‘New terrifying levels’: 10 people fatally shot by immigration officials in Trump’s second term

Early on Tuesday morning, 52-year-old Lorenzo Salgado Araujo took his coffee and a meal his wife had prepared for him, said goodbye to his dog, and left the house he built. He drove his white van, picked up three co-workers, and headed towards a construction site to work on some houses.But Salgado never made it to work. During a “targeted enforcement operation”, officers with Immigration-and-customs-enforcement" class="entity-link entity-organization" data-entity-id="142597" data-entity-type="organization">Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) shot and killed Salgado and arrested the three other men.Salgado’s death marks the 10th fatal shooting by federal Immigration officials nationwide since the second Trump administration took office, a review of public reports by the Guardian shows, as the Trump administration continues with its anti-immigrant crackdown.ICE officers and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents have been responsible for the fatal shootings. Not all of the shooting deaths took place during Immigration enforcement operations. In one case, CBP agents shot and killed a man who fired on a border patrol station in Texas. And in another, an off-duty ICE officer shot and killed a man in California.Details of Salgado’s shooting remain murky, with the Department of Homeland Security alleging that Salgado “weaponized” his vehicle when ICE officers tried to stop and arrest the four men. Salgado’s family, public officials and civil rights groups have called for an independent investigation into the shooting, saying that the DHS claims are unreliable.“He did not deserve to die,” Ronaldo Salgado, the son of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, said at a press conference on Wednesday.Ronaldo Salgado, the son of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, on Wednesday. Photograph: David J Phillip/APThe homeland security department has been grappling with its agencies’ involvement in high-profile deaths in the past year. Last month, Human Rights Watch and Physicians for Human Rights released a report calculating that in the first 500 days of Trump’s second administration, 52 people died in ICE custody. The United Nations high commissioner for human rights has raised alarm about the increasing number of deaths in US government Immigration custody.Now critics are saying that the administration’s aggressive efforts to engage in its “mass deportation” campaign are heightening the likelihood of violence and death.“The deaths of people in Immigration prisons has reached new terrifying levels – 21 people have died in ICE detention this year alone, and now we are learning of yet another shooting death by an Immigration agent on the streets of another US neighborhood,” said Jesse Franzblau, the associate director of policy with the National Immigrant Justice Center.“Congress has given ICE and CBP billions of dollars, $70 billion alone in a bill passed just last month, with no accountability for the violence they have brought to our communities.”Two of the highest-profile shootings in the past year have been those of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minnesota during the Trump administration’s Immigration enforcement surge. In January, Good and Pretti, US citizens, were killed by federal Immigration enforcement officials. Good was killed by an ICE officer, while Pretti was shot and killed by CBP agents. Their deaths led to mass protests.A person kneels near posters with images of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis. Photograph: Seth Herald/ReutersIn at least four of the Immigration-related shooting deaths, including Salgado’s, the victims were driving vehicles when they were shot. Law enforcement officials are trained to move out of a car’s path, rather than shooting at a moving vehicle. From July 2025 to January 2026, the Wall Street Journal identified over a dozen incidents of federal Immigration officials firing at people in vehicles.As in Salgado’s case, DHS claimed Renee Good “weaponized” her vehicle against ICE officials. That claim was later disputed by footage later released that seemed to contradict the Trump administration’s statements.In a separate case, from March 2025, an ICE agent shot and killed 23-year-old Ruben Ray Martinez, also a US citizen, during a traffic incident. ICE’s involvement in his death was revealed nearly a year later, leading congressional Democrats to demand an independent investigation.Officials claimed Martinez had “intentionally” run over a federal agent, but video released later painted a more complicated picture.“DHS’s repeated lies and omissions about the shooting of Mr Martinez reflect a troubling pattern in which official statements about the use of lethal force are later challenged by video footage, witness testimony, or subsequent investigations,” congressional representatives Robert Garcia and Greg Casar said.Ruben Ray Martinez, who was shot and killed in Texas by a federal Immigration agent last year. Photograph: APDue to the contradictory statements put forward by the homeland security department, and its repeated claims of people weaponizing their cars against federal officials, the Salgado family and civil rights groups have called for an independent investigation into this week’s shooting by local officials.“Anytime someone is killed by a federal law enforcement agent, federal authorities should legitimately investigate to see if that killing is criminal,” said Steve Descano, the Fairfax county commonwealth’s attorney, in a statement to the Guardian. “The Trump administration has made it clear that this is a duty they have no interest in fulfilling – and unfortunately their moral abdication means that state and local prosecutors must be the ones to pursue transparency and justice.”Descano, a co-founder of Fight Against Federal Overreach, a national coalition of district attorneys looking to hold federal officials accountable, said that he could not comment on the specifics of Salgado’s case, since it did not happen in his jurisdiction.Congressional representative Sylvia Garcia called for an independent investigation into Salgado’s death. James Talarico, a Democratic Texas state representative who is running for US Senate, also urged for a “full, independent investigation”.“Previous incidents have shown that this agency cannot be trusted to report all the facts,” Talarico added in a statement.On Wednesday, the Houston mayor’s office said local city officials do not hold jurisdiction over federal law enforcement matters. Instead, Houston’s mayor, John Whitmire, said during a city council meeting that he was insisting on a “transparent, independent investigation” by federal authorities.In 2024, the Trace, Business Insider and Type Investigations released a major investigation into shootings by ICE officials. The investigation, based on previously undisclosed public records, found that between 2015 and 2021, 23 people were killed in shootings by ICE officers.