Azucena Marisol Gonzalez Ortiz (left) was at the immigration office when she learned she was being detained. (Photo credit Christian Mendoza)
Ashly Benítez Gonzalez said when she got a note to leave class Tuesday, she thought her mom had come to pick her up.
“I thought, oh, maybe she’s picking me up to go eat, because she’s here with us, and nothing happened,” Benítez Gonzalez said.
But Benítez Gonzalez quickly learned that her mom wasn’t there to pick her up and would not be home.
“I don’t think it’s fair that they’re doing this,” Benítez Gonzalez said.
Her mother, Azucena Marisol Gonzalez Ortiz, was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) during her routine check-in with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. During that meeting, an ICE agent informed her she would be taken into custody.
Christian Mendoza, Gonzalez Ortiz’s immigration lawyer, was in the room.
“I offer[ed] plenty of other opportunities … why not an ankle monitor to, you know, why are you doing this?” he said.
What shocked Mendoza was the fact that this happened to Gonzalez Ortiz, who had no criminal record.
“She’s been my client for many, many years, never missing an ICE appointment, always doing everything by the book, not even working without authorization,” he said. “It’s not just unfair. It feels un-American.”
Over the years Mendoza said Gonzalez Ortiz complied with ICE – including wearing an ankle monitor, doing photo check-ins, and attending her in-person check-ins.
WFYI confirmed her detainment. The reporter also reached out to ICE to confirm more information. In the only email response received before publication, public affairs officer David L. Yost told the reporter her inquiry "may be appropriate for another agency.” WFYI will include a comment from ICE in this story if it is provided.
Mendoza said the answer they were given for detainment was, "Well, if she wants a 'reasonable fear interview,' those take less time once they’re detained,”
The reasonable fear interview is something Gonzalez Ortiz has been waiting years for. She applied for defensive asylum — which is filed when someone is going through removal proceedings.
Gonzalez Ortiz’s long wait is typical
The U.S. Justice Department cites a backlog of roughly 4 million immigration cases waiting to be heard.
Kathleen Bush-Joseph is a policy analyst with the Migration Policy Institute. She said the U.S. government can detain individuals in order to speed up their immigration case.
“Detained cases actually move much, much faster, because judges prioritize those given the liberty interests involved, so those cases can actually happen in as few as three to four weeks,” Bush-Joseph said.
She notes that under the Biden administration the prioritization was for people with criminal charges. For others, they would consider release to let them stay in their community and possibly work while waiting for their case to be heard.
“The Trump administration, on the other hand, is trying not to release people from detention, and when it arrests people, it’s trying to move really quickly to be able to deport as many people as quickly as it can,” said Bush-Johnson.
National Immigrant Justice Center director of legal services Lisa Koop said prioritizing speed comes with barriers. When someone is in custody, they may get a hearing faster, but they may not have access to their lawyer or all of their evidence — translated documents, expert testimony, witnesses, etc. ready for the hearing on short-notice.
“When you’re detained, it’s awfully hard to put together a case in that way, oftentimes you have really limited access to telephone calls, to speaking with your attorney,” Koop said.
The trend in having asylum granted is also going down. Approvals shrunk over the last few months, according to national data. In March, asylum relief cases denied were at roughly 76% – the highest rate recorded through the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) at Syracuse University since October 2000.
Daughters Ashly Benítez Gonzalez and Nercely Gonzalez Ortiz hold hands next to Idalia Lopez Urbina. (Sam Horton / WFYI)
Family fears for her safety
Idalia Lopez Urbina, Gonzalez Ortiz’s wife of five years, describes Gonzalez Ortiz as a great mom to her two daughters Ashly Benítez Gonzalez, 15, and Nercely Gonzalez Ortiz, 12, and a hard worker who is valuable to the community. She said she understands the need for immigration enforcement, but asks that more consideration be taken.
“I know they need to send people back to the country, but double check who are the people who need, need to go back, and other people who can be well in the country to stay working with the family, stay together,” she said.
Lopez Urbina is concerned about Gonzalez Ortiz’s safety.
“We’ve been talking about ICE because she gets scared to go back to El Salvador,” Lopez Urbina said.
Gonzalez Ortiz fled the country years ago after being a victim of domestic abuse. She also left because of her sexual orientation.
While same-sex relationships are legal in El Salvador, same-sex marriage is not recognized. Despite laws prohibiting discrimination, violence and abuse, the U.S. Department of State’s most recent report from 2024 found those related issues remained widespread for women and LGBTQ+ people.
Gonzalez Ortiz’s lawyer Christian Mendoza said he’s concerned for his client’s life if she were to be sent back.
“I personally would beg the ICE officer who’s reviewing this case to find a little bit of empathy for this family who has tried to do everything correct,” Mendoza said.
Detainments increase for people without criminal records
The most recent ICE detainment numbers include a breakdown of those detained with criminal records, those being tried for a crime, and those without either. People detained for criminal records still make up the highest total, followed by people pending criminal charges. But, the sharpest increase in detainments has been for the third category, those with no record. From Jan. 26 to April 20, that number increased by about 575%.
Gonzalez Ortiz’s daughter Benítez Gonzalez said she hears about detainments more and more.
“I always see it online, like on the news on TikTok, but I would have never, never imagined it will happen to me and that will be my mom. It’s not fair,” she said.
Gonzalez Ortiz’s detainment story is something lawyers across the country now grapple with when working with their clients going to routine ICE check-ins. With the Trump administration issuing arrest quotas to ICE agents and planning additional detention facilities, Lisa Koop with the National Immigrant Justice Center said more cases like Gonzalez Ortiz’s will happen.
“This is not about making an individualized determination about, ‘Is this person a flight risk? Is this person a danger to the community?’...it’s about having bodies in detention and having numbers of deportations,” Koop said.
She now plans to be at check-ins for her clients, something she said she didn’t always have to do before.
“We’re there to, you know, advocate for them and make the argument that that detention doesn’t serve a purpose in that case,” Koop said.
On Monday, May 12, Gonzalez Ortiz was denied a stay of removal that would have allowed her to be released from detention, with no option to appeal. She remains at the Grayson County Detention Center in Kentucky waiting for her reasonable fear interview.
Benítez Gonzalez hopes to have her mom back home soon.
“She was always there for me and my sister,” Benítez Gonzalez said. “We always had a plate on her table to eat. She was always there for us to give us a hug or anything we needed.”
Lopez Urbina agrees. “I hope she can stay, we can stay together,” Lopez Urbina said.
Read more: Mother, sister of Bloomington man detained by ICE speak out
Contact WFYI All Things Considered newscaster and reporter Samantha Horton at shorton@wfyi.org or on Signal at SamHorton.05.
