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Progressive politicians and advocates have reignited calls for the abolition of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) after an ICE agent shot and killed a man in Houston, Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, on Tuesday.
Politicians like New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Representatives Rashida Tlaib (D-Michigan) and Delia C. Ramirez (D-Illinois) called to abolish the agency after Salgado Araujo’s killing, which marked the 10th person shot and killed by a federal immigration agent during President Donald Trump’s second term.
“New York City stands with the Salgado family in demanding a full, independent investigation and real accountability. 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,” said Mamdani in a statement on Thursday. “Abolish ICE.”
“ICE has repeatedly lied about killing people in cold blood. His family deserves the truth, and our entire country needs ICE to be abolished,” said Tlaib.
Ramirez went one step further and called for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to be “dismantled.”
Salgado Araujo was on his way to work on Tuesday with three other men when he was stopped by unmarked ICE vehicles. During this stop, he was shot and killed by an ICE agent. His family didn’t find out about his death until they saw a video of the shooting on social media, they said.
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DHS officials claimed they stopped the vehicle as part of an immigration enforcement operation. The department also claimed that Salgado Araujo ignored orders and tried to ram the officer who later shot him with his car — echoing the Trump administration’s claim about Renee Nicole Good, despite multiple camera angles and witness accounts proving otherwise.
DHS has also previously claimed that Ruben Ray Martinez, a 23-year-old shot and killed by an ICE agent in Texas in March of 2025, ran over an officer, but video evidence contradicted that claim.
Some video footage of the moments leading up to Salgado Araujo’s killing suggest that, in fact, the unmarked ICE vehicle first cut him off.
Salgado Araujo’s family said that he was in the process of getting a work permit and is a Mexican citizen. His son, Ronaldo Salgado, said in a press conference that he may have feared that he was getting robbed, and that he would have complied with any ICE orders had they been identified as such, for fear for his life.
“ICE kills people and threatens community safety across the country,” said Carly Pérez Fernández, communications director for advocacy group Detention Watch Network, in a statement. “ICE was hastily created just two decades ago. Its existence is neither necessary, nor a foregone conclusion. People are dying in detention and ICE agents are tearing families apart and shooting people on the streets, making people less safe, and causing chaos wherever they go.”
“We demand an end to the ICE age,” she went on.
Support for abolishing the agency hit a record high in March, after the killings of Good and Alex Pretti and amid ongoing immigration raids of cities across the U.S. Polling by Economist/YouGov found at the time that 50 percent of Americans said they supported the idea of abolishing ICE.
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