report the deaths of those recently released from detention centers—people like Shah Alam and Michel. This rescinds a policy instituted in 2021 by the Biden administration to hold the agency accountable for releasing severely ill detainees.
This is the reality of what ICE is: an agency that kills people; an agency that intentionally lets people die; an agency without remorse or accountability. Banning traffic stops or mandating bodycams will not change this. So long as ICE exists, it will continue to kill.
In light of all this death, we must seriously ask ourselves: Are we, as a nation, greater because a 3-year-old girl will never know her father? Are federal agents murdering people working hard to provide for their families making any of our lives better? Are we safer because of ICE?
The tens of billions of our taxpayer money spent on ICE could be going to fund childcare, instead of killing parents. It could be used to fund healthcare instead of an agency that deprives medication. It could be used to meaningfully improve the lives of millions instead of agents that kill and injure innocent people.
For all our sakes, enough must finally be enough. We must abolish ICE. Punish the ICE agents who have committed these shootings. Hold every member of the Trump administration who covered their crimes and every politician who voted to fund ICE responsible for the chaos they have unleashed across our country.
Unless there is real change, it is not a matter of if, but when ICE will kill again.
“These are not social Dumocrats, these are hardcore, godless communists.” And they will “attack all religions, but in particular, Christianity. They always do..."
“It's like crazy. They will close your churches in this country... They will kill your people, and that's what they're about. They want to end religion. They have to end religion because their ideology doesn't work if you have strong religion... This is the greatest threat to our country since its founding, in my opinion, 250 years ago, what's happening right now.”
This is our Dear Leader speaking, of course, ripping our seriously problematic political system to shreds and turning it into a cult, with Donald Trump as the cult leader, of course. Only he can save us, and by “us” I mean real Americans: the true believers in virtually nothing except what they’re told to believe, also known as MAGA,
“Donald Trump is a desperate man,” writes Elliott Negin at the LA Progressive. “With the midterms on the horizon and his approval ratings under water, he doesn’t want to talk about affordability. Nor does he want to talk about his war with Iran. And he certainly doesn’t want to talk about Jeffrey Epstein.”
Trump’s fearmongering is just a cover for his administration’s fear creating.
What he wants to—needs to—do is offer his followers, which in good times may amount to about half the country’s voters, an enemy so terrifying it takes their minds off Epstein, Iran, et al. Even the “white replacement” invasion by immigrants isn’t enough right now. He has decided to return to the Cold War, when nuclear annihilation was a possibility that everyone thought about, and bring back the godless commies. Oh my God, they’re back under our beds! But they’re Americans now: Democratic socialists. And somehow they’re on the rise politically.
Welcome to what’s starting to look like the end of actual democracy. If Trump succeeds, that’s what it may well be. Candidates will base their campaigns on vicious insults, not policies of any sort. Every last breath of reality could get squeezed out of our elections. Watch out, the commies are coming!
And they want to kill you. Here’s the truly unbearable irony of Trump’s words. It takes one to know one. Trump’s fearmongering is just a cover for his administration’s fear creating. It’s not godless communists who are walking around, arresting and sometimes killing Americans, it’s the Trump Gestapo, also known as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Eleven people, for instance, have been killed by ICE or Customs and Border Patrol, agents during the second Trump administration, including two men in the past week: Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, age 52, was shot while driving to work in Houston, Texas on July 7; and Joan Sebastian Guerrero, age 26, was shot in Biddleford, Maine on July 13. He was also driving to work.
In both incidents, federal officials claimed that the victims had attacked the agents with their vehicles and were killed in self-defense. The agents were not wearing body cameras and no evidence supports this claim. But in both cases, witnesses say that’s not what happened. The vehicles were not “weaponized,” and the men were shot for no reason (except, perhaps, racism).
And both victims were husbands and dads, and their families have been tossed into horrific shock and grief. Guerrero, for instance, had a 3-year-old daughter. His wife posted a photo of him on social media a day after his killing and wrote: “I love you. I have no words for this pain, my life, my love, watch over me, help me to have strength, I love you, stay with me always—don’t leave me alone, I beg you, my love.”
Yeah, better blame this—and so many other deaths—on the godless commies. So far there have been 11 killings by Homeland Security agents this year, along with 21 deaths in immigrant detention centers. Not to mention multi-thousands of arrests, with many detainees essentially disappeared from their loved ones’ lives.
