Another family drama in the Cuban community of Miami. The young man from Pinar del Río, Randy Mesa Padrón, 30 years old, entered the United States in 2022 with form I-220A. This Tuesday, he was detained by agents of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) as he left the second asylum court he attended in the United States.
"They are picking up everyone. I saw many young people being taken away. They are not interested in anything," said his wife, Roxana Reguero, in statements to CiberCuba on Wednesday.
During Randy Mesa's appearance in court, where he was accompanied by a lawyer, the judge dismissed his asylum case without even hearing the argument. This was the second court Mesa had attended; a barber by profession, he is married to his girlfriend from Cuba, who is already a resident under the Cuban Adjustment Act. He has a pending family petition and has been detained in a detention center just as he was planning to open his own business in Miami.
Once the judge closed her court, ICE officers were waiting at the doors of the Miami courthouse to take him into custody. At this time, his wife, Roxana Reguero, has managed to locate him in Pompano Beach, in Broward County.
In the first 24 hours of police custody by ICE, Immigration agents attempted to convince him to self-deport to Cuba, but he has refused. When asked about the case, lawyer Willy Allen explained to CiberCuba that not everything is lost and that it is possible to fight.
Allen believes that given the time Randy Mesa has spent in the United States (three years), he is not at risk of being detained because those who are in the crosshairs are the ones who have been in the country for less than two years. They currently constitute easy prey for expedited deportation as their cases are closed and their access to the courts is removed.
"Given the time spent in the United States, he should not have been detained. Now he can pursue asylum and residency while in detention. He should not give up. He must fight," Allen commented in response to questions from CiberCuba.
Randy Mesa entered the United States in February 2022. He is married to a resident (they were dating in Cuba before emigrating to the United States) and has a petition submitted. "He is a barber and has not even a traffic ticket. He is a model person for living in any country in the world, especially here," explains his sister Dainerys Mesa, deeply distressed.
According to reports, Randy Mesa went to the Second Court yesterday with his lawyer and "they closed all asylum cases en masse, allowing ICE to detain them outside the court. They had no time for anything. Once detained, they were being coerced into signing their deportation, being threatened that if they didn’t do it, they would be sent to prisons in other states," he noted to this platform.
"He didn't sign, but an officer told him that he still had an expedited deportation order and that this was happening by mandate of the president, who signed an agreement to massively close the courts and give the green light to ICE. This will ensure the expedited deportation that the processes make so lengthy in time and in the numbers that the government has set," insists Dainerys Mesa.
The couple formed by Roxana Reguero and Randy Mesa, both from Pinar del Río, had future plans. As she recounted through tears, they weren't going out anywhere and were saving every dollar earned with their eyes set on opening their own barbershop and buying a house. All those dreams are, for the moment, put on hold. "They are clipping our wings. Cubans need to unite," the young woman stated, not before criticizing those compatriots who have been in the United States for years and have forgotten that they too once arrived with no money.
The I-220A form is a parole order issued by U.S. immigration authorities after detaining a migrant and allowing their release under supervision. This document is not considered a legal admission or "parole," which has created complications in applying for the Cuban Adjustment Act and obtaining permanent residency.
Lawyer Willy Allen believes that the vast majority of I-220A forms will be legalized, but along the way, there will be victims. Among them, he pointed out those who have been in the United States for less than two years.
Republican Congresswoman María Elvira Salazar requested leeway to work and criticized former DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who, in her opinion, could have easily resolved the I-220A situation but did not. Now the obvious question arises: if it was so easy, why isn't the new Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem, taking that easy step now?
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