Any Lucia López Belloza has refused to board a flight arranged by the Trump administration to return her to the United States after discovering court filings revealed plans to detain and deport her again upon arrival.
The 20-year-old Babson College freshman told reporters Thursday: “I believed him for a second. I pictured stepping off of the plane and finally being free… I won’t mince words. I am angry. I am sad.” She stated an ICE officer had misled her by saying she would be released after landing.
In court filings on Friday, the Trump administration confirmed Belloza did not appear at a pre-arranged meeting and failed to board the flight at San Pedro Sula airport in Honduras that had been organized for her return. A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson stated: “ICE attempted to facilitate Any Lopez-Belloza’s return back to the United States. But she failed to appear for her pre-arranged flight. ICE made multiple attempts to reach out to her with no response.”
Belloza’s lawyer Todd Pomerleau accused the Trump administration of “gamesmanship,” declaring: “I’m not stopping until she’s back here, but she’s not coming back in handcuffs.”
The student was arrested in November by two Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials at a Boston airport whilst traveling home to Texas for Thanksgiving. She was deported to Honduras, the country she immigrated from with her parents when she was eight years old.
Assistant US Attorney Mark Sauter acknowledged the administration made a “mistake” when ordering her deportation, stating: “On behalf of the government, we want to sincerely apologize.”
US District Judge Richard Stearns issued an order on 21 November barring Belloza from being deported or transferred out of the state for 72 hours. However, she had already been flown to Texas, potentially stripping Stearns’ court of jurisdiction before landing in Honduras on 22 November.
Sauter blamed the violation on a “mistake” by an ICE officer who thought the order no longer applied and failed to properly flag it. On 13 February, Stearns ordered the Trump administration to facilitate Belloza’s return to the US.
A US Attorney spokesperson stated: “The status quo that existed prior to her removal was that she was subject to a final order of removal. And as the government argued throughout this case, ICE has statutory authority to detain an individual to effectuate such removal.”
The DHS spokesperson added: “This illegal alien entered the country in 2014 and an immigration judge issued her a final order removal in 2015, over a decade ago. She was removed to Honduras. The court order to stop her removal was issued AFTER she was already removed.”
Belloza’s arrest and deportation were based on a removal order issued when she was 11. She stated she was unaware the order existed.
Stearns suggested the State Department issue Belloza a student visa allowing her to finish her studies, but the Trump administration has not heeded his recommendation. The judge stated in January: “We don’t want to lose sight that we have a real human being here. She’s a very sympathetic person, and there should be some means to addressing this.”
Sauter called it a rare instance of the government not following an order in over 700 cases filed in Massachusetts by migrants challenging detention since Trump took office with a hardline immigration agenda.
Pomerleau also represented Bruna Ferreira, mother of Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt’s nephew, when she was arrested by ICE in November.