And then there are the wars, the trillion-dollar military budget... on and on and on. I certainly don’t blame this solely on Trump. He's only making the best (by which I mean the worst) of the system he inherited.
Nearly all Democrats in the US House of Representatives on Wednesday demanded independent investigations into federal immigration agents' recent fatal shootings of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero in Biddeford, Maine, and Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston, Texas.
The men killed—immigrants from Colombia and Mexico—apparently weren't even the targets of the operations that claimed their lives earlier this month, Democrats stressed in their letter to the leaders at the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and its agency Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
"Both of these incidents have created enormous fear and outrage in the community, and raise serious questions about the safety of community members, regardless of immigration status," the nearly 200 members of Congress wrote to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin and ICE acting Director David Venturella.
The letter was led by Democrats from both states, Congresswomen Chellie Pingree (Maine) and Sylvia Garcia (Texas), as well as ranking members on key House panels: Reps. Bennie Thompson (Miss.) of the Committee on Homeland Security, Jamie Raskin (Md.) of the Judiciary Committee, and Pramila Jayapal (Wash.) of the Subcommittee on Immigration, Integrity, Security, and Enforcement.
"DHS agents have shot at least 22 people just since the start of President Donald Trump's second term. Six of these shootings have been fatal, resulting in the death of US citizens and individuals with no criminal records," wrote the lawmakers—who have also drawn attention to the dozens of immigrants who have died at ICE detention centers under this administration.
"In several of these cases, DHS and its component agencies made unsubstantiated allegations about individuals its agents have shot and even killed, including Renée Good, Alex Pretti, Ruben Ray Martinez, Marimar Martinez, and Julio Sosa-Celis," they highlighted. "DHS claimed that the shooting victims were attacking law enforcement officers, attempting to 'weaponize' their vehicles, and even called them domestic terrorists."
The Democrats emphasized that "in each case, evidence later emerged that contradicted these claims, showing that DHS representatives made false statements and DHS agents acted inappropriately, resulting in several cases against DHS's victims to be dismissed with prejudice. As such, Trump's DHS has lost the trust of the American people and can no longer be considered a reliable source of fact."
"We are calling for immediate independent investigations into both of these deaths, without interference. We are also calling on ICE to stop any removal proceedings against the witnesses to Mr. Salgado Araujo's killing for the duration of the investigation," they wrote, pointing to reported attempts by the administration to deport his brother, Victor Hugo Salgado Araujo, as well as two employees, Jose Trinidad Rojas Pliego and Daniel Tirado Pantoja.
Those three witnesses to the killing in Texas "should have no threat of retaliation or deportation to provide their testimony," the lawmakers argued. "Similarly, DHS must not interfere with any investigations into the death of Mr. Guerrero. Far too many people, Americans and noncitizens alike, are dead as a result of DHS's reckless actions."
The House Democrats aren't alone in their demand. The Fair Immigration Reform Movement, faith leaders, and labor advocates held a Wednesday press conference to call for "independent investigations and real accountability" after the deaths in Texas and Maine, as well as Florida.
The 28-year-old man who officials say died Tuesday after being hit by a tractor-trailer while fleeing federal immigration agents at a gas station in St. Augustine has not yet been publicly identified, but like the other two cases, he had been in a vehicle. Despite the rising death toll, Trump said Wednesday that he wants ICE to keep pulling over cars.
"No one can be guaranteed safety from this rogue agency, which has terrorized our community since long before the current administration, but is now capturing and even widening a net of Americans in their ruthless execution of the mass deportation agenda," said Lizeth Chacon, executive director of Workers Defense Action Fund, one of the groups demanding an independent probe.
"To end this brutal campaign for good, we must abolish ICE and offer a pathway to citizenship for all," Chacon declared. "The officers responsible for the killing of Mr. Lorenzo must be held accountable. We can and must dismantle this agency because ICE's next victim could be any of us. Mr. Lorenzo could be any of us."
Rev. Jodi Hayashida, an organizer from Multifaith Justice Maine, said Wednesday that "the most important fact about ICE is that it is simply the latest vehicle in this nation's long-standing practice of racialized state-sanctioned violence and terror, that this paramilitary force accountable to nearly no one and funded by billions of dollars pulled from our housing and healthcare does not provide the safety or security it promises. It is a threat to the well-being of all people."
