South America29 June, 20263 min read
ICE Air Deportation Flight Delivers 146 Venezuelans as Daniel Alejandro Núñez Ramírez Goes Missing
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ICE deported 146 Venezuelans from Miami to Caracas on a single flight. Hours before two powerful earthquakes struck Venezuela, the deportation flight arrived.
Deported, then Quakes
A deportation flight from the United States delivered 146 Venezuelans to Venezuela on the same day two earthquakes struck, and Oswadeliz Núñez Ramírez has spent five days searching for her son across hospitals in La Guaira and Caracas after he was pulled from the rubble of the Hotel Santuario La Llanada, which collapsed during the tremors. The Miami Herald reported that a member of the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service who identified himself only as “Jonathan” told Núñez Ramírez that he had personally pulled her 28-year-old son, Daniel Alejandro Núñez Ramírez, from the rubble, but five days later his whereabouts remain a mystery.
“I only found out because an official gave him a phone, and he was able to notify me.”
The flight arrived at Simón Bolívar International Airport in Maiquetía near Caracas at 12:30 p.m., and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Flight Monitor confirmed the flight was operated by ICE Air and chartered by Global X, departing from Phoenix, Arizona, with stops in El Paso, Texas, and Miami. Núñez Ramírez said she learned of her son’s arrival at 5:25 p.m. that same day, and she told the Miami Herald, “I only found out because an official gave him a phone, and he was able to notify me.”
Hotel Collapse Scramble
Survivors described a scramble to find bodies and help after the deportees were held in a hotel when earthquakes hit, with Lisbeth Portillo saying she escaped the rubble with about 20 other deportees who walked the streets looking for help. The Independent and South China Morning Post both tied the missing deportees to the hotel collapse in La Guaira, where Portillo said she saw people running, some naked and others barefoot as they emerged from the rubble.
Portillo told the Associated Press that “We walked about five kilometers, and I cried and cried … there was no communication,” and she later said, “I was born again; God gave me a second chance.” The Independent also reported that the Venezuelan government says more than 1,700 people were killed, and it described Portillo’s account of being shaken during the second earthquake after she heard “papa, papa papapa,” and saw women next to her fall.
Legal and Accountability Fight
Beyond the immediate search for missing deportees, a separate federal case ordered the Trump administration to take steps to allow certain Venezuelan immigrants deported to a prison in El Salvador to return to the United States at the government’s expense.
Noovo Info said U.S. District Judge James Boasberg in Washington criticized the White House’s response to an earlier injunction, writing that “Apparently reluctant to participate in this process, the government's response essentially told the Court that it did not care about anything,” and it said the order requires U.S. authorities to provide boarding letters and cover plane tickets.
The same article reported that the 137 men were later sent back to Venezuela as part of a prisoner exchange negotiated by the United States, and it quoted attorney Lee Gelernt saying plaintiffs’ lawyers were in contact with some of the men who had managed to leave Venezuela and are now in a third country.
In the deportation flight case, the Miami Herald reported a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said, “This flight safely reached Venezuela and all illegal aliens on board were returned home,” and added that “ICE is no longer responsible for them” once they are no longer in ICE custody.