Because I'm Black

A personal account of ICE detention in Minneapolis

Another US citizen was murdered by ICE on Saturday.

I’ve been shaking on and off since I read the news, alternately rendered completely numb and then so overwhelmed by grief and anger I struggle to breathe. It is so hard to square what we are seeing unfold in Minnesota (and now Maine) with the country that I know and love. “Land of the free and home of the brave” seems like a cruel reminder of what we once were, not what we currently are. Everything feels rather hopeless. And yet, we cling to hope and lean into prayer, sharing stories and calling our senators and representatives and reposting the atrocities with the fervent dream that people who have been sleeping will finally wake up.

We’re not the sort to give up, even when our spirits are crushed.

Today, I have the privilege of sharing a story straight out of Minnesota. I hope that it helps even one person to realize the level of incompetence and depravity that we’re dealing with in the Trump administration’s current immigration policy. What’s happening on US soil is not just morally wrong and unconstitutional, it is antithetical to the gospel of Christ, and it is far past time for his followers to denounce it. It’s not too late to change your mind.

On Wednesday, January 14, I received a text from a loved one. Pray for Joseph* the message said. (*I’ve changed his name to protect his identity.)

He was arrested by ICE. He’s from Africa. No criminal record. Working in STEM on an OPT*. Had all his papers. Didn’t matter.

*Optional Practical Training, a temporary work authorization allowing F-1 visa students to work in jobs directly related to their field of study.

I could hear the shock in the text. The short, quick sentences, the complete lack of emotion. My heart began to race. It wasn’t hard for me to imagine this kid (yes, I know he’s a college graduate, but twenty-somethings are still kids to me) in ICE custody, alone and afraid. It wasn’t hard for me to quickly and firmly put myself in the shoes of his mother as I have three children of African descent of my own—and you’d better believe there isn’t a day that goes by right now that I am not sick with fear for them.

Our family spent a fraught few hours in prayer for Joseph, waiting and wondering as those with intimate knowledge of the situation did their level best to free him, and by the end of the day on Wednesday, we received word that he had, indeed, been let go.

Last week Thursday (1-22-26), I was able to interview Joseph via Zoom about his experience. I hope his story not just moves you, but compels you to take action.

“I didn’t know anyone who had any interactions with ICE prior to that day,” Joseph told me right off the bat. He has a kind face, a gentle spirit, and absolutely no accent. I asked him about it and he laughed, unable to pinpoint how he had mastered American English so perfectly in just a few years. It was clear that he was ready to tell his story, and that he wanted very much to be as fair and factual as possible. He thought before he talked. He reminded me of my son.

“So, I’m driving in [to the parking lot of a take-out joint where he was picking up a poke bowl on his lunch break] and the first thing I see is, like, four black SUVs and people with military wear. And in my mind I automatically know what it is, but at the same time I wasn’t really worried because I knew my status was good. I had nothing to worry about.”

But he did have a lot to worry about. While Joseph was in the restaurant picking up his food, several agents got out of their vehicles and scanned his license plate. Joseph watched them do it as he waited in line. When he finally returned to the parking lot with his takeout, three officers surrounded him. “Are you Joseph?” they asked, making it seem like they had been searching for him all along. “They made me feel like I was a person who had been running away for a really long time, and they finally caught me.” But Joseph is here legally, has no criminal record, and was doing nothing wrong. There’s no way he could have been on their “worst of the worst,” most-wanted list.

“I start to explain to them my situation, my status, but you know, the sad reality is most of them don’t know anything about immigration.”

At that point, observers started to come out of their cars and began recording what was happening. Some yelled at the ICE officers and tried to make them stop harassing Joseph. Instead, out came the cuffs. The agents quickly put Joseph in the back of the SUV and drove away with him.

On the way to the detention center, Joseph tried to convince the ICE agents that he was here legally, that he had papers to prove it, and that they were making a terrible mistake. They didn’t want to hear it. Even when they got to the detention center and were booking him, Joseph’s entreaties fell on deaf ears. They told him it would take too long to verify his claims. “At that point, I realized that the booking officer just wanted me to be arrested and detained. He told me: ‘I’m just going to process the arrest and start the deportation process.’”