"We know that death is an inevitable consequence of the existence of ICE, modifications to practices and policies are not enough," Hayashida added. "In the very short term ICE must not be allowed to investigate itself. We demand a full, transparent accounting of every single death, and then we demand that Congress stop funding this violence and remove ICE from our communities altogether."
"The high number of head injuries... suggests a pattern of force directed towards the head. Whether intentionally or recklessly, this violates virtually all use-of-force guidelines."
Federal, state, and local law enforcement agents' brutal attacks on protesters across the US have caused blindings, traumatic brain injuries, permanent disabilities, and other maladies, according to a report released Monday by researchers at Physicians for Human Rights and the Human Rights Center at the University of California at Berkeley.
In an examination of actions taken by authorities in response to demonstrations against US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) actions over the span of a year, the report documents 412 instances of misuse of force against protesters, journalists, and bystanders.
Just over half of the misuses of force were directed at demonstrators, while 43% were directed at journalists, the report finds.
This misuse of force led to 203 documented injuries affecting 119 individuals, including 44 incidents of laceration, 19 traumatic brain injuries, 10 ocular injuries, seven permanent disabilities, and one instance each of amputation and hearing loss.
The report adds that the actual number of injuries inflicted upon anti-ICE demonstrators "is likely far greater" given researchers' limitations in documenting "invisible injuries" such as chronic pain or hearing loss.
What is particularly troubling, the report emphasizes, is the number of injuries impacting people's heads.
"The high number of head injuries (19 brain, 10 eye, 1 hearing loss) suggests a pattern of force directed towards the head," the researchers write. "Whether intentionally or recklessly, this violates virtually all use-of-force guidelines and results in significant harm."
The report documents 97 incidents of law enforcement officials shooting crowd control projectiles at people's heads, making it the second-most frequent type of improper force used, following shots taken at close range.
Dr. Rohini Haar, the lead author of the report, said in an interview with The Guardian that she started tracking misuse of force in response to anti-ICE protests after a federal agent shot a pastor in the face at close range during a demonstration in Oakland last year.
"Those weapons can cause harm,” said Haar, who for years has been researching the health impacts of crowd control weapons. "It’s just when they’re used, how they’re used, and if they’re used."
Tactics used by ICE and other law enforcement agencies have come back into focus over the last week after the fatal ICE shootings of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Texas and Joan Sebastian Guerrero in Maine over the span of less than a week.
Salgado Araujo, 52, was an undocumented immigrant from Mexico who had lived in the US for more than three decades and ran a small construction business. Sebastian Guerrero, 26, was a Colombian national who was authorized to work in the US and was shot and killed by ICE in front of his three-year-old daughter.
The controversy surrounding the killing of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo by federal immigration enforcement officials is growing amid new reports that the Trump administration is trying to deport three witnesses to the the fatal shooting.
Juan Proaño, CEO of the League of United Latin American Citizens, said in a Thursday interview with The New Republic that the witnesses, all undocumented immigrants who were detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials after the shooting, are "being pressured to sign self-deportation orders."
"They’re currently in detention," said Proaño, who is serving as a representative for Salgado Araujo's family. "These men hold the key to what actually happened."
Salgado Araujo, a 52-year-old Mexican national who ran a small construction business and had been living in the US for more than three decades, was pulled over by ICE officers in unmarked vehicles on Tuesday morning.
ICE officers claimed that Salgado Araujo, who was driving to work along with three coworkers, tried to evade arrest by ramming his car into them.
Purportedly fearing for his life, one ICE agent opened fire on Salgado Araujo and killed him, the officers said.
However, The Washington Postreported on Friday that all three men who were in the car with Salgado Araujo are strongly disputing the ICE agents' account of the deadly incident.
In fact, all three witnesses said that the ICE officer involved in the shooting opened fire immediately after exiting his vehicle, and that Salgado Araujo did not try to drive into him.
Detainee Jose Trinidad Rojas, 51, in a hand-written statement obtained by the Post through attorney Hugo Balderas-Ibarra, bluntly contradicted the ICE officers' claims.
"That is a lie,” Trinidad Rojas wrote. “It is impossible for them to say that they were going to get run over … there were no officers in front of or behind the vehicle. They were on the sides."
