They have helped put out fires in neighborhoods, offered shelter, food and spiritual guidance to those in need and provided live coverage of protests and immigration enforcement to hundreds of thousands of Spanish speakers. Many are parents and the sole providers for their families.
But despite their contributions, immigration officials still detained them as part of President Donald Trump’s massive crackdown on undocumented immigrants.
The arrests happened as some of these immigrants were working or commuting to and from their jobs.
Neighbors, friends and colleagues have united behind many of the community pillars taken into custody in recent months raising tens of thousands of dollars for their families and legal fees and urging immigration authorities to release them.
Here are some of the prominent community members who have been arrested by ICE in recent months:
Milton Guamarrigra is known to many in Port Chester, New York, as a family man who made a living as a marble installer and a volunteer with the local fire department.
But that life was ripped away from Guamarrigra earlier this month when United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers arrested him as he was leaving his home to go to work, according to CNN affiliate WLNY.
Many in the community are rallying behind Guamarrigra who, as of early August, was being held at an ICE field office in Michigan, according to CNN affiliate WLNY.
Port Chester Mayor Luis Marino said he has known Guamarrigra and his family for many years and wrote a letter to the federal government highlighting Guamarriga’s volunteer service to the fire department and good character. Marino said the fire department volunteers are like a family and Guamarrigra was part of it.
“He was active, and he was there when we needed him,” Marino said. “He got along with everyone.”
According to WLNY, Guamarrigra wanted to go to college and study IT and had worked for 20 years as a local marble installer.
Marino said Guamarrigra immigrated to the US from Ecuador but was uncertain how long ago.
Court records show Guamarrigra was convicted twice of driving while intoxicated in New York in 2003 and 2006.
Guamarrigra’s family has raised more than $13,000 on GoFundMe to help pay for their legal fees “to ensure he receives a fair chance and that we can work toward bringing him home.”
“My father has recently been detained, and our family is navigating a deeply emotional and challenging time,” the GoFundMe page read. “He is a loving father, a hardworking man, and someone who has always put his family first.”
“The way that they took my father … they made it out to seem like he was a criminal when that’s not even the case at all,” Guamarrigra’s daughter, Jocelyn Guamarrigra, told WLNY.
Journalist Mario Guevara has spent the last 20 years covering law enforcement and immigration in the metro Atlanta area.
He has worked for several Spanish language outlets and founded the digital news outlet MG News which has 113,000 followers on Facebook; his personal account has 782,000 followers.
On June 14, Guevara was arrested while livestreaming law enforcement officers at a “No Kings” demonstration in the metro Atlanta area. The event was one of a few thousand held across the country that day in protest of President Donald Trump and his policies.
Guevara, who came to the US from El Salvador in 2004, was charged with improperly entering a pedestrian roadway, obstruction of law enforcement officers and unlawful assembly. He was wearing a vest and press credentials at the time of his arrest.
Guevara has legal authorization to work in the United States but does not hold a permanent resident card, advocates say.
A habeas corpus petition filed by Guevara on Aug. 20 says that during a bond a hearing on July 1, the “government asserted that Mr. Guevara posed a danger to the community because of his reporting.” An immigration judge, however, disagreed and granted him bond, the petition states.
The federal government appealed Guevara’s release on bond, and the Board of Immigration Appeals granted a stay, according to the legal filing. Guevara remains in custody despite all charges against him being dropped.
He is being held in isolation at Folkston ICE Processing Center in Folkston, Georgia – his fifth detention location in more than two months, according to the ACLU.
Katherine Jacobsen, program coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists, said the federal government’s refusal to release Guevara “sends a very chilling message both to those who might be caught up in ICE actions as well as journalists … that there will be consequences if you cover this topic.”
“The charges against him have been dropped,” Jacobsen said. “There is no rational reason that we are aware of, that the government has made public, as to why he is continuing to be held.”
Jacobsen said Guevara has three children and is the primary breadwinner for his family. One of Guevara’s children relies on him for long-term medical care, according to the ACLU.
“They were relying on him to put food on the table, and he is now in prison,” Jacobsen said. “It’s a very difficult situation.”
Maryland pastor took care of the needy
Daniel Fuentes Espinal came to the US from Honduras in 2001 to flee poverty and violence.
Espinal built a life for himself and his family here, working in construction and volunteering as a pastor at Iglesia del Nazareno Jesus Te Ama, also known as the Church of the Nazarene Jesus Loves You, in Easton, Maryland.
Espinal became known as a spiritual leader who opened up his home and provided shelter, food, coats and suits for job interviews for those in need, family friend Len Foxwell said.
On July 21, ICE agents arrested the father of three for overstaying his visa. His daughter Clarissa Fuentes Diaz told CNN the arrest happened as Espinal left McDonald’s and headed to a construction site to drop off some materials he bought at Lowe’s. An unmarked vehicle, she said, followed him, pulled him over and a uniformed officer arrested him.
ICE confirmed Espinal’s arrest to CNN last month saying in a statement he was “an illegal alien from Honduras who was arrested by ICE on July 21, in Easton, Maryland.”
“Fuentes entered the United States on a 6-month visa and never left in 24 years,” the statement said. “It is a federal crime to overstay the authorized period of time granted under a visitor’s visa.”
Espinal was released from custody on August 15 after supporters wrote dozens of letters highlighting his impact on the community and advocating for him to be freed, Foxwell said.
Foxwell said he believes the letters as well as the national attention Espinal’s case received weighed heavily on the judge’s decision to release him.
“I believe it was a combination of the intense level of interest in the pastor’s plight and his remarkable personal attributes,” Foxwell said.
Foxwell said Espinal’s arrest was “devastating and frightening” because he was such a pillar for the Easton community. Now, he said, there is “a sense of relief and a sense of joy.”
“If something like this can happen to somebody with his reputation and stature, then it really was a sobering reminder that it could happen to anybody and therefore nobody is safe,” Foxwell said.
Espinal had spent the last decade trying to apply for a green card but faced a lot of bureaucratic red tape, according to Foxwell. He will now resume that process so he can remain in the US legally, Foxwell said.
Foxwell noted Espinal does not have a criminal record. Online court records in Maryland also indicate that Fuentes Espinal has no criminal history.
“For those who falsely characterize these immigrants as being net takers from society, I think the experience of Pastor Fuentes Espinal reveals the lie of that mentality,” he said. “This is someone who was putting money back into the economy by earning a fair wage for a hard day’s work and paying his taxes faithfully.”
