José Angel Gutiérrez ● Detentions, Incarcerations, and Deportations by the USA ● Our Voices/Nuestras Voces

Detentions, Incarcerations, and Deportations by the USA

José Angel Gutiérrez joseangelgutierrezbooks.com

voiceofthemainland.blogspot.com/voces-index

Every day, if you watch television or even posts on social media platforms, there is news about more killings, detentions, incarcerations and deportations by ICE, the Border Patrol, and, other police of Homeland Security. The latest statistics as of December 14, 2025 were that these agencies under the direction of President Trump, had deported some 68,000 persons from US soil. They were not harden criminals much less gang members of Tren de Aragua from Venezuela. Many were lawful US residents and citizens, few have been criminals. They arrest people as if they are meeting a quota. This is exactly why they are doing this across the country.

There are hundreds of protests being held across the country protesting these “official” crimes including murders of innocent people whose crime was to be monitoring the ICE and Border Patrol officers dressed in incognito garb to hide their true identities. No body cameras are worn by them. They do not wear name tags. Their faces usually are covered up as if they were bank robbers. They have no warrants to arrest anyone; they just randomly arrest anyone they feel like. Kill them if necessary. Necessary now means resisting being in their way, manhandled by them, shouting at them to stop, filming them, asking what crime you have committed and being in a protest. What makes these mass arrests so illegal is the arbitrariness, lack of due process, side-stepping constitutional rights, and being so blatant about their behavior.

All US presidents have deported people from the US. George W. Bush deported 2, 030,965 during his 8 years. That does not break Obama’s record at 2, 749,706. That is why Chicanos and Mexican origin people nicknamed him “Deporter in Chief.” Clinton deported 863,958 in 8 yrs. while Biden in 4 years deported only 545,282. But some of the other most atrocious actions have been not too long ago.

During the Depression years, 1929 to 1939, about 2 million Mexican origin people were deported from the US. Estimates range from 40 to 60 percent, that among these 2 million were US citizens, mostly children.

Frankline Delano Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942. It was not meant to be a Happy Valentine’s Day remembrance. He had his national police round up and detain 122,000 persons in the US because they were Japanese. Of these, 70,000 were US citizens. He suspected that any and all Japanese ancestry people were enemies of the US. It was World War II when the US was at war with Japan and other countries. In my hometown of Crystal City, Texas there was such an internment camp. When the war was over those facilities became our segregated schools for Mexican origin kids like me.

A decade later in 1954, Republican president Dwight D. Eisenhower initiated Operation Wetback. That is what the massive nationwide round up was called. The target to be deported were Mexican origin people, some 1.3 million were deported. Approximately 26% of these were US citizens. Ronald Reagan deported some 7.8 million people from all different ancestries in the US, not just Mexicans in his 8 years.

These statistics and presidential terms help realize that lots of racism is behind who get detained and deported. Usually, it has been Mexican origin people by Democrats and Republicans alike. We are not the most desired people to stay in the US, except when recruiting for domestic, agricultural, construction and service labor. It is as if the left USA hand brings us in as labor and their right hand deports us as unwanted, criminal, illegal aliens.

Third Country Deportations

Those deported are not always sent back to their home countries. The US claims their home countries do not want them anymore than the US so they are sent to third countries at a heavy price. Deportees in this past year, 2025, have been sent to countries to which they have no connection whatsoever. The biggest gain for the US is that this increasingly favored practice circumvents immigration law. A deportee cannot assert any US Constitutional rights either while detained in a foreign country. There is no oversight as to how these deportees are treated in these 3rd countries. Thers is no monitoring as to compliance and transparency by the US and these 3rd countries. It is a huge waste of our taxpayer monies to send them abroad. Up to January 2026, more than $40 million dollars has been spent on countries which have agreed to take US deportees. These third countries which have taken in over 300 persons and money amounts so far are: Rwanda 7 of($7.5 million), Eswatini (15 for $5.1 million), Equatorial Guinea (29 for $7.5 million), Palau (0 for $7.5 million), and El Salvador (250 for $4.76 million). Then, there is the

cost of the flights to and from these countries. No figures have been released yet on the private airlines. When the US military uses one of its aircraft, it cost taxpayers $32,000 per hour. There are other countries utilized such as Cuba’s Guantanamo Bay prison in possession of the US since Fidel Castro took over back in the 1960s. There is also the Congo (15 sent), Ghana, Nigeria, and Jamaica that also have taken in US deportees for money.

What is known and reported, for example, by Transparency International in their Corruption Perception Index of 2025 (www.transparency.org) is that Africa is the most corrupt region in the world. Out of 182 countries scored, the US ranks 64. Then, the scores get worse: South Sudan (9), Sudan (14), Equatorial Guinea (15), Eswatini (23), and the Congo (20). Are the US taxpayer monies going to house and care for the deportees or fuel the corruption in the third countries? Other information was obtained from the US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations/Minority Report as of February 2026.