Thankfully, a supervisor stepped in and required the intake agent to check Joseph’s information via his ISO (Immigration Services Officer). While Joseph was still sitting there (able to observe everything), the ICE agent tried to send the wrong email address to the ISO in what Joseph assumed was an attempt to prevent the documents from arriving. Again, the supervisor stepped in. He made the agent resend the request with the correct address. “Even though everything was above my control and beyond my understanding, the sovereignty of God was with me in that moment,” Joseph said. “Because the information request was sent to the right person.”

The papers arrived in moments, but still the ICE agents were skeptical. “They went back and forth because again—they don’t understand anything about immigration. They’ve never seen an I-20 before in their lives, and they’re still trying to figure out if I’m lying to them or not. So at that point, they just decide to detain me. Imagine, I’m walking into the detention center with cuffs on my hands, cuffs on my feet, and everyone is just looking at me like I’m a criminal.”

They put Joseph in a small cell—concrete floor, concrete walls, one door with a tiny window in it and a button to summon people on the other side. There was a disgusting toilet in one corner with a sink beside it that was equally filthy. Joseph was given a cup and told that if he wanted to drink he could use the sink. But it was so foul, he never took a single sip of water the entire 30 hours that he was detained.

There were approximately fifteen other men in the cell with him. All were shackled hand and foot. It was absolutely freezing, and some were poorly dressed for the frigid conditions. They had clearly been snatched in the middle of going about their daily lives, and were not given time to grab warm clothing, a coat, or, in some cases, even shoes. They were all people of color, quiet and afraid.

Joseph spent the next four hours hitting the button beside the door and trying to get someone’s attention. Everyone ignored him. “They just looked at me as a criminal.”

Around 5:00 that evening, an ICE agent did come to talk to Joseph and go over his case. When the agent looked at Joseph’s records and saw that he was in the US legally, he began to apologize, but explained that they had to keep him anyway because it was procedure. Joseph was sent back to the cell. “There’s this paper called a manifest,” he told me, “and everyone on the manifest was going to be sent to El Paso to be deported. So even after he saw that my status was right—that I was here legally—he still put me on that list. I went back to the cell devastated because this agent has seen my status and still chose to keep me detained and potentially deported. I just started sobbing and crying and praying in my cell for God to intervene.”

At midnight, a different officer came into Joseph’s cell and removed him again. “I totally believe that was a miracle,” Joseph said. The agent explained that he had heard about Joseph’s case and thought he was being detained by mistake. The ICE agent was a Black man, and Joseph wondered if there was a sense of brotherhood between them. The agent offered to get Joseph’s phone out of lock-up so that he could text all his paperwork for review (keep in mind, these documents had already been provided), and once he saw them, he apologized again. “You’re not supposed to be here,” he told Joseph. Then, to another agent: “Is he still on the manifest?”

He was.

By 2am, the ICE agent had managed to remove Joseph from the manifest, a truly miraculous deed because at 5am his entire cell was scheduled to leave for El Paso. If Joseph would have been on that transport, his story would have turned out very differently. The agent also sent an email to the ICE lawyers and all his supervisors, explaining Joseph’s case. After that, he was moved to a different cell because the ICE agent who helped him did not have the authority to release him.

Still shackled hand and foot, Joseph spent the rest of the night in custody. When morning rolled around, he began pushing the button by the door again, trying to get someone’s attention. He was afraid they had once again forgotten about him and he’d end up being deported anyway. The ICE agents just ignored him.

Joseph spent the day in despair. No one wanted to listen; no one seemed to care. The agent who had helped him was off-duty, and Joseph didn’t know if he’d ever see him again. But around 5pm, a familiar face peered into the cell. It was the Black ICE agent, returning for his next shift. “He was like, what are you doing here? You’re not supposed to be here.”

