Tag Archives: Guatemala

Fort Worth Star-Telegram: ICE Reports Major Arrest — Slams Biden-Era Decision

Posted on by
Reply

An ICE spokesperson said, “This criminal alien should never have been roaming the streets of Los Angeles. Not only is he a member of the ruthless Surenos gang, but he also has multiple convictions for murder, assault, and rape or sexual abuse of a minor.”

Wow! Golly gee! You finally caught one of the 6% of real criminals that you are supposed to be catching!

Roberto Carlos Munoz-Guatemala, with a history of sex crimes and assault, was arrested after dragging an ICE officer while fleeing in his vehicle.

And a rapist, too. So far you caught only 11% of them.

If you actually concentrated on catching the murderers and rapists instead of masking up and disappearing families from the streets and neighborhods, you wouldn’t have such a godawful PR problem. Unfortunately, like most pigs, you’re too stupid to learn.

ICE Reports Major Arrest — Slams Biden-Era Decision

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/ice-reports-major-arrest-slams-biden-era-decision/ss-AA1HB4gt

Spectrum News: Syracuse mother, four children detained by ICE

Posted on by
Reply

A mother and her four children, three of them born in the U.S., complied with an Immigration and Customs Enforcement order to report for detainment, reporting to the Syracuse ICE office early Tuesday morning.

The woman and her kids, ages 13, 10, 9 and 6, are being sent to Texas, according to their La Vid Verdadera pastor, Paul Reynoso. He says ICE arrested her husband at their Syracuse home last Friday.

The detainment letter arrived just one day later.

The family brought legal filings from their attorneys, but immigration officials said they must still report.

According to the pastor, three of the children were born in the U.S. and attend Syracuse City Schools. 

“We offered to keep the children with us, but she decided to keep the family together,” Reynoso said. “That’s good. The family should stay together.”

Reynoso says the family, originally from Guatemala, has lived in the U.S. for more than a decade. ICE reportedly told them they’ll be housed in a hotel together and provided for during detainment.

Syracuse mother, four children detained by ICE
The woman and her kids, ages 13, 10, 9 and 6, are being sent to Texas, according to their pastor.

https://spectrumlocalnews.com/nys/central-ny/news/2025/06/24/syracuse-mother-children-ice-detainment

SFGate: From San Diego to the Bay Area, California restaurants are on edge over immigration raids

Posted on by
Reply

Brandon Mejia usually spends his weekends conducting a symphony of vendors serving pupusas, huaraches and an array of tacos at his two weekly 909Tacolandia pop-up events.

…

But in the past week, that’s all come to a screeching halt. As the Trump administration ramps up immigration raids in California, some restaurants, worried about their workers or finding that customers are staying home more, are closing temporarily. Many street vendors are going into hiding, and some food festivals and farmers markets have been canceled.

Mejia called off all Tacolandia events last week. His mind raced about whether agents would come for his vendors as videos surfaced on social media of taqueros, farm workers and fruit vendors vanishing in immigration raids around LA and neighboring Ventura County.

“A lot of these vendors, their goal is to have restaurants. They want to follow the rules,” said Mejia, who was born and raised in San Bernardino in a family from Mexico City. But after conferring with vendors, they decided the risk was too high: “Some people have told me that their relatives have got taken, so I don’t want to be responsible for that.”

After a week of mass protests and more raids at farms, grocery stores and at least one swap meet, Mejia and many others remain on edge. Mejia said some small food businesses are getting desperate, trying to decide whether to risk reopening or stay closed while their own families grow hungry.

…

From San Diego to the Bay Area, California restaurants are on edge over immigration raids

https://www.sfgate.com/news/bayarea/article/from-san-diego-to-the-bay-area-california-20385093.php

Newsweek: Texas man with two US citizen children detained by ICE

Posted on by
Reply

A Texas man with two children who are United States citizens was apprehended by federal immigration agents following a traffic stop that turned into a life-altering encounter for his family.

Pablo Jose Morales Petzey, 32, from Guatemala, was detained on June 6 after local police pulled him and his wife over on Highway 6 while they were on their way to a landscaping job. The officer cited a missing license plate, which the family said had fallen off the vehicle unknowingly. The officer called federal authorities after discovering Morales’s immigration status.

…

Rodriguez, a U.S. citizen, told Newsweek the arrest has left their family broken, and their two children, 4-year-old Victoria and 3-year-old son Angel, are struggling to cope with the sudden absence of their father.

“My son Angel has autism and struggles to talk. The only words he says are ‘papa’ and ‘mama,’ and now he just looks out the window to see when his dad will return,” Rodriguez said.

“My daughter cries when she thinks of him in the truck when the police told him to get off, and she started to scream, ‘Why are they taking my dad? Why is he all chained up?’ I just told her everything will be OK with a knot in my throat with nothing else to say.”

