A federal court late Sunday temporarily blocked the Trump administration from sending three Venezuelan immigrants to Guantánamo Bay, where the U.S. president is planning to jail tens of thousands of people in new detention facilities that critics have likened to concentration camps.
The decision from Judge Kenneth Gonzales of the U.S. District Court for the District of New Mexico came in response to a request for a temporary restraining order filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and other advocacy organizations on behalf of three Venezuelan men currently being held in U.S. immigration detention in New Mexico.
"I fear being taken to Guantánamo because the news is painting it as a black hole," said Abrahan Barrios Morales, one of the petitioners. "I also see that human rights are constantly violated at Guantánamo, so I fear what could happen to me if I get taken there."
Baher Azmy, CCR's legal director, called the judge's decision Sunday a "small but important win for clients otherwise bound to the latest iteration of the legal black hole."
"Will the judge allow the executive branch to smuggle away individuals who have a pending case to a military prison on a remote island where there is no guarantee their rights will be respected or that they will even be able to make a phone call to their lawyers or their loved ones?"
The Trump administration has already moved dozens of people it characterized as Venezuelan gang members from El Paso, Texas to Guantánamo, the site of a notorious U.S. military prison that Amnesty International has described as "a symbol of torture, rendition, and indefinite detention without charge or trial."
The New York Timesnoted over the weekend that the administration "has not released any of their identities, though they are believed to all be men, nor has it said how long they might be held at the island outpost."
"So far, none of the first arrivals have been taken to an emerging tent city that has been set up for migrants," the Times reported. "Instead, they have been housed in the military prison."
According to CCR, its clients "came to the United States seeking asylum, and each passed an initial Credible Fear Interview with U.S. asylum officers by establishing a credible fear of persecution or torture in their home country" of Venezuela.
Jessica Vosburgh, a senior staff attorney at CCR, said in a statement Sunday that "our clients refuse to be used as pawns in this twisted game of punishment theater."
"The question before the court is simple," said Vosburgh. "Will the judge allow the executive branch to smuggle away individuals who have a pending case to a military prison on a remote island where there is no guarantee their rights will be respected or that they will even be able to make a phone call to their lawyers or their loved ones? The answer must be a resounding no."
Rebecca Sheff, senior staff attorney at the ACLU of New Mexico, warned that "transferring immigrants from Otero County to Guantánamo is a blatant attempt to obstruct their legal rights by placing them thousands of miles from their families and attorneys."
"We're outraged that New Mexico and El Paso, against the backdrop of the horrific cruelty of family separation in the first Trump administration, are once again being used as a testing ground for dehumanizing and dangerous immigration policies," Sheff added.