Balderas-Ibarra told the Post that he interviewed the other two men in the car, who both gave the same account.
“All of them reiterated that there were never any ICE agents in front of the van,” Balderas-Ibarra said. “They came in and started shooting from the sides.”
David Bier, director of immigration studies at the libertarian Cato Institute, said in a Friday social media post that the Post's reporting seems to show "ICE appears to have lied yet again about killing someone."
"Unbelievable," he added, "but actually totally believable given that they lie about events fully captured on video."
In a separate post, Bier examined a video of the shooting scene and noted that there appeared to be no damage to the front of Salgado Araujo's van, even as ICE claimed Salgado Araujo had tried to use it as a weapon against them.
Video appears to show no damage to the vehicle of the man ICE killed in Houston, who had lived in America peacefully for 35 years, despite ICE's claim that he "rammed" an ICE vehicle and "tried to run over" an agent. These people are not credible. https://t.co/3d3cBJBMUgpic.twitter.com/N7GqoW7ycq — David J. Bier (@David_J_Bier) July 9, 2026
"These people are not credible," Bier remarked.
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, pointed out that all three witnesses to the shooting were telling the same stories even though they were being detained separately, which he said bolsters their credibility.
"When you add the videos showing a lack of evidence of damage to the front despite ICE's ramming claim," Aaron Reichlin-Melnick added, "ICE's story is falling apart."
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Thursday renewed his call to "abolish ICE" after a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent fatally shot a man in Texas earlier this week.
"Lorenzo Salgado Araujo called Houston home for 35 years. On Tuesday, an ICE agent shot and killed him," Mamdani said on social media. "His family learned of his death from a video before anyone bothered to knock on their door."
"New York City stands with the Salgado family in demanding a full, independent investigation and real accountability," the mayor added. "To the Salgado family and any immigrant family in this city living in fear: We grieve with you, and we will continue to stand beside you in the pursuit of justice."
More than 1,000 people gathered in Houston's East End on Wednesday evening to denounce ICE and remember Salgado, a 52-year-old married father of three originally from Mexico who, according to relatives, was in the process of legalizing his status in the United States.
Salgado's son, school teacher Ronaldo Salgado, said that his father had "dedicated his life to giving his family the American dream."
Salgado was driving in the Magnolia Park neighborhood to pick up his construction crew on Tuesday morning when an unidentified ICE agent fatally shot him during an enforcement operation. ICE claimed that Salgado tried to evade arrest and threatened agents with his vehicle, but his family, civil rights advocates, and community leaders strongly dispute that account, pointing to surveillance footage and eyewitness accounts that they argue undermine the agency's narrative.
A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson told The New York Times late on Thursday that neither Salgado nor any of his three passengers were the targets of ICE enforcement, but that they drew agents' attention because one of them resembled a wanted man from Guatemala.
Democratic lawmakers and civil rights groups have joined Salgado's relatives in demanding an independent investigation of his killing.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum announced Thursday that her government plans to file criminal complaints in the United States in connection with 14 Mexican nationals who died in ICE custody. Sheinbaum added that Salgado's killing "is not only sad and regrettable, but also appears to have been targeted."
On-duty officers from ICE and other Department of Homeland Security agencies have fatally shot at least four other people during President Donald Trump's deadly second-term crackdown on undocumented immigrants: Silverio Villegas González of Mexico and US citizens Ruben Ray Martinez, Renee Good, and Alex Pretti.
At least dozens of people have also died in ICE custody or shortly after being released during Trump's second term. Last month, ICE announced that it was rescinding a 2021 Biden administration policy requiring congressional notification and an investigation whenever a detainee died within 30 days of their release.
“We don’t expect the truth from the Department of Justice or from the FBI," said the president of a legal group advocating for the family of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo. "We expect a whitewash.”
The family of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo is demanding a full, independent investigation into his killing by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent in Houston earlier this week, as they and their lawyers warn that the government is being dishonest about the incident.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said the agent shot Salgado, a 52-year-old construction worker from Mexico who has lived in the US for over three decades, in self-defense on Tuesday after he attempted to ram them with his vehicle while trying to evade arrest, though it has not provided evidence to corroborate this account.
