ICE may start testing deportees pending results of coronavirus checks by CDC in Guatemala
U.S. immigration officials, facing criticism from countries receiving deportees who then test positive for the coronavirus, may consider testing foreign nationals before they’re deported.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials told the Miami Herald that the decision on whether detainees are tested will hinge on findings by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Guatemala.
A team from the CDC was dispatched to the Central American country last week after health officials there said more than 70 detainees on two recent ICE deportation flights had tested positive and they were suspending deportations from the U.S. until further notice. It marked the third time since March 17 that the country had suspended U.S. deportation flights over the coronavirus.
“Currently, CDC is on the ground in Guatemala to review and validate the COVID-19 tests performed on those arriving from ICE Air flights,” ICE said in a statement. “Once results are available, ICE will determine whether to re-evaluate current medical procedures with CDC guidance to ensure that any newly necessary practices are implemented.”
Guatemala’s stance has only added fuel to the growing debate about whether the Trump administration is exporting the virus to vulnerable nations, given that testing inside detention centers is sporadic while the number of confirmed positive cases among employees and detainees is growing.
Earlier this month, a Haitian national, who had been exposed to the virus while in immigration lockup at two different ICE facilities, was taken off a Haiti deportation flight at the last minute. Days later, he tested positive for the coronavirus at the Pine Prairie detention center in Louisiana.
Three other detainees who were flown to Haiti as part of a repatriated group of 68 also tested positive, the country’s prime minister, Joseph Jouthe, confirmed. One of them later escaped quarantine after being told of his results, a Haitian health official acknowledged.
Jouthe, acknowledging the three positive cases during a radio interview Monday, said if he had listened to U.S. officials about detainees being screened before being loaded onto the charter flights, he would have had a bigger problem on his hands.
But a human rights advocate in the country told the Herald that while deportees are put in isolation after arriving, the hotel where they are being kept in Port-au-Prince lacks any barriers. At night after security has left for the day, the repatriated Haitians take to the streets to go buy food, risking spread of the disease.
Immigration rights advocates have been unsuccessful in trying to get Haiti to pause such flights pending the CDC’s findings in Guatemala. On Thursday 129 Haitian nationals, some of them minors, were successfully deported from the U.S.
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ICE would not say how many other nations have followed Guatemala’s lead in refusing to accept deportation flights, or requested a pause pending the CDC’s findings. An ICE spokesperson, however, acknowledged they are awaiting the findings to decide on the next steps.
“The situation is fluid,” the spokesperson said. “The United States must be able to repatriate, remove, and return foreign nationals who violate U.S law.”
ICE would not comment on the process the CDC is using to “validate” Guatemala’s testing or when the CDC’s results would be made available. Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei in a national address said at least 12 deportees who were randomly selected and examined by the CDC did in fact test positive.
While ICE said “repatriation flights to Central America are ongoing,” as many as 50 Guatemalan detainees have been transferred from Miami International Airport and two Florida detention centers 13 times in the last nine days after their flight kept getting canceled.
The ICE spokesperson said that while countries’ conditions can sometimes affect their willingness to accept their citizens with final U.S. orders of removal, “ICE’s expectation is that each country will continue to meet its international obligation to accept its own nationals.”
But detainees awaiting deportation should be tested, health experts have told the Herald, which has reported in recent weeks that even detainees with coronavirus symptoms have not been tested.
Under current ICE protocol, deportees are given only a visual scan and sometimes a temperature check, but no coronavirus test, even though many are being exposed to the virus inside detention centers.
“Any detainee with an elevated temperature will be immediately referred to a medical provider for further evaluation and observation,” ICE said, but would not disclose what in this view constitutes a fever.
At least 60 percent of immigration detainees who have been tested nationwide have the virus that causes COVID-19, according to federal data. As of Tuesday, only 425 out of 32,309 detainees had been tested for the coronavirus, according to ICE.
Out of the 425 tests administered, the agency said, 253 people, or 60 percent, tested positive as of Wednesday.
That number could be higher because ICE does not update its website in real time. In the past few weeks, officials have delayed as much as a week in posting on the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 on their web page.
ICE does not report on its site how many tests have been administered. The Herald obtained those numbers from an agency official on Wednesday.
This story was originally published April 23, 2020 at 6:19 PM.
