I wish I could make white people(and not just white Americans) understand how diverse the pre-columbian Americas were. The history, religion, culture, politics was at least as complex as Europe's. There was the full gamut of religions, from monotheists to animists to ancestral religions. There were city building empires, village farmers, nomadic traders, and so many other ways to live. This is all just based on what we know, the fragments left behind and the stories of survivors of an apocalyptic plague. All this before the most extended campaign of genocide in history was waged in an attempt to wipe out those survivors.
Over 500 years spent trying to cut down a whole trunk of human culture.
Do you understand how much poorer our whole species is because of it? Can you imagine where art, religion, and science would be if we still had these vast bodies of knowledge? The stain of the colonial project will never be fully washed clean. We owe more than just the land to those we stole from. We owe them a whole future, a future that could have been brighter for all of us. If only greed and fear weren't allowed to rule this land.
Lorenzo Salgado Araujo was picking up a crew for a construction project when ICE shot him. It now claims he was the aggressor.
Adrian Carrasquillo at The Bulwark:
LORENZO SALGADO ARAUJO CAME TO THE UNITED STATES thirty-five years agoâa few years too late to benefit from the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, popularly known as the âReagan amnesty.â He worked in construction. By the 2000s, he was a small business owner who provided jobs and work for other men. They would drive to the North Houston suburbs and build houses. His dream was to build his own home for his family one dayâa dream he achieved.
On Tuesday morning, Lorenzo was picking up workers as usual shortly after 6 a.m. when he was confronted by ICE and killed. He was 52 years old.
The shooting in Houstonâs historically Mexican-American East End community near Magnolia Park took place just five minutes from the site of Houstonâs FIFA Fan Festival.
Lorenzoâs son Ronaldo Salgado, a teacher, wrote on Facebook Tuesday night that his father had been in the process of obtaining his work permit through the legal process.
Speaking at a press conference Wednesday morning, Ronaldo thanked his former students for being in attendance and Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-Texas) for spending time in the hospital with him overnight.
He said Lorenzo had been a hardworking man of routine, one who never cared for his name to be known outside his family, only for his childrenâthree sons, all born in the United Statesâto be educated and to become good people.
âI love our dad, he worked hard,â Ronaldo told me in an interview after the press conference. âHe always told us that we needed to do well in school so we donât end up like him in the sun.â
On Tuesday, Lorenzoâs day began at 5 a.m., the same way it did every day: âwith a hearty meal prepared by my mom,â Ronaldo said.
But after taking his coffee and loading his work boots in the car to pick up his crew for work on houses in North Houston, Lorenzo was beset by ICE agents in unmarked cars. Some sort of confrontation ensued. He was shot. He died of his injuries at a hospital.
As Ronaldo wrote this morning, âToday is the first day without him for all of us, and it is heartbreaking to know that my mom did not make lunch for my dad before going to workâthe first time in their 30+ year marriage.â
In the emotional press conference, Ronaldo described his desperate scramble to find out information about what happened to his father. When he first heard about an interaction with ICE, the reports were conflicting. He hoped his father had simply been detained, so his first plan had been to find his fatherâs white work van and deliver it to his crew so that they might be able to finish work and get paid.
As time went on, Ronaldo remained in the dark. He did not learn about his fatherâs final moments from a hospital or law enforcement. Instead, confirmation of his death came in the cruel form of videos on social media.
âI recognized him immediately: not from his appearance, but from his voice crying in the street as he was bleeding out,â Ronaldo said through tears.
[...]
âMe estan matandoâ
ICE HAS PORTRAYED LORENZO in its statements to the media as an âillegal alienâ who acted violently in the confrontation.
âFrom information we are receiving, he rammed an ICE law enforcement vehicle, refused to follow multiple verbal commands, and weaponized his vehicle in an attempt to run over an ICE law enforcement officer, resulting in our officer firing his weapon in self-defense,â an ICE spokesperson said.
If this sounds familiar, itâs because weâve all heard it before. As Lorenzoâs family, activists, and Democratic officeholders have all pointed out, ICEâs response after this shooting has been the same as its response to each ICE-related killing during Trump 2.0: to claim its personnel acted responsibly, and not to wait for an investigation before casting blame on the dead. The New York Times found that Trump administration claims about shootings frequently unravel under legal scrutiny.
One witness told the Washington Post that he heard a manâLorenzoâgurgling and shouting âMe estan matandoââtheyâre killing me, a haunting echo of âI canât breathe,â the final words of Eric Garner and George Floyd, two others killed by law enforcement.
Roman Palomares, president of the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), one of the oldest Hispanic civil rights organizations in the country, accused ICE of a coverup.
âIn the absence of facts from ICE we are left to conclude a man was unlawfully killed on the streets of Houston,â he said. âItâs unacceptable and un-American to use lethal force against a human being and lock away the evidence and expect his family, the people of Houston, the American people to say âWe believe you.â We donât believe you. ICE has not earned that trust from the American people.â
ICE terrorists shot and killed Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in a not too dissimilar manner to Alex Pretti and Renee Good while picking up a crew for a construction project. #AbolishICE
See Also:
The Guardian: âHe did not deserve to dieâ: family of man fatally shot by ICE agent speaks out
The Michael Fanone Show (Michael Fanone and Peter Rothpletz): ICE Killed Again
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