{"id":15215,"date":"2025-04-04T12:59:34","date_gmt":"2025-04-04T12:59:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/?p=15215"},"modified":"2025-04-04T13:02:04","modified_gmt":"2025-04-04T13:02:04","slug":"venezuelan-immigrants-prison-el-salvador","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2025\/04\/04\/venezuelan-immigrants-prison-el-salvador\/","title":{"rendered":"Venezuelan immigrants sent to prison in El Salvador \u2014 from intersecting POVs"},"content":{"rendered":" \n
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Sign up for the Nieman Storyboard newsletter,<\/em><\/a> delivered every Friday in your inbox.<\/em><\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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This week, let’s take a closer look at stories of the hundreds of Venezuelan immigrants who were arrested in the U.S. by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers and sent to a prison in El Salvador, after the Trump administration invoked the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to deport them<\/a>. As multiple reporters and publications attempted to piece together what happened, we can see how different POVs add layers of context and show how one event ripples through many communities: <\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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On the ground: Families search for their loved ones<\/h3>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n
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Mother Jones reporters Noah Lanard and Isabela Dias told the story of a wife who discovered that her husband had been sent to El Salvador after she zoomed in on a photo and recognized his tattoos<\/a>. At the Washington Post, Silvia Foster-Frau profiled Mervin Yamarte<\/a>, who was living in Dallas with friends from Venezuela before he was arrested; his mother later discovered video of him being pulled off a plane in El Salvador. And at The New Yorker, Jonathan Blitzer recounted how a woman in Venezuela kept in contact with her makeup artist son after he was first detained in the U.S. \u2014 only to find out that he, too, was subsequently sent to El Salvador<\/a>: <\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Throughout the fall and winter, Alexis Romero de Hern\u00e1ndez struggled to accept a grim new routine. She lived in a small town in central Venezuela called Capacho, with her husband and the younger of her two sons. Her eldest, a thirty-one-year-old makeup artist named Andry Jos\u00e9 Hern\u00e1ndez Romero, was being held in an immigration jail in San Diego. He called her every few days, usually late in the afternoon, to reassure her that he was safe. The calls would last about a minute. Alexis had to put money on his calling card to keep them coming. \u201cMama, relax,\u201d Andry would tell her. \u201cI\u2019m fine. They\u2019re treating us well. What\u2019s bad is that we\u2019re stuck here.\u201d<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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In the air: Flight attendants speak out<\/h3>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n
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Meanwhile, at ProPublica, reporter McKenzie Funk shared the backstory on how flight attendants who got jobs with Global Crossing Airlines were shocked to learn that the private company would be running deportation flights for ICE<\/a>. The company also participated in the flights taking Venezuelan immigrants to El Salvador.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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The flight attendants were most concerned about their inability to treat their passengers humanely \u2014 and to keep them safe. (In 2021, an ICE spokesperson told the publication Capital & Main that the agency \u201cfollows best practices when it comes to the security, safety and welfare of the individuals returned to their countries of origin.\u201d)<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n\n\n \n

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They worried about what would happen in an emergency. Could they really get over a hundred chained passengers off the plane in time?<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n\n\n \n

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\u201cThey never taught us anything regarding the immigration flights,\u201d one said. \u201cThey didn\u2019t tell us these people were going to be shackled, wrists to fucking ankles.\u201d<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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As Funk noted on Bluesky<\/a>: “Most of the flight attendants hadn’t knowingly signed up to help deport people. They knew a lot about a topic of great national interest, but they weren\u2019t talking politics \u2014 just about what they experienced. There’s something trustworthy, to me, about third-party witnesses like this.”<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Hat tip to Storyboard editor emerita Jacqui Banaszynski<\/a> for alerting me to Funk\u2019s piece. I asked Jacqui what she appreciated about this story. \u201cIt adheres to a counterintuitive wisdom of story work: The more dramatic the information, the more matter-of-fact the tone,\u201d she told me.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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The news business tends to focus on scoops, but kaleidoscopic coverage like this of the same issue, across many publications, underscores the gravity of the moment and deepens readers’ understanding. Each story matters.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n

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Subscribe to Storyboard<\/h2>\n \n
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Get insights into the craft of journalism and storytelling in your inbox, delivered on Fridays.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n \n

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Links of note<\/h2>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n
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ProPublica truck outside of USAID\u2019s former headquarters at the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center in Washington, D.C. By Jason Andrew, courtesy of ProPublica<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/div> \n
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