The immigrant father of a sailor who is on board the beleaguered USS Abraham Lincoln is back with his family Tuesday after being detained by immigration authorities over the weekend.
The family confirmed the release of Luis Manuel Aviles in a statement posted on social media by his son Joshua Aviles, a Navy handling airman. Joshua Aviles has been deployed on the aircraft carrier for nine months, which is considered a U.S. military record for uninterrupted time at sea.
“Luis has been released back to our family. We are grateful for all of the support for both Luis and Josh throughout this situation. At this moment, our family is taking time to be together. While we await the return of our proud Navy sailor, we kindly ask for your understanding and respect,” the statement reads.
The Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not respond to multiple requests for comment about the release of Luis Manuel Aviles.
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DHS confirmed over the weekend that Border Patrol arrested Luis Manuel Aviles on Saturday during a traffic stop in Key West, Florida, where the family lives. The agency said he entered the U.S. illegally at an unknown date and location and was being held in ICE custody.
Originally from Nicaragua, Luis Manuel Aviles, 47, has been living in the U.S. for 20 years. He’s mostly worked as a handyman for hotels in Key West, according to his youngest son, Luis Aviles, and stepdaughter, Katty Delgado.
In an interview with Noticias Telemundo on Sunday, Luis Aviles said his father “never hid, he always did things the right way,” adding that he was working toward getting legal status and had complied with his paperwork and visits to ICE’s offices.
Delgado told NBC News on Saturday that her stepfather had a work permit, a Social Security card, a driver’s license and an active asylum case. Joshua Aviles, along with another family member, had filed immigration petitions requesting he remain in the country legally, according to the family.
Asked to confirm whether Luis Manuel Aviles had a Social Security number, a work permit or pending immigration cases, as his family indicated, DHS said in an email Sunday, “Having a family member in the military is not a free pass to violate our nation’s laws.”
“Military service by an immediate relative does not automatically grant parole, lawful status, or immunity from immigration enforcement,” the email reads.
On the same weekend in which Luis Manuel Aviles was detained, the Key West Immigrant Support Network had been alerting immigrant communities in the area of an uptick in “immigration activity” following the detentions of three people Thursday afternoon.
“We saw this surge of officers we didn’t recognize. We saw cars that we didn’t recognize,” said Heather Slivko-Bathurst, the director of the nonprofit immigrant rights organization. “All of a sudden, boom! It was 28 people detained in 72 hours.”
After months of quiet immigration detentions, Slivko-Bathurst told NBC News, immigrant communities in Key West “saw this resurgence of almost like an operative type.”
DHS and Customs and Border Protection did not respond to questions about their enforcement operations in Key West in recent weeks. They said in an email that “ICE agents uphold our nation’s immigration laws in all 50 states, seven days a week, 24 hours a day,” and cited the cases of several convicted criminals who were arrested in Florida.
Slivko-Bathurst said the presence of Border Patrol in the area seemed particularly heightened Saturday morning, prompting the Key West Immigrant Support Network to share a post on Facebook at 9 a.m. saying, “If there is ever a day to be as careful as possible, it is today.”
Later that morning, Luis Manuel Aviles was arrested by Border Patrol while running errands. He was among at least seven people immigration authorities detained in Key West on Saturday, according to Slivko-Bathurst.
Her organization verified the immigration detentions of 28 people this week, and it has been in contact with the families of most of them, she said. Most of the detainees “have work authorizations and have been following the legal process to be in this country,” according to the group.
The organization has also decried how its small Florida town has become “targeted on a huge level compared to our population size.”
It’s estimated that nearly a quarter of the roughly 25,000 people who live in Key West are foreign-born residents, many of whom work in the hospitality and tourism industries, as well as in landscaping, construction and contract