Arresting A Married Gay Man During His Green Card Interview?
Chester County, Pennsylvania resident Jose “Ivan” Nuñez was in the middle of his application for a green card on January 31 when the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (or ICE for short) arrested him.
It was Nuñez’s husband, Paul Frame, that convinced him to apply for the green card in the first place.
“I was the one pushing Ivan to go through with this process,” Frame said during a press conference on Monday at Philadelphia’s William Way LGBT Community Center (seen below). “I said, ‘Let’s become legal, then we have no worries.”
Unfortunately, it was during the meeting with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services that Nuñez was arrested and taken away by ICE. This is a tactic that ICE has been using more frequently since Trump’s administration took over, and is being criticized greatly.
Frame later gave more details about how the moment went down.
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While the couple were in an interview for an I-130, a petition for an undocumented relative ot change immigration status, Frame was asked to leave the room.
Then, ICE offiicals came in and grabbed Nuñez. He was then transported to the York County Prison.
Gonzalo Peralta of Audrey Allen Immigration Law is representing the couple. In addition, social justice organizations GALAEI and Juntos are protesting for them. The two groups created a petition, which already has 800 signatures, asking for Nuñez’s release.
“Marriage was just was not enough for queer people, particularly for queer people of color,” said GALAEI executive director Nikki Lopez. “In this case, citizenship doesn’t matter because this [Trump] administration sees us how they see us.” “We have an administration that is making it harder and harder to live in this country as an immigrant and criminalizing people of color,” said Juntos executive director Erika Almiron. “This radical love that we’re expressing is a way we’re going to fight back.”
We’ll keep you updated as the story progresses.
