Free Father & Son Detained by ICE in Vermont

10/19 Update: Followng a public campaign denouncing their arrest and calling for their release, Guadalupe and Emanuel are free and back in Vermont! Read more!

Guadalupe and Emanuel Diaz are imprisoned in an immigration detention center after being pulled off the street by ICE in South Burlington, VT. On August 27th, plainclothes agents pulled over the father and son while driving the van of the painting company where they work. Even though ICE was apparently looking for someone else, Guadalupe and Emanuel were detained and are now facing possible deportation.

Guadalupe Diaz and his son Emanuel migrated to the U.S. from their hometown in Chiapas, Mexico as farmworkers. Guadalupe worked on several dairy farms across Vermont before he and Emanuel moved to Winooski to work for a local painting company. Their employer writes that the two are “vital to the success of my business.” In their time in Vermont, both have organized with their community for human rights through their involvement with Migrant Justice and their participation in the Milk with Dignity campaign.

The night before their detention, Emanuel celebrated his 19th birthday with friends and family at the Champlain Valley Expo. He and his father now find themselves behind bars in a detention center in Michigan, where ICE is moving to deport them. But the two are fighting their case. After weeks in detention, they have the possibility of winning their release.

The ICE detention of Guadalupe and Emanuel is just one of dozens of immigration arrests carried out across Vermont since the start of the Trump administration. While ICE and Border Patrol have surveilled, detained, and deported immigrants in the state under previous administrations, detentions and deportations have reached unprecedented levels in recent months – and are continuing to escalate. 

Since the inauguration, Migrant Justice has documented nearly three dozen ICE and Border Patrol actions in Vermont, resulting in the detentions of 77 people. These are only the cases where the organization has been directly involved in supporting detainees and their families; the list represents just a fraction of the overall number of detentions in the state.

• 1/25 Ecuadorian asylum seeker detained by ICE in Burlington
• 2/7 Ecuadorian construction worker detained by ICE on his way to work
• 2/9 Venezuelan family detained by CBP after mistakenly driving to the Canadian border
• 2/22 Mexican man detained in the street while looking for work
• 2/24 Ecuadorian construction worker detained by ICE at a gas station in Burlington
• 3/10 Mexican farmworker detained by CBP in Derby
• 4/4 3 workers detained outside the DMV in S. Burlington by ICE
• 4/9 Arbey Lopez, a Mexican father, detained in Enosburg while delivering food to farmworkers
• 4/14 Mohsen Mahdawi detained by ICE at an immigration appointment in Colchester
• 4/21 8 Mexican farmworkers detained in their homes at a dairy in Berkshire 
• 4/22 Two Haitians detained by CBP while trying to request asylum in Canada
• 5/15 Four Peruvian landscapers detained while driving home from work
• 5/19 Ecuadorian father detained on his way to work
• 5/22 Two Mexican farmworkers detained on their way to their milking shift 
• 5/24 Two Guatemalan sisters detained by ICE while leaving their home in Colchester
• 5/28 11 construction workers detained at a worksite in Newport
• 6/1 Honduran man detained by ICE
• 6/8 Ecuadorian asylum seeker detained by ICE in Burlington on his way to work
• 6/14 Migrant Justice leaders Nacho and Heidi detained in Richford while delivering food to farmworkers
• 7/26 Mexican father of three, in US for over 30 years, pulled over and detained by CBP while on vacation in VT
• 7/27 Ecuadorian roofer detained by ICE while driving home from the store
• 7/30 4 Ecuadorian construction workers detained by CBP coming off the Lake Champlain ferry on their way to a worksite
• 8/2 3 Mexican workers detained at a lumber yard in Essex
• 8/4 Mexican farmworker pulled off a tractor and detained by CBP in Berkshire
• 8/8 Nicaraguan asylum seeker pulled over and detained by ICE
• 8/12 3 men detained by ICE at a bus station in Colchester
• 8/19 9 Ecuadorian construction workers detained by CBP leaving a worksite in Barton
• 8/25 Jamaican care worker and mother of three, Davona Williams, detained at her home in Manchester by ICE 
• 8/26 Guatemalan father of two detained in front of his home in White River Junction
• 8/27 Peruvian father detained by ICE in Rutland
• 8/27 Mexican painter detained by ICE in front of his house in Winooski
• 8/27 Guadalupe and Emanuel pulled over and detained by ICE in South Burlington

Guadaulpe and Emanuel are among the latest in a long string of detentions. Each represents an abuse of human rights and a lifelong trauma for those taken off the street, out of their homes, and from their workplaces. Most who are detained are deported under the radar and without due process. Yet some, like Guadalupe and Emanuel, have the possibility of winning their release and stopping their deportations.

Guadalupe and Emanuel must be freed! Sign the petition to tell the immigration judge to release the father and son, so they can return to their family and community in Vermont.