Daughter says she still doesn't know why Chicago area immigrant advocate was arrested by ICE
The daughter of a longtime immigrant advocate said her mother had no deportation order or reason to be arrested when she was detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement earlier this month.
Gladis Yolanda Chavez Pineda was an organizer with Organized Communities Against Deportations. Pineda's attorney and her daughter are told she was being held at a facility in Kentucky as of Tuesday.
"She feels very overwhelmed and stressed, like she doesn't have any motivation to keep fighting anymore," said Chavez Pineda's daughter. "She keeps saying she would rather like, she doesn't want to be there anymore."
Chavez Pineda's daughter said her mother left an entire life behind. The daughter and Chavez Pineda's attorney said they have been fighting for her asylum status since she arrived in Chicago from Honduras over a decade ago.
"My graduation is next year. I'm turning 18 in August," said Chavez Pineda's daughter. "Like, it's very emotionally impactful to have her taken away."
That asylum status, the daughter and attorney said, was still pending when ICE picked up Chavez Pineda at a check-in location on South Michigan Avenue in the South Loop on June 4. At the time, Chavez Pineda was trying to report for an immigration check-in.
Chavez Pineda's daughter said her mother received a text to report, and she did — trying to do the right thing while still hoping for official asylum status.
"She had an ankle monitor, and I don't know where they just told her to go to a meeting, and then they didn't let her go out anymore — but they gave her no reasoning of why they were arresting her," the daughter said. "She didn't have a deportation order, and the judge never told her that she had to be deported, and they gave her absolutely no reasoning to be arrested."
Chavez Pineda's 17-year-old daughter asked that her face not be shown.
"She's never done anything bad — like no criminal record — and she's paying taxes," the daughter said.
Pineda's daughter also said her mother had a work permit and had been using it.
Now living with her brother, Chavez Pineda's daughter waits for her mom's daily calls from the third facility to which her mom has been brought — this one in Kentucky.
"She was in the van for seven hours being shackled from her hands and her feet. they were not able to get out of the van to stretch — and I think she was in the van for seven hours, jam-packed with other people," said Chavez Pineda's daughter. "They're really treating them like criminals."
Chavez Pineda's daughter also said her mother has complained about conditions at the Kentucky facility.
"Where is she right now, she said that there's no beds available, because all the beds are being occupied — and they had to wait till somebody gets deported or released until they get a bed," the daughter said.
Michael Drake has been working with the lead attorney on the case. He explained how it has been difficult to get in touch with clients taken to ICE detention in different states.
"Impossible — I mean, very, very difficult by nature. I think that's part of it — making it difficult to talk to your clients, or making you have to jump through a hundred hoops to do a very basic thing like talk to your client — is, I think, part of the agenda."
Meantime, advocates continue to use everything from Divvy bikes to wooden planks to block Immigration Court — hoping to prevent another case like Chavez Pineda's.
At the facility where Chavez Pineda was taken into custody, U.S. Reps. Raja Krishnamoorthi and Jonathan Jackson (D-Illinois) tried to get their own answers Tuesday. They said agents tried to kick them out.
"This is federally paid property," said Krishnamoorthi. "We should be able to conduct oversight here, and we're going to insist, following this visit, on doing just that."
Chavez Pineda's attorney said they were able to get a stay order for her, which means they do not believe she will be imminently deported. But she does remain in custody.
CBS News Chicago was still waiting Tuesday on information from ICE on why they are detaining people at check-ins. CBS News Chicago also asked specifically about the Chavez Pineda case.