At a press conference on Wednesday, Salgado's 29-year-old son, Ronaldo, a teacher in Houston, described coming to the harrowing realization that his father had been shot when he saw video of the incident as it circulated on social media.
"I recognized him immediately," Ronaldo said, beginning to tear up. "Not from his appearance, but from his voice crying for help as he lay on the street, bleeding out."
After hearing rumors that "something bad" had happened to his father, Ronaldo said it took hours for him to figure out what had happened—after going to the scene of the shooting, he found that nobody could give him any answers.
He did not find out where his father was until he approached Conchita Reyes, a representative from the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), who contacted Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-Texas) and informed Ronaldo that his father was in the hospital.
"I learned of my father's passing from a news report on social media, not the hospital, not law enforcement," he said.
Ronaldo described his father as a "family man" who "dedicated his life in the United States to giving his family the American dream."
DHS described Lorenzo Salgado as an "illegal alien" who was living and working in the US without legal status. Ronaldo said he had lived in the US for 35 years, had no criminal record, and was in the process of obtaining a legal work permit when he was killed.
"We dotted every I, crossed every T, filled every document, attended every appointment," Ronaldo said. "He was close to obtaining his legal status."
He added that his father "worked the last 30 years of his life building homes in the Houston suburbs" and that "part of his dream was to build a house for himself and his family, just like the hundreds he had built for himself over his career."
"And he did, after he built his own house with his crew composed of family members and other loved ones," Ronaldo said. "You could find him every evening after work, resting on his porch, listening to music, petting his dog."
"I am deeply heartbroken to see that the man who taught me the value of hard work, family values, and education will no longer spend an evening on that porch," Ronaldo said.
Ronaldo said he was "calling for a full investigation into the events that transpired yesterday, July 7."
"He did not deserve to die," Ronaldo said. "He deserved to live a quiet life as Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a husband, a father, and a job creator for dozens of men who also wanted the American dream."
Ronaldo noted that three other men, including his uncle, were also "rounded up" by ICE at the scene.
“I have not heard from them,” Ronaldo said, “but I hope that they are able to provide their own statements to prove that my father feared for his life as unmarked cars followed my dad, who only wanted to get back to work and back to us.”
Security cameras near the scene of the incident have captured some footage of Salgado’s white van appearing to be followed by unmarked ICE vehicles, but none captured the events leading up to the shooting, and there is no publicly available visual evidence of ICE’s claim that Salgado attacked officers.
The lawyers representing Salgado's family have called for DHS to release body camera footage of the incident. LULAC leaders called into question ICE's official account, noting that there had been no damage to Salgado's vehicle.
Ronaldo said his father has "always been aware of what to do in the event that he got pulled over" by ICE agents and that "he wasn’t supposed to give them a hard time.”
The legal team representing his family has said Salgado likely panicked when he saw he was being followed by masked men in unmarked cars and feared that criminals were attempting to steal his van and work equipment.
"One of his worst fears is that someone took away his work tools because that is how he made his livelihood," Ronaldo said.
So far, the federal government has not announced plans for a public, independent investigation into the agents involved in Salgado's shooting. The FBI has said it is investigating the alleged assault on the ICE agent, while the Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General is conducting an internal investigation.
DHS has not publicly released the name of the ICE agent who shot Salgado, citing what it said were rising threats to federal agents.
“We want a full and transparent investigation," said Juan Proaño, the CEO of LULAC. "Every piece of evidence, body camera footage, dash cam footage, bystander video, dispatch records must all be preserved and released to an independent investigator and to the public.”
In several cases over the past year, DHS and other law enforcement agencies under the Trump administration have claimed that people shot by ICE agents had attempted to harm them, only for video evidence to later prove those assertions to have been exaggerated or outright fabricated.
LULAC national president Domingo Garcia told The Texas Tribune, “We don’t expect the truth from the Department of Justice or from the FBI. We expect a whitewash.”
Garcia and other Democratic members of Congress sent a letter to DHS and ICE on Wednesday calling for an "immediate, fully independent, and transparent investigation" into Salgado's killing.
"This is not the first time ICE agents have used unnecessary, deadly force," she wrote, referencing the killings of US citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti during a surge of immigration agents to Minneapolis in January.
"ICE shot and killed Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in our community. His family deserves answers," she said in a public statement. "ICE cannot investigate itself."
