More than 70 Escucha Mi Voz Iowa supporters gathered outside U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Cedar Rapids Field Office on a crisp spring day, accompanying three families and offering support for an imprisoned immigrant.
The Iowa-based, immigrant-led organization’s latest monthly “protective accompaniment” on Tuesday, May 5, supported immigrants at ICE check-ins while pressuring federal officials to stop the deportation of José Yugar-Cruz to the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Yugar-Cruz is an asylum seeker who faces removal despite a court order barring his deportation to his home country of Bolivia because of the risk of torture or persecution.
Supporters say Bolivian national’s story is unique
Yugar-Cruz’s case is unique, according to Iowa City Catholic Worker House co-founder David Goodner. Since February 2025, the Donald Trump administration has pushed countries to accept third-country deportees while seeking to arrest and remove those granted withholding of removal orders. ICE is pursuing a third-country deportation despite a court order barring his removal to Yugar-Cruz’s home country.
Yugar-Cruz won his release from the Muscatine County Jail in a lawsuit alleging violations of his due-process rights and of the Immigration and Nationality Act. He now resides in the Linn County Jail, awaiting deportation.
Escucha Mi Voz organizers believe Yugar-Cruz’s case a “serious human rights violation.” Yugar-Cruz could be deported at any time, and supporters say he will “face torture as he did in his home country.”
“The notion that someone could be deported to a country where they have never been, they have no family, or other contact, or do not speak the language and have no way to support themselves is incredibly cruel and inhumane,” said Escucha Mi Voz Iowa member Rogelio Lagunas. “José deserves to stay in the U.S. and continue with his asylum legal process.”
Supporters met with 7-foot fence at monthly ICE rally
Escucha Mi Voz holds monthly “protective accompaniment” events on the first Tuesday of every month. The May event fell on Cinco de Mayo, a holiday that commemorates the Mexican army’s victory over French forces at the Battle of Puebla during the Franco-Mexican War.
Tuesday’s gathering, which featured speakers from community organizers and faith leaders along with songs and chants, was met with a new, seven-foot chain-link fence surrounding the ICE field office. The fence separates immigrants awaiting their appointments from demonstrators.
In October 2025, the City of Cedar Rapids conducted a “detailed review” of the local field office, following an obstruction permit request for a fence to be placed outside the facility, and cited an anomaly in the property boundaries. The city then altered the public right-of-way near the DHS field office.
Fence construction started in March and was completed in April.
The barrier hasn’t slowed the regular rallies, as Cookie Sherrman and Virginia Recker travel more than an hour from Dyersville to Cedar Rapids each month.
“[The fence] is a gross kind of thing,” Sherrman told the Press-Citizen. “… People need to know we care, so standing here and cheering when they come out, it has to make them feel that somebody cares. That’s the big thing, I don’t care what we’re going through in life, if somebody cares about us, we can get through it.”
Jessica Rish is an entertainment, dining and education reporter for the Iowa City Press-Citizen. She can be reached at JRish@press-citizen.com or on X, formerly known as Twitter, at @rishjessica_
This article originally appeared on Iowa City Press-Citizen: Iowa immigrant support continues at ICE office despite new fence
Reporting by Jessica Rish, Iowa City Press-Citizen / Iowa City Press-Citizen
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