Josalin Benitez welled up in tears Friday when talking about the possibility that her father, Alvaro Benitez Reyes, a beloved fixture in Huntington Beach, would be deported.
"I'm not going to have my dad," she said. "I wasn't going to be able to go to school. My plans were ruined. I was confused, upset, sad."
But it didn't happen.
In a big show of community support this week, Benitez Reyes earned a reprieve from being deported to Mexico after the community made hundreds of calls to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials and lawmakers demanding they stop his deportation.
"I never lost faith in God," he said in Spanish. "I said to myself, 'only a miracle will make them return me.'"
It all began Wednesday when he was required to check in at an ICE office. When he showed up, he was detained. The family got a call saying they weren't going to let him out, that he would be deported and was on his Tijuana.
In a statement, community groups RAIZ, Oakview Communidad and the National Day Laborer Organizing Network said they forced ICE to stop the bus and returned Alvaro to his family.
The groups said in a statement that on the day when the U.S. government "once again failed our communities on the Texas v. U.S. case," the immigrant community didn't wait for the administration and "took matters into their own hands to keep a family together."
Alvaro, the father of four, is also a member of RAIZ, a migrant led group who focuses on stopping deportations and fighting against police abuse.
"Yesterday a man was being deported and the community of Orange County stepped up and successfully turned ICE's arm in order to bring back Alvaro from the bus heading to Tijuana," said Alexis Nava Teodoro, staff at NDLON and member of RAIZ. "The people spoke and it should be made clear to ICE and the Obama administration that we will only escalate our efforts when they deny us justice."
They pointed out that ICE eventually exercised discretion in releasing Alvaro, but it came only after "we launched a massive campaign."
Virginia Kice, an ICE spokeswoman, said authorities decided to delay the deportation after receiving inquiries about the case from several local congressional offices.
"U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement remains focused on smart, effective immigration enforcement that prioritizes threats to national security, public safety, and border security," she said in a statement. "Based on his case history, which includes a final order of removal upheld by both the Board of Immigration Appeals and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, Mr. Benitez fell within ICE's enforcement priorities."
