Nashville Reporter Covering ICE Raids in Her Community Ends Up Detained Herself

A journalist from Nashville named Estefany Rodriguez, who reports on Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) actions was recently arrested. The arrest of Rodriguez has become a new highlight of the Trump administration's recent immigration crackdown.

Rodriguez was born in Colombia and entered the United States legally, according to her lawyer. Rodriguez is a journalist for a Spanish-language news outlet named Nashville Noticias. She has been reporting stories critical of the actions of ICE, and according to an appeal filed by her lawyer, she had been covering the ICE arrests the day before her detainment on March 5.

It is one of the latest incidents of a journalist being caught up in the crackdown on immigrants in the recent Trump administration. Mario Guevara, a Salvadorian journalist, was recently deported after being arrested while covering the No King protest in Atlanta.

On March 5, trucks surrounded Rodriguez, and her husband’s car, as ICE agents approached the windows. Rodriguez was confused, as mentioned by her husband, Alejandro Median. Median realized it was ICE before his wife did, he said: “ We really couldn’t understand why we were being summoned. We’re definitely shocked,” CNN reported.

According to Median, the agents who surrounded their car knew a lot about Rodriguez and her husband. They knew Median was born in the United States and had applied for a green card. Rodriguez also has a pending political asylum claim and a valid work permit, according to the court documents.

A spokesperson for ICE told CNN that “Rodriguez currently does not have any lawful immigration status.”

“ A pending green card application and work authorization does not give someone legal status to be in our country,” a Department of Homeland Security Spokesperson told CNN.

According to Rodriguez’s lawyer, Joel Coxander Rodriguez was kept in a detention center in Alabama till March 6, before she was set to be sent to Louisiana. However, there is still no evidence that Rodriguez has been transferred from Alabama as of March 7, Coxander said.

Rodriguez received the first letter from ICE on January 8, asking her to visit the Nashville field office for “processing and additional information,” as per the court documents. Rodriguez and her lawyer collected paperwork and were ready for the appointment, but the city was shut down due to an ice storm, and the office was closed, Coxander said. Rodriguez soon received a second letter rescheduling the appointment for February 25.

Three days before the rescheduled meeting, Rodriguez’s husband and another attorney visited the ICE office to see if the office could mail the immigration charging documents to Rodriguez’s legal team instead of her visiting the office in person, as the petition mentioned. The lawyer asked the ICE agent directly if she needed to be there on February 25, and the agent replied by saying they couldn’t find Rodriguez in their computer systems for an appointment and “could not find any sign of an appointment on February 25.”

The agent, as per the petition, mentioned that Rodriguez should come on March 17 instead, before which she was arrested.

According to ICE, “she failed to depart the country and is in violation of the conditions of her visa and currently has no lawful immigration status. She will remain in ICE custody pending her immigration proceedings.”