The immigration attorney, Avelino González, has issued a public warning stating that the route between Miami-Dade County and the Florida Keys has become a sort of border where ICE detains Cubans with I-220A on a daily basis.
The statement was made to journalist Gloria Ordaz during the program "Virtual Meeting," of Telemundo 51.
González indicated that the area between Miami-Dade and the Keys has become a sort of internal border where immigration authorities have intensified controls against Cubans with irregular status.
"Raids are happening every day," warned González.
"Practically what happens between Miami-Dade and the Keys is a border," he added.
The lawyer recounted the case of one of his clients, a Cuban who was detained while traveling from Marathon to Miami.
His wife, who also holds an I-220A document, has been unable to visit him for fear of being arrested during the journey.
"She is terrified... she thinks that if she goes out towards Marathon, they might stop her too," González explained.
González also reported that even those with pending appeals are not safe: “There are people with pending appeals at the Board of Immigration Appeals in Virginia, who are supposed to be untouchable, and they have been taken and appear in Mexico within four days.”
Despite the climate of fear, González did not rule out the legal avenues available: "I haven't lost faith in the federal appeal circuits. Something could still happen in a federal appeal circuit."
As is known, the I-220A document allows for temporary release under supervision of migrants detained by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), but it does not grant definitive immigration status nor does it protect against new detentions.
As it does not equate to a formal admission or a parole, it prevents Cubans from benefiting from the Cuban Adjustment Act to apply for permanent residency.
González described the legal mechanism that ensnares these migrants as a deliberate one.
"The reality is that this is intentional. If they halt the residency process, ICE does not consider pending applications, and when you appear before a judge, that judge has no jurisdiction over that application. Therefore, the only option left is asylum… and for the most part, people end up being deported," he stated.
The situation worsened following Trump's presidential proclamation signed in December 2025, which suspended all immigration proceedings for citizens of 19 countries, including Cuba and Venezuela. This includes status adjustments, stay extensions, and status changes.
The figures reflect the magnitude of the phenomenon.
According to a recent analysis by the Cato Institute, based on data from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), approvals for residency for Cubans dropped by 99.8%: from over 10,000 monthly in February 2025 to just 15 in January 2026.
At the same time, the detentions of Cubans by ICE have increased by 463% since October 2024.
In April, a federal judge in Maryland ordered the reactivation of residency applications for 83 immigrant plaintiffs, declaring the indefinite suspension imposed by the Trump administration illegal.
In March, lawyers had already filed a federal class action lawsuit over delays affecting more than 100,000 Cuban residences.
The political analyst from Telemundo 51, Alex Penelas, believed that this immigration policy will have little electoral effect on the Republican candidates as the November 2026 elections approach.
“The political impact is going to be very limited, even though some family members who vote in the elections could be affected; however, that generation, which is more affected by these decisions, is frankly the segment of voters that participates the least in elections,” he argued.
Penelas noted that the new Cuban immigrants are more focused on everyday survival than on civic participation.
"They are more concerned, Gloria, about the daily aspects of life, about sending food, medicine, and help to their family members in Cuba. In other words, what they didn’t experience in Cuba, they don’t practice here either," she asserted.
"The strong vote of Cubans in this community is the historical exile... and the numbers prove it," concluded Penelas, referring to the electoral bloc that remains decisive in the primaries and the general elections in November.
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