The officer walked Joseph to the door, unshackled him, and apologized again, acknowledging that the Border Patrol officers were uneducated and that Joseph had been wrongly detained.

When he was free, the first thing Joseph did was call his family. They had no idea where he was or what he had endured. No one did. His car was abandoned at the poke bowl place, and his coworkers were left completely in the dark. He had just disappeared. Joseph also called his ISO and discovered that there had been lawyers fighting for him from the second they learned about his situation. “It was shocking to discover that they [ICE agents] were lying about my case, trying to keep me detained. It was a very traumatizing experience. They didn’t consider me a human being. You would expect someone to be able to discern right from wrong, but they persisted in what they were doing even though they knew it was wrong.” One of the ICE agents had even encouraged Joseph to take legal action and sue ICE and DHS for what had happened to him.

In detention, Joesph met American citizens, legal immigrants, and refugees. One man in his first cell was a naturalized citizen who showed up at the detention facility of his own volition to verify some documentation. Instead of helping, they detained him. That man left with the 5am group for El Paso. Joseph feels sure he will be deported.

“While I was there I tried to have conversations with people [ICE agents] just so I could connect with them on a human level and they could have empathy and understand my situation, but they didn’t care.”

When I asked if Joseph had experienced violence at the hands of ICE agents, he gave me a small, tight smile. “As a person of color, I understand what is at risk if I resist. So I just complied, even though I knew I was in the right.” But others were not so lucky. Several detainees that Joseph encountered were beat up, bloody, or bruised. One Latino man in his fifties or sixties had a gash from his hairline to the tip of his nose that looked like it needed medical attention. He got none.

When I asked Joseph how he is doing now and if he feels safe, he said: “Definitely not. I don’t feel safe to leave my apartment.” He’s afraid of getting picked up again. Of not being so lucky the second time around.

“I wish people knew that they [ICE and DHS] are not doing things the right way. There’s a big disconnect between what they say they’re doing and what they are actually doing. What they’re doing right now is not just at all. It’s harassment. They’re harassing anyone of color, anyone. I was profiled.”

“They picked me up that day because I’m Black.”

Joesph’s story is just one of tens of thousands. From the time he was approached in the poke bowl parking lot until the moment he was released from detainment around suppertime the next day was thirty hours that will impact the rest of his life. But consider: Joseph is a handsome, highly educated and well-dressed professional who was detained while on lunch break from his prestigious STEM job. He’s a fluent English speaker with no accent. Because he could advocate for himself so eloquently, he was able to convince the ICE officers to place a call to his ISO—and once that wheel was set in motion, lawyers and immigration consultants worked tirelessly on Joseph’s behalf until his eventual release.

Praise the Lord that Joseph is home, but many more are not nearly as lucky. Those who can’t communicate as well. Who don’t have such a connected and powerful support system. Who are no less valuable and worthy of dignity no matter their ethnicity, language, social status, or language(s) spoken. The older man with a head injury. The American citizen who tried to do the right thing and is now in El Paso. The refugee who came to the United States because he was invited and promised he would be safe. Keith Porter. Renee Good. Alex Pretti. Ripped from their cars, workplaces, schools, and homes. Treated like criminals. Ignored and dehumanized. Killed.

The collective trauma of this monstrous immigration policy will be a wound that this nation will spend generations trying to recover from. It has to stop. Here are four things you can do right now:

1. Call your senators and demand that they defund ICE. Use 5Calls and read the script. It’s easy as pie, takes less than 5 minutes, and is something that can make a huge difference.

2. Sign the World Relief Statement urging President Trump to uphold his commitment to protecting persecuted Christians and for his administration to sustain the refugee resettlement program.

3. Donate to a reliable organization in Minnesota that helps our neighbors. One I recommend is Arrive Ministries in Richfield.

4. Share this story. Or any story about what’s happening in Minnesota and beyond. Keep elevating the voices of the oppressed and inviting people to open their eyes and see what’s happening in our country.

Eyes open. Hearts steady. Hands ready.

Thanks for reading. xoxo - Nicole

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