In mid-January, Rhode Island mom Lilian Calderon was nearly deported for trying to get in line for legal status. The undocumented mom of two and her husband, a U.S. citizen, had gone to an immigration interview with photographs and documents testifying to the authenticity of their relationship in hand, only to have Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) take her into custody.
Calderon was eventually reunited with her family, but not without an intervention from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which sued for her release. It turns out, Calderon wasn’t alone in being targeted. According to an ICE affidavit filed in Calderon’s case, mass deportation agents have arrested six other immigrants in Rhode Island and Massachusetts at similar appointments. Judge Mark Wolf called Calderon’s arrest, “part of a pattern”:
He outlined the case of Fabiano Mateus de Oliveira, a Brazilian national also arrested in January after he went to a government office seeking permanent residency through his marriage to an American.
In March 2017, Leandro Arriaga Gil, a Dominican man, and four other unauthorized immigrants were arrested at a Citizenship and Immigration Services office in Lawrence under similar circumstances, Wolf noted.
In his affidavit, [ICE Field Office deputy director Todd] Lyons wrote that in addition to Calderon and Oliveira, five other people had been detained in January under similar circumstances. One person was detained and released the same day, he said.
In December, Colorado dad Melecio Andazola Morales was deported after being taken into custody at his immigration interview. “We thought it was the last step for him to finally become a permanent resident,” said his daughter Viviana, a U.S. citizen. She had petitioned for him, filed paperwork, paid fees and hired a lawyer, yet he was still taken into custody and deported despite having no criminal record. “Honestly, it was incredibly cruel,” Viviana later said. “In retrospect, now I know they had planned that all along. My dad was trying to do right by the law.”
Nope, ICE isn’t using your tax dollars to target dangerous people and so-called “bad hombres,” they’re instead targeting immigrants Jose “Ivan” Nuñez, who was arrested at his immigration appointment during his attempt to gain legal status through his U.S. citizen husband, Paul Frame. Advocates have also kicked off a petition. “I was the one pushing Ivan to go through with this process,” Frame said during a press conference at a local LGBTQ center. “I said, ‘Let’s become legal, then we have no worries.’” Like Calderon, Andazola Morales, and so many others targeted by ICE, Nuñez has no criminal record:
During an interview in which the couple was seeking an I-130, a petition for an undocumented relative to change immigration status, Frame claims he was asked to leave the room. It was at this moment that Nuñez was taken in custody by ICE and placed in York County Prison, where Frame has been allowed to see him only three times a week.
“Marriage was just was not enough for queer people, particularly for queer people of color,” said GALAEI executive director Nikki Lopez. “In this case, citizenship doesn’t matter because this [Trump] administration sees us how they see us.” “We have an administration that is making it harder and harder to live in this country as an immigrant and criminalizing people of color,” said Juntos executive director Erika Almiron. “This radical love that we’re expressing is a way we’re going to fight back.”
“Under President Trump, every undocumented person living in the United States is a target, a deportation priority,” Viviana wrote in a New York Times op-ed following her dad’s detainment. “This is a grave national security mistake. As this administration creates more distrust and fear in our communities, it is not encouraging people to be honest with law enforcement agents. Undocumented people want to cooperate with the law, but there is no path for them to do so without jeopardy of detainment or removal.”
As the administration claims it’s trying to reform the immigration system with one hand, it’s discouraging those here who might have a path to legal status to veer off it with the other. And, it’s part of their plan. “It injects a sense of fear into the process,” the National Immigration Law Center said last year, “that shouldn’t be there for people who are otherwise going forward with their application that they’re entitled to pursue. They’re now being sent this message that they should be very, very afraid and very cautious.”