Rayos was arrested just days after Trump's government broadened the definition of a "criminal alien", a change that migration activists say affects the majority of undocumented people in the United States.
PHOENIX - For eight years, Guadalupe García de Rayos went to the local office of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to have her case reviewed.
It was a requirement since she was discovered using a false social security number on a migratory network at an aquatic park where she worked during 2008.
Every year, he would enter this office, the agents would review his case, ask him a few questions and García de Rayos would walk away.
Hasta ayer.
On February 8, migration agents arrested Rayos, 35, and began the process of deporting her to Mexico, a country she hasn't seen for two decades. A truck with her on board left the ICE building while demonstrators and activists waited outside. "Liberation, not deportation", they chanted. Rayos' daughter, Jacqueline, carried a sign that read: "Not one more deportation". The activists surrounded the vehicle to try to stop it and seven people were arrested, although the truck ended up backing into the building.
Rayos was arrested just days after Trump's government broadened the definition of a "criminal alien", a change that migration activists say affects the majority of undocumented people in the United States.
"We are living in a new era, an era of war against migrants", said Rayos' lawyer, Ray Ybarra Maldonado, after leaving the ICE building.
The Obama government prioritized the deportation of migrants considered to be a threat to public or national security, who had links to criminal groups or had committed serious crimes or various minor offences. Rayos did not meet any of these criteria, which is why he had been able to stay in the United States even though a judge issued a deportation order against him in 2013.
But that changed with Trump. One of the 18 executive orders he has issued since taking office on January 20 provides that any undocumented migrant convicted of any type of offense - and even those who have not faced charges, but are suspected of having committed "acts that could be a criminal offense" - should be a priority when it comes to deportations.
By midnight on Sunday, Rayos' husband said he was still not sure where the woman was. A vehicle left the building with a police escort, possibly with Rayos on board. Yasmeen Pitts O'Keefe, spokesperson for ICE, said in a statement that Rayos "is under detention by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Service following a removal order issued by the Executive Office for Immigration Case Review" in 2013.
Maldonado, Rayos' lawyer, filed a deportation request, but the ICE press release does not mention this or when the woman would be deported.
Lawyers from one of the main civil rights groups said that Rayos is possibly the first undocumented migrant to be arrested while attending a scheduled meeting with officials since Trump took office. Thousands of others face a similar risk when they attend regular immigration reviews, in good measure because now federal agents can decide who is, or is not, a threat to public safety, activists said.
"This is precisely the most alarming problem with Trump's domestic enforcement order," said Cecilia Wang, deputy legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Trump, Wang said, "has given the agents the leashes and has allowed them to go against the migrants regardless of their ties to and contributions to the United States".
Rayos was 14 years old when she left Acámbaro, a town in the Mexican state of Guanajuato, and went across the border to Nogales, Arizona. Se casó con un hombre que también es migrante indocumentado y tuvieron un hijo y una hija, ambos actualmente en la adolescencia.
"The only crime my mother committed was going to work to give her children a better life", said Jacqueline, before Rayos entered the meeting at ICE accompanied by her lawyer.
Rayos was working at Golfland Sunsplash, an aquatic park in Mesa, a suburb of Phoenix, when agents of the then Maricopa County sheriff, Joe Arpaio, carried out a raid. La arrestaron el 16 de diciembre de 2008, junto con otros empleados, bajo cargos de posible robo de identidad y uso de documentos apócrifos para conseguir empleo. La redada fue una de las primeras ordenadas por Arpaio amparadas en una nueva ley que autorizaba sanancionar a empleadores que contrataran a migrantes indocumentados a sabiendas.
Rayos spent three months in a county jail and another three months in a migrant detention center. In 2013, a migratory court ordered her deported to Mexico, but her case was on hold because the federal authorities of the Obama government decided not to execute the deportation order.
Angel, Rayos' son, still remembers the night his mother was arrested.
"I'll never forget that night, because I've lived with the dread of losing my mother every day since then," she said.
Rayos was afraid to attend the meeting with ICE. Carlos García, director of the migrant rights group Puente, told him he could skip it and hide or take refuge in a church north of Phoenix, where two other unauthorized migrants facing deportation already live.
Rayos decided to present herself anyway, a dangerous bet, but also a demonstration. Outside, volunteers and demonstrators shouted at her as she entered the building: "You're not alone".
Source: The New York Times
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