Another Cuban, Eduardo Núñez González, has requested his deportation to Spain.
14ymedio, Havana, 10 April 2025 — U.S. Immigration and Customs Control (ICE) is keeping the futures of José Francisco García Rodríguez and Eduardo Núñez González in limbo. Although the former was released after a week at the processing center in Pine Prairie, Louisiana, he has to check in periodically with the immigration office in the future. The second, a Spanish national, has requested deportation to Madrid because he “cannot stand the festering conditions” of the detention center in New Mexico where he is currently being held.
García Rodríguez, 73, arrived in the United States during the Mariel exodus in 1980, when more than 125,000 Cubans left by sea in what came to be known as the Mariel Boatlift. He accepted that he made mistakes in the early years of his arrival in the country but paid for them by serving time.
The US government is implementing the Laken Riley Act, signed by President Donald Trump at the beginning of his second term, to detain and deport irregular migrants who are accused but not yet convicted of crimes such as robbery or assault.
“However, in this specific case, that did not happen because the individual was from Cuba,” lawyer Tala Voosoghi told local television channel KATC 3. According to the lawyer, the “marielito” has refugee status and therefore “cannot be deported to his country of origin.” Hence, this migrant “finds himself in a kind of limbo.”
Voosoghi explained that when they are arrested “many times, after completing their sentence, as in this case, they are released and receive a supervision order, which means that they have to report to ICE periodically, and while they continue doing so, they generally stay here indefinitely.”
The release of García Rodríguez is just the beginning;”there’s a lot to be solved,” said his stepson, Tyler García.
Christian Cooper Riggs, his stepdaughter, said, “Our country has a delicate immigration path ahead. I believe that we can protect our borders by analyzing individual cases. It is not a political issue, but one of humanity.”
Meanwhile, Eduardo Núñez González, the Cuban-Spaniard who was arrested by the FBI on March 20 while taking out the garbage, is being held in the detention center of Torrance County, in New Mexico, which has been denounced by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) because of the conditions in which migrants are kept.
Vilma Pérez Delgado told the Nuevo Herald that her husband “remains permanently immobilized in the center, with a chain around his waist. They also keep him isolated, without visits, and he suffers from chronic bronchitis without medical attention.”
The conditions under which he is held led the family to consider deportation to Spain. The Cuban has received an electronic tablet to carry out his request. Catholic Legal Services’ managing lawyer in Miami, Rebeca Sánchez-Roig, told the same media that for this to happen, an official order from an immigration judge is required.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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