Last year we came to know Claudia Rueda very well. We learned of her because the 23-year-old Cal State L.A. student and DACA activist was seemingly detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials for questionable reasons. Technically she is undocumented, that is true, but why would ICE detain a student with DACA protection? That has been the question ever since she was detained last year on May 18, 2017. Now, more than a year later, Rueda has not given up the fight for justice.
“I’m here today because the Department of Homeland Security is targeting me. They want to deport me. They want to silence me for my political activism,” Rueda said in a press conference yesterday, according to a local ABC news affiliate. Her legal team say that Rueda was wrongfully detained for almost a month, and they claim it was just a scare tactic because she had been fighting for the rights of undocumented immigrants, DACA students, and primarily the release of her mother who was also detained prior to her own detainment. Rueda also says that because of her detainment, her DACA application has since been rejected, which puts her in jeopardy for deportation now more than ever.
“We will ask a federal judge to impose appropriate remedies against the government for that illegal seizure and to make sure that Claudia gets consideration and the DACA benefits that she’s truly entitled to,” her attorney John Ulin said, according to an ABC news affiliate. “The only discernible difference between Ms. Rueda and the hundreds of thousands of others who have been approved for DACA status is her political speech and activism against Defendants’ immigration practices,” the lawsuit states.
According to CBS News, Rueda was released in June of 2017, “after spending three weeks in DHS custody in San Diego, an immigration judge ordered that Rueda be released after her attorney submitted a brief which included letters of support from the likes of L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti and U.S. Rep. Karen Bass (D- Los Angeles).”
"We need to keep fighting for everyone."
Immigrant rights activist Claudia Rueda is finally free after being detained by Border Patrol: pic.twitter.com/tvxAqSrTAS
— Splinter (@splinter_news) June 12, 2017
Rueda’s next court hearing is scheduled for the end of November, where a judge will rule whether or not she will be deported. Another judge will rule on federal lawsuit early in 2019. Till then, Rueda says she will fight loudly.
“I’m not going to stay silent when I face and continue to face this legal violence and retaliation against my existence,” Rueda said.
We definitely think she has a solid case, and as we just learned this week, the government has to pay up when they have done something wrong.
