Governor Abbott Orders Texas Rangers to Probe Deadly Houston ICE Shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo

Texas will launch a state investigation into the fatal shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo by federal immigration agents last week, Governor Greg Abbott announced amid mounting public demand for answers.

The Texas Rangers, a state law enforcement agency, will collaborate with federal authorities “to get to the bottom of exactly what happened,” Abbott told reporters on Wednesday.

“Immigration laws can be enforced, and stopping illegal immigration from coming across our border can be achieved, without shooting people,” Abbott said.

Following the shooting by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, the federal government said it would review the incident, but local leaders pressed for an independent inquiry.

ICE agents stopped Salgado Araujo on the morning of 7 July as he drove to work. He was transported to a local hospital and died there later.

Information remains limited and no footage of the shooting has been released. According to US Congresswoman Sylvia Garcia, a Democrat representing the area, ICE personnel were not wearing body cameras during the operation.

ICE initially claimed Salgado Araujo “weaponized his vehicle” and that an officer fired in self-defence.

The Department of Homeland Security later stated Salgado Araujo was not the operation’s target and that agents initiated the stop after spotting “a white van with an individual who resembled the target.”

The family of Salgado Araujo has challenged the official version of events.

In other shootings linked to President Donald Trump’s stricter immigration enforcement — including the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis earlier this year — video and eyewitness accounts have contradicted ICE’s statements.

Salgado Araujo, 52, was a father of three who had lived in the United States for roughly 35 years and was seeking legal residency, his family said.

His son, Ronaldo Salgado, told reporters he first learned of the shooting through social media video showing the aftermath.

“I recognised him immediately, not from his appearance, but from his voice, crying for help as he lay on the street,” Salgado said.

He later confirmed his father’s death via news reports.

Salgado also said three men, including his uncle, were with his father during the incident and were detained on immigration charges afterward.

The Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General is conducting an internal review, and FBI Houston is leading a probe into a possible assault on a federal officer, an ICE spokesperson told the BBC last week.

Houston Mayor John Whitmire called for an independent investigation and, at his request, the Houston Police Department asked the Texas Rangers to open one.

Days after Salgado Araujo’s death, ICE agents in Maine shot and killed 26-year-old Colombian national Joan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, prompting protests in that state.

The consecutive shootings have renewed debate over ICE’s use of force in arrests and detentions of those suspected of being in the country unlawfully.

On Tuesday, Trump said ICE would keep conducting traffic stops — a primary enforcement tactic — after border official Tom Homan had suggested such stops might pause following the shootings.

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