Immigrant rights activist Jeanette Vizguerra, who once evaded deportation by living in Denver churches, has been detained by federal authorities.
Vizguerra was arrested at about 11 a.m. Monday by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents while on her lunch break at a Target store, according to her friends family.
Her detention set off a mad scramble among activists, attorneys and the family of Vizguerra, who also goes by Vizguerra-Ramirez. Vizguerra's lawyer filed a petition with the U.S. district court for Colorado on Tuesday morning seeking to stop any deportation actions.
Supporters gathered outside the Aurora Detention Center on Tuesday morning. One of her four children, teenager Zury Baez, spoke with Denverite.
"Yesterday afternoon, when my mom went on her lunchbreak, she got picked up by ICE without any of us knowing, and we're out here trying to get her out know," said Baez, a teenager. "My mom just isn't a regular person. She's been through a lot, and she's helped a lot of people, so now it's time for other people to help her as well."
At times, supporters didn't know where Vizguerra was. Officials initially told the family she had been taken to the airport — though it was confirmed later on Tuesday morning that she remained at the Aurora facility, which is run by the private company GEO.
Vizguerra's family asked ICE to let the case play out in court,. "There is no reason to target her. Nothing has changed in her case except the Administration. It’s clear to us now that the government of our country is targeting our mom in violation of her rights and due process, for her bravery and courage, for her leadership and skill, for her speech," they said in a statement.
Vizguerra's detention comes as the Trump administration has cracked down on immigrants who are seen as political dissidents, sometimes defying judges and moving quickly to strip them of visas and other legal protections.
"She was a symbol of resistance," said Jordan Garcia, a local immigrant rights advocate.
Authorities have moved to revoke the visa and the green card of two students at Columbia University in connection to pro-Palestine protests. A Lebanese doctor was deported for her alleged sympathies for Hezbollah, despite holding a visa and even though a federal judge had ordered the government not to remove her.
“It is definitely something that is meant to send a message to the larger community about the risks of being outspoken and being an activist right now in the Trump administration,” Garcia said. “The good news is that many of our members are saying we will be here for each other, we will take care of each other. They can do all of the threatening that they want, but we won’t go down without a fight.”
On Monday, Vizguerra's family launched a crowdfunding campaign titled “Help reunite my family.” It had raised almost $30,000 by Tuesday afternoon.
"I want a lot of people to know this is happening. I want a lot of people to know this system isn't working well. They're not doing their job well. They lie a lot," Baez said. " I want people to know this system is very corrupt and we're going to get justice for my mom."
John Fabbricatore, the retired field director for ICE in Denver, says the agency tried to deport Vizguerra for years, starting in President Donald Trump's first term.
“She's been against this government, against ICE,” Fabbricatore said. “She's just part of the Abolish ICE movement, and she should have been deported years ago.”
Vizguerra's detention drew immediate condemnation from Democratic elected officials.
Denver Mayor Mike Johnston condemned a "plain abuse of power" that he said was meant to punish Vizguerra for her "political views without the due process that is a cornerstone of our American values," calling for her release.
In a statement, Johnston continued: “Let’s be clear what happened today. This is not immigration enforcement intended to keep our country safe. This is Putin-style persecution of political dissidents."
Johnston continued: "This is the great lie of the Trump Administration. This is not about safety. This is about political theater and political retribution. This doesn’t make this country safer. It makes this country lawless, which is the most unsafe thing any president can do.."
U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet demanded Vizguerra be released from custody.
"Jeanette Vizguerra is a mother and pillar in her community. I am deeply concerned about ICE's actions to detain her without any due process, like a deportation order," Bennet posted on the X microblogging service. "ICE should ensure Jeanette has legal counsel and immediately release her."
U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper also expressed concern, posting that the deportation wouldn't " fix our broken immigration system or secure our border."
Gov. Jared Polis' office said in a statement that he "has met with and knows Jeanette Vizguerra," adding that she poses no threat, has no history of violence "and above all else, deserves due process pursuant to the law."
Polis called for more accountability from the Trump administration about how they're running deportation operations. "The state has not seen any transparent accounting of ICE operations in our state and has not been notified beyond press reports of the apprehension of Ms. Vizguerra," the statement read.
Trump and ICE have pledged to prioritize the "worst of the worst" in the immigration crackdown, but the number of people detained and removed from the U.S. since Trump's inauguration have failed to match his rhetoric. Vizguerra meets none of the criteria they have touted as necessitating immediate deportation.
Fabbricatore, the former ICE official, argued that Vizguerra hadn't taken responsibility for driving without a license or using a fake Social Security number.
“She can never get a green card, never become a citizen,” Fabbricatore said. “ So do we just allow her to stay here, bad mouthing the United States for more years? Because that's what she does every day. And you know, she's on her way home. She can go to Mexico and bad mouth the U.S. from Mexico.”
The American Friends Service Committee, a nonprofit, said the detention raises significant legal issues.
“ICE acted without a valid deportation order and without notifying Ms. Vizguerra or her lawyers. She was suddenly taken into ICE custody and placed at the GEO Group for-profit detention facility. ICE appears to be readying to possibly deport her even though the agency knows they don’t have a valid deportation order,” a statement from the group said. “Her attorneys have raised serious legal errors and concern her due process rights are being violated.”
Who is Jeanette Vizguerra?
Vizguerra became famous for her activism during President Donald Trump’s first term.
She was named one of Time Magazine’s “100 most influential people” in April 2017. Actress America Ferrera wrote her blurb on the list.
"Jeanette moved to the U.S. to be a janitor, working as an outspoken union organizer and building her own company before becoming an advocate for immigration reform — a bold and risky thing for an undocumented immigrant,” Ferrera wrote at the time.
Vizguerra accepted the honor on the front steps of the First Unitarian Society of Denver’s church in Capitol Hill, where she was living in sanctuary to avoid arrest and deportation.
She came to the U.S. in 1997 from Mexico, and lived in the country undocumented and undetected for more than a decade before she was arrested during a 2009 traffic stop for possessing a fake ID.
She returned to Mexico in 2012 to visit her dying mother, then was arrested again when she attempted to re-enter the U.S. Authorities let her stay in the country, but she was required to check in with authorities regularly.
She filed for a U-Visa, a special immigration allowance for people who have been the victim of crimes, and was waiting for a decision on that claim when Trump took office in January 2017.
Deportation was always possible during her regular check-ins with ICE. But it wasn’t until Trump took office, and quickly attempted to curb both legal and illegal immigration, that she and her supporters suspected it would actually happen.
When she took sanctuary in February 2017, Hans Meyer, her attorney at the time, said her resistance was the result of “the brutality and the stupidity of Trump's immigration enforcement plans.”
Then-U.S. Rep. Jared Polis joined Vizguerra’s supporters in calling for a reprieve in her case. At the time, he said she was being targeted by a “rogue ICE agent” with a personal vendetta against her.
Polis and Bennet introduced private bills in Congress that would allow her some time to work through her U-Visa case. Then, in May 2017, she was granted a stay of deportation that allowed her to leave the church.
Polis announced his campaign to become Colorado’s governor just a few months later; Vizguerra and others would accuse him of abandoning their cause after he won and took office.
The special allowances expired in 2019, so Vizguerra took sanctuary for a second time. Though she was able to leave the church again in 2020, her legal status has remained in limbo.
Vizguerra has been a regular face at protests in the years since, and has been a vocal advocate in Facebook groups meant to spread word about ICE presence in the metro area.