One more family cruelly separated!

Texas man with two US citizen children detained by ICE
“They took him with handcuffs and a chain,” his wife, Laura Rodriguez, told Newsweek.

https://www.newsweek.com/texas-man-us-citzen-children-detained-ice-2086161

New York Times: Mexican Flags Have Become Republican Fodder, but Protesters Keep Waving Them

Posted on by
Reply

Images of Los Angeles protesters waving Mexican flags have gone viral in conservative circles this week. Many protesters say they are aware of the political reaction but won’t put their flags away.

But protesters said this week that they see the Mexican flag as a symbol of defiance against Mr. Trump’s immigration policies or of solidarity with other Mexican Americans. The flag has become so ubiquitous in recent decades that it is a part of the Southern California landscape, adorning pickup trucks and flapping from bridges. Few mass gatherings occur in the region without a Mexican flag or two, from weekend soccer matches to Los Angeles Dodgers championship parades.

This week, those who kept waving them said that it was important to honor their heritage and not acquiesce to Mr. Trump, even while they recognized the potential political cost. They said that the flag to them was not un-American, that it represented their Chicano roots rather than a national allegiance.

Mexican Flags Have Become Republican Fodder, but Protesters Keep Waving Them
Images of Los Angeles protesters waving Mexican flags have gone viral in conservative circles this week. Many protesters say they are aware of the political reaction but won’t put their flags away.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/11/us/la-protests-mexican-flags-republican-reaction.html?unlocked_article_code=1.OE8.g1hA.vlsUVEmrDjkH

SFGate: ‘Unbelievable’: Protest against ICE arrests shuts down San Francisco court

Posted on by
Reply

Multiple people were detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in downtown San Francisco on Tuesday morning, merely 12 hours after thousands of protesters took to the streets in the Mission to rally against the widespread raids taking place across California.

The news, first reported by the NBC Bay Area, unfolded around 9:30 a.m. outside of the San Francisco Immigration Court at 100 Montgomery St. The reporter captured footage of ICE agents wearing masks escorting a person into a parked car. About an hour later, two other people were reportedly taken into unmarked cars. One told the NBC reporter that he was from Guatemala. 

…

The public uprising continued into Monday night, when an estimated 9,000 protesters rallied at San Francisco’s 24th and Mission BART Plaza late into the frigid June night.

…

San Francisco Immigration Court canceled the rest of its hearings on Tuesday afternoon and closed the courthouse because of the protests, NBC Bay Area reported. 

‘Unbelievable’: Protest against ICE arrests shuts down San Francisco court

https://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/ice-arrests-san-francisco-courthouse-20370758.php

New York Times: The Mexican Flag Becomes a Potent L.A. Protest Symbol

Posted on by
Reply

Trump officials have cast demonstrators waving the Mexican flag as insurrectionists, but for many protesters who are Mexican American, the flag represents pride in their heritage.

Elizabeth Torres, 36, held a Mexican flag outside the detention center in downtown Los Angeles on Sunday morning.

“I am a very proud American,” said Ms. Torres, whose grandparents immigrated to the United States. “But I have to show support also for our Mexican brothers and sisters.”

Throughout this weekend’s protests, Mexican and other Latin American flags have emerged as protest emblems, angering the Trump administration and its supporters. Trump officials have cast flag wavers as insurrectionists and implied that they are not U.S. citizens.

Stephen Miller, a top White House adviser, called out “foreign nationals, waving foreign flags, rioting and obstructing federal law enforcement attempting to expel illegal foreign invaders” in a social media post on Sunday afternoon.

But for many protesters who are American citizens, the flag signifies pride in their roots, as well as solidarity with immigrants who are being targeted for deportation.

“They’re the children and grandchildren of immigrants,” said Chris Zepeda-Millán, a professor of Chicano studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, who has studied the immigrants rights movement in California. “They have no doubt in their own citizenship or their own belonging here, but they understand the racial undertones of the attacks on immigrants,” he said.

“So you’re getting this reaction of ‘We’re not going to let you make us be ashamed of where our parents and grandparents came from,’” Mr. Zepeda-Millán added.

The Mexican Flag Becomes a Potent L.A. Protest Symbol
Trump officials have cast demonstrators waving the Mexican flag as insurrectionists, but for many protesters who are Mexican American, the flag represents pride in their heritage.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/08/us/mexican-flag-protest-los-angeles.html?unlocked_article_code=1.Nk8.XSvh.dQHlQ_pMcu80&smid=url-share

Washington Post: ‘La migra!’: Day laborers recount ICE raid outside Los Angeles Home Depot

Posted on by
Reply

Angel knew from the moment he raised his hand with a whistle and shouted “Labor!” at a white van pulling into the Home Depot parking lot full of workers last Friday that something felt wrong.

