Illinois Rep. Mike Quigley leads a letter signed by more than two dozen House Democrats slamming Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for its continued refusal to release vulnerable LGBTQ asylum-seekers amid the novel coronavirus pandemic, writing “Detaining LGBTQ asylum seekers, especially in the midst of a COVID-19 pandemic, is dangerous and irrational.”
“LGBTQ asylum seekers, like Yanelkys Moreno-Agramonte are terrified for their safety due to ICE’s wholly in adequate response to the COVID-19 pandemic,” they tell acting Homeland Security Sec. Chad Wolf. “This fear is heightened for LGBTQ individuals who are already particularly vulnerable to abuse and mistreatment in immigration detention.”
“Ms. Moreno-Agramonte is a lesbian from Cuba who, together with her partner, fled homophobic persecution in search of safety in the United States,” the legislators write. “However, instead of finding protection, Ms. Moreno-Agramonte was separated from her partner and placed in immigration detention, where she remains today.”
She’s eligible for release right now and has a sponsor waiting to shelter her, they continue. “Nevertheless, ICE refuses to release her, even amid a lethal pandemic,” instead making an intentional decision to keep her further locked up in inhumane conditions, including a more than week-long period when she was deprived of basic hygienic products including toilet paper.
“For instance, in March and in the beginning of April, Ms. Moreno-Agramonte reported that the South Louisiana ICE Processing Center (‘South Louisiana’), where she is detained, experienced frequent shortages of sanitation products, including a nine-day period where Ms. Moreno-Agramonte and others went without toilet paper or soap,” legislators write.
“South Louisiana continues to mismanage its COVID-19 response today,” they continue. “In fact, social distancing is impossible in Ms. Moreno-Agramonte’s sleeping quarters and detention staff are not required to wear masks despite the extremely close quarters and rapid spread of the virus.” Just days ago, a federal judge in fact slammed the mistreatment of Florida detainees in her court ruling ordering the agency to give them soap and masks, noting that a guard standing next to a detained person who testified as part of the lawsuit wasn’t even wearing a mask.
Since ICE clearly has to be forced to do the bare minimum, it could just release detainees to sponsors and communities who actually do give a damn about their safety and lives. But it won’t even do that. “ICE has proven itself incapable of protecting the people in its custody, routinely ignoring CDC guidelines and ICE’s own Pandemic Response Requirements,” legislators said.
“Ms. Moreno-Agramonte’s detention and the risk it poses to her health, and others like her, is entirely avoidable,” they tell Wolf. “We believe that there is no justification for detaining her, especially when weighed against the risks to her health and safety in immigration detention. We urge ICE to consider, within all applicable rules and regulations, releasing Ms. Moreno-Agramonte and all LGBTQ asylum seekers immediately.”