Isabela Dias

18 hours ago | motherjones.com | Isabela Dias

In December 2023, Eduardo Bolsonaro, one of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro’s sons and a congressman from Rio de Janeiro, led a delegation of federal deputies to El Salvador on a fact-finding mission focused on public safety. As part of the trip, Eduardo and his entourage visited the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT, the notorious mega-prison where the Trump administration recently sent more than 230 Venezuelans accused of gang membership.

5 days ago | motherjones.com | Isabela Dias

On April 3, a Justice Department contracting officer sent the Acacia Center for Justice a “notice of termination for convenience.” The email instructed the nonprofit to discontinue several federally funded programs described as “no longer needed.” Among them was the little-known National Qualified Representative Program (NQRP), which appoints government-paid counsel to detained immigrants deemed unfit to represent themselves in court due to serious mental health needs or cognitive disabilities.

1 week ago | motherjones.com | Isabela Dias

On April 28, lawyer Paul O’Dwyer opened his email inbox to find some good news. A New York City immigration judge had approved the asylum application for one of his clients. But the immigration court email also contained an attachment O’Dwyer hadn’t seen before: a Justice Department notice encouraging immigrants to self-deport. O’Dwyer was confused. If an immigration judge had just granted his client protection from deportation, why would they send out such a flyer?

1 week ago | motherjones.com | Isabela Dias

On Thursday afternoon, Lorraine Beausejour Crowe, 82, and her daughter Donna Crowe, 60, joined thousands of protesters in the streets of downtown Washington, DC, to rally against President Donald Trump’s administration’s assault on immigrant workers and communities. The duo held one sign that read “ICE Is Trump’s Gestapo” and another displaying a photo of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem posing in front of men behind bars at El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT.

2 weeks ago | motherjones.com | Noah Lanard |Isabela Dias

As the bus drove away from the Bluebonnet Detention Facility, in Anson, Texas, on April 18, Stiven Prieto Viera feared he was headed to El Salvador. Prieto, a Venezuelan barber detained last month by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, knew that the Trump administration had already sent hundreds of his compatriots to that country’s infamous Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT). Now, he appeared to be facing the same fate.