What seemed for dozens of Cubans to be the end of a migratory nightmare turned into another one, longer, darker, and much more bewildering.
After spending weeks detained at Guantánamo Naval Base, a group of deported Cubans was transferred back to the United States, in an unexpected turn that left many families feeling a mix of momentary relief and renewed despair.
According to The New York Times, most of these men are currently confined at the Adams County Correctional Center in Natchez, Mississippi, while one of them was separated from the group and sent to Houston for medical care.
Relatives cited by the New York newspaper claim that the men were returned to U.S. territory on Monday on a charter flight operated by ICE with Global X, a 175-seat passenger plane. However, the return merely represented another transfer within the same limbo.
The plight of these Cubans began when many accepted deportation, believing they would return to Cuba before Christmas to reunite with their families and put an end to years of uncertainty. Some even voluntarily gave up their immigration proceedings in immigration courts, trusting that this would speed up their departure, according to their relatives in a report to the New York Times at the end of January.
But the plane did not land in Havana.
Starting in December, the first 22 ended up at the U.S. military base in Guantanamo, confined in penitentiary facilities that had been associated for years with detainees accused of terrorism. As weeks passed, more flights brought in additional Cubans, raising the number of detainees at the base to 55 by early January, according to the report.
At that time, relatives reported that several were transferred "deceived," isolated for days, handcuffed, and treated like criminals, despite many not having criminal records and some even having applied for asylum or holding work permits.
Now, after weeks in Guantánamo, the group finds itself trapped again, but this time within the United States.
The authorities of the Department of Homeland Security have not publicly explained why these Cubans were selected to be sent to Guantanamo, nor why they were returned to Mississippi, amidst a process that has been described by critics as an expensive political spectacle.
"The fact that the Trump administration sent dozens of Cubans to Guantánamo for weeks, only to bring them back to the United States, reveals the absurdity of the government’s policy in Guantánamo," stated Lee Gelernt, a lawyer for the ACLU, as quoted by the New York Times. "Simply put: it’s political theater designed to scare immigrants."
The operation in Guantánamo is part of the immigration offensive driven by President Donald Trump. According to data cited by the New York Times, around 780 migrants have passed through the base during this campaign. However, many have had to be returned to the United States before being deported, as was the case with the Cubans.
The background appears to be a broader political conflict between Washington and the Cuban regime.
According to the report, Cuban migrants would be caught in a tug-of-war between both governments, at a time when the Trump administration has also intensified its pressure on Havana, including measures related to Venezuelan oil.
Although since April 2023 there have been nearly monthly repatriation flights for Cubans deported from the United States, the New York Times notes that in January no agreement was reached to send a flight to Havana, which would have left the Cubans stranded in Guantanamo until they were again transferred to U.S. territory.
It is unclear what the next step will be if Cuba continues to refuse to accept deportees. The United States has agreements to send some Cubans to Mexico, and is also reportedly negotiating with Argentina to accept deportees from other countries.
Meanwhile, families continue to experience the same anguish as always: brief phone calls, incomplete news, fear of reprisals, and a question that has been repeated for weeks: when will this end?
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