Arizona Daily Star border reporter Emily Bregel reported last Sunday that our government is in the business of jailing confused grandmothers with no criminal history.
Julia Benitez is 79. She has worsening dementia. She has been, for no reason other than our government’s contempt and disregard for all asylum seekers (unless they are whites from South Africa), kept in the Eloy Detention Center for the past nine months.
She is being ruthlessly, needlessly imprisoned despite the fact that the government from which she is fleeing — Cuba’s — is routinely excoriated by President Trump, Secretary of State Rubio and many other federal officials.
Yes, crossing the border without authorization is a misdemeanor, but at the same time, our laws say that anyone has the right to request asylum once they're on U.S. soil, or at a port of entry. Julia Benitez was exercising her human right, and her right under international and U.S. laws, to seek protection here.
Her detention is a stain upon this country.
Now, after Bregel’s story has publicized Benitez’s situation, there is even less justification for the government to keep her away from the family members, lawful residents, who want to take care of her.
Let her go.
Julia Benitez is not the “worst of the worst.” She is not MS-13 or Tren de Aragua or a member of any other gang ICE would like to name in order to demonize her. She is a threat to absolutely no one. It is an outrageous violation of human rights to keep her locked up.
Let her go.
Her detention begs the question of how many other similarly harmless and non-offending people are being detained in the same manner, and the answer, of course, is many. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has largely stopped using the power it has to release vulnerable people on a humanitarian basis, Bregel’s reporting revealed.
The number of elderly people with no criminal records arrested by immigration authorities in Arizona has increased fivefold since Trump’s second term began.
Let her go.
To detain people like Benitez is a perversion of the government’s power. It calls into question every arrest ICE has made under Trump. How can the ICE supervisor responsible for her continued detention sleep at night? How can her jailers, the private firm CoreCivic, live with themselves?
If ICE released Julia Benitez on humanitarian parole, it would be just for the duration of her immigration proceedings. It wouldn't affect whether or not she would be deported once her case is decided.
Let her go.
U.S. Rep. Adelita Grijalva, alerted to Benitez’s plight by Bregel’s story, visited the woman, affectionately known as “la abuela” within the Eloy center’s walls.
The congresswoman cried when she saw what the government that she is a part of had done.
Let her go.
Benitez thought when Grijalva visited her that it meant she was being released. When she realized Grijalva was leaving without her, she cried.
ICE has much to answer for, including the Minnesota deaths and countless unjustified and needlessly violent arrests. But speaking of the worst of the worst, not much is worse than locking up a harmless, ill elderly woman.
Let her go. Now.
Follow these steps to easily submit a letter to the editor or guest opinion to the Arizona Daily Star.
