The man, identified as Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, is the latest person to be killed by ICE agents since President Trump took office.
Published July 8, 2026
According to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), a U.S. immigration officer shot and killed a man in Houston, Texas, as he tried to stop his car.
The man killed Tuesday was identified as Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, and ICE said he was a Mexican national and an “illegal alien” who was attempting to evade arrest during a “targeted enforcement operation” by federal immigration agents.
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Ronaldo Salgado, who identified himself as Salgado Araujo’s son, told Spanish-language television station Telemundo Houston that his father was shot while looking for workers to hire in the area.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees ICE, said Salgado Araujo ignored orders to stop his vehicle, “rammed an ICE law enforcement vehicle, refused to comply with multiple verbal commands, and used his vehicle as a weapon in an attempt to run over an ICE law enforcement officer.”
In previous shootings, including the January killings of Renee Good and Alex Preti, immigration authorities have said their staff were being assaulted when they were shot, claims in both cases that are hotly contested.
Video footage taken on Tuesday by a nearby business’s surveillance camera and seen by Reuters showed a person lying on the ground next to a white van, apparently in the aftermath of a shooting, surrounded by police officers.
According to DHS, Salgado Araujo was in the country without legal permission and was therefore considered for surgery.
Democratic U.S. Representative Sylvia Garcia called for a thorough, independent investigation into ICE’s claims regarding the shooting.
“All available footage, communications and other evidence should be preserved and considered as part of a full and impartial investigation,” Garcia posted on social media.
Juan Proano, CEO of the United Citizens League of Latin America, echoed Garcia’s call for a transparent investigation into ICE’s actions.
“We do not accept DHS’s word for it at all,” Proano told The Associated Press. “An independent investigation should be conducted and all videos should be made public.”
There have been at least six fatal shootings by federal immigration agents since President Donald Trump began ramping up immigration enforcement.
Good, a 37-year-old American citizen, was shot in the head by a federal immigration officer during a stop in Minneapolis. The Department of Homeland Security also said Good tried to hit the officer with her car, but local officials and witnesses disputed that she only tried to drive away.
The backlash from Goode’s killing and other similar cases has led ICE to back away from some of its more controversial operations.
But Tuesday’s deadly confrontation in Houston came amid a recent increase in ICE arrests across the U.S., with immigration agents rounding up about 2,000 immigrants a day over the past week, Reuters reported.
