Kyle McClenagan/Houston Public Media
The sons of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, Ronaldo Salgado (center) and Lorenzo Salgado Jr. (left), speak about their father at a Houston news conference one day after their father was fatally shot by an ICE agent on July 8, 2026.
On the morning of July 7, when Ronaldo Salgado first got word that something had happened to his father, he put into motion the plan his family had discussed and rehearsed for years.
As the son of an undocumented immigrant, Ronaldo and his brother Lorenzo Salgado Jr. had spent years bracing for the moment their father, Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, might be detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agents. On his way to the scene, Ronaldo began making calls to lawyers to begin the process of what he assumed would be getting his father out of ICE detention and keep him from being deported. Until that morning, detention and deportation was the worst-case scenario they’d been expecting.
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The sons said they feared for their father. They had coached him not to “sign anything” if he was ever detained by agents and to let them get a lawyer involved.
“We were prepared,” Ronaldo said. “It just doesn’t seem like [my dad] was given a chance to do any of that.”
During a targeted enforcement operation by ICE agents, for which Salgado Araujo was not the intended target, ICE agents trailed Salgado Araujo’s van and allege Salgado Araujo attempted to weaponize his vehicle. Department of Homeland Security officials said the agent fired in self-defense. The family and witnesses inside the van have refuted that account. The shooting is now under investigation by the FBI, the Texas Rangers, and the Harris County District Attorney’s Office.
Last week, Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare said his office was at a “tipping point” in the investigation and deciding what, if any, charges to present to a grand jury.
In an interview with Hello Houston’s Ernie Manouse, Ronaldo and his younger brother Lorenzo Jr. shared how much their lives have changed in the two months since the fatal shooting of their father at the hands of federal agents became national news.
“From the beginning — It was a roller coaster,” Lorenzo said.
Since the shooting, both of their lives have changed dramatically. Lorenzo Jr. has taken a leave of absence from work and Ronaldo was set to start a new teaching job in Dallas on Aug. 1.
“July 7 happened and derailed all those plans,” Ronaldo said.
The brothers have attended protests, vigils, and served as representatives for their family as their father’s death has become a symbol for the anti-ICE movement.
“I want to be there in any circle, any room, any space in which my dad’s name is being mentioned,” Ronaldo said. “I just want there to be justice for our dad, and I want there to be changes done so that no one’s dad ever has to go through this again.”
RELATED: Third witness to fatal Houston ICE shooting released from federal custody
Immediately after the shooting, the three men in the van with Salgado Araujo were detained by ICE. Two men working with Salgado Araujo — Jose Rojas Trinidad Pliego and Daniel Tirado Pantoja — and his brother Victor Hugo Salgado Araujo have all since been released from detention. The men refute ICE’s account and said Salgado Araujo was not ramming agents with his car and that the agent fired into the vehicle immediately upon opening the passenger door.
Victor was the final witness released from detention after 54 days in custody. Speaking through his lawyer Ruby Powers, he said the bullet had whipped past him in the passenger seat and hit Salgado Araujo, who was driving, in the stomach. As Victor was being pulled from the vehicle, he said Lorenzo grabbed his stomach, realized he was bleeding, and said to Victor in Spanish, “They’re killing me. They’re killing me,” according to Powers.
Ronaldo and Lorenzo Jr. say their uncle Victor is still grappling with the event.
“It’s hard to hear him tell it, but because I just know it’s replaying in his head,” Lorenzo Jr. said. “There’s so many things that take him back to that moment, and he’s traumatized, to say the least. Every time a door slams really he’s reminded of the gunshot. Any time he sees a car, an SUV with tinted windows, he starts shaking. He’s like, ‘It’s them.'”
The brothers said Victor is the youngest of his siblings and looked up to his brother Lorenzo as a father figure.
“He remembers every little detail of that day,” Ronaldo said. “My uncle remembers even the expression of the ICE agent that shot my dad. Just the expression on the guy’s face, and for my uncle to continuously have that in his mind — I really can’t imagine.”
Houston Public Media’s Ernie Manouse contributed to this article.