The Honduran immigrant caught a glimpse of the driver and a passenger wearing what looked like bulletproof vests. He followed the vehicle with his eyes as it parked toward the eastern entrance near downtown Los Angeles and the heart of the city’s Central American immigrant community.

His creeping suspicion exploded into full-blown fear just as the doors of the van opened and masked agents began pouring out.

“La migra!” Angel and another day laborer yelled. More than 100 men and women standing in the parking lot began to run. Six migrants who said they were present recounted how federal immigration authorities began handcuffing anyone they could grab in one of several raids in the city that would spark a wave of unrest and leave immigrant workers of all stripes jolted.

The Immigration and Customs Enforcement operation was one of several Friday in Los Angeles that drew widespread criticism from elected leaders and community activists in a city that is home to one of the largest undocumented immigrant communities in the country. As word spread, protesters hit the streets to confront the officers and denounce their actions as a broad attack against immigrant families. The indignation continued into Sunday as officers fired tear gas at demonstrators outside a downtown building where some National Guard troops mobilized by President Donald Trump had been stationed.

The hardware store parking lot was empty for the first 24 hours after the raid. The immigration sweep spooked many day laborers who said they could not recall another enforcement action in which people had been detained so seemingly arbitrarily. But by Sunday, they began to return. Their numbers were far fewer but, they said, they showed up because they had to. There were too many bills to pay and mouths to feed not to work.

‘La migra!’: Day laborers recount ICE raid outside Los Angeles Home Depot
Workers who witnessed the ICE raid outside a Los Angeles Home Depot say officers arbitrarily detained migrants. The sweep was one of several that sparked protests.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/2025/06/08/ice-los-angeles-home-depot-raid-trump

Also at MSN:

‘La migra!’: Day laborers recount ICE raid outside Los Angeles Home Depot
Workers who witnessed the ICE raid outside a Los Angeles Home Depot say officers arbitrarily detained migrants. The sweep was one of several that sparked protests.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/la-migra-day-laborers-recount-ice-raid-outside-los-angeles-home-depot/ar-AA1GkfF2

Newsweek: Pastor in US for 26 years detained by ICE at immigration appointment

Posted on by
Reply

A Florida pastor who has lived in the United States for more than two decades was detained by federal agents during his annual immigration check-in.

Maurilio Amizael Ambrocio Mendez, 42, from Guatemala, was detained at the ICE field office in Tampa on April 17 at around 9 a.m., according to his family. He is currently being held at the Glades County Detention Center.

Ambrocio Mendez had been attending annual ICE appointments for the past 12 years under a court-issued “stay of removal,” a form of supervision allowing him to remain in the country despite a deportation order.

According to his daughter, 19-year-old Ashley Ambrocio, Ambrocio Mendez had always complied with the conditions of his supervision.

Pastor in US for 26 years detained by ICE at immigration appointment
“If they were the ‘real criminals’ Trump is supposedly deporting, they wouldn’t be representing themselves to a judge,” the pastor’s daughter told Newsweek.

https://www.newsweek.com/florida-pastor-detained-ice-immigration-appointment-2080717

Reason: ‘Banal Horror’: Asylum Case Deals Trump Yet Another Loss on Due Process

Posted on by
Reply

President Trump is entitled to try to execute his immigration policy. He is not entitled, however, to violate the Constitution.

The Trump administration this week formally agreed to comply with a ruling that ordered it to facilitate the return of a migrant who was unlawfully deported—in what was another loss for the government as it attempts to subvert basic due process rights in immigration proceedings.

The migrant—named in court documents as O.C.G., who has no criminal history—arrived in the U.S. in May 2024 and sought asylum. An officer agreed he had a credible fear of persecution and torture if returned to Guatemala; a judge assented as well and granted him withholding of removal to that country.

During his proceedings, when he asked if he might be sent to Mexico, a judge replied: “We cannot send you back to Mexico, sir, because you’re a native of Guatemala.” Deportations to a nonnative country legally require, at a minimum, additional steps in the process.

That was particularly relevant to O.C.G.’s case, because, as he testified in court, he claims to have been held for ransom and raped while passing through Mexico, securing release only after a family member paid the sum. Yet two days after his withholding of removal was granted, the government unlawfully deported him—without a chance to contest it—to Mexico, after which he returned to Guatemala, where his attorneys say he lives in hiding and in fear of serious harm.

‘Banal horror’: Asylum case deals Trump yet another loss on due process
The Trump administration this week formally agreed to comply with a ruling that ordered it to facilitate the return of a migrant who was unlawfully

https://reason.com/2025/05/29/banal-horror-asylum-case-deals-trump-yet-another-loss-on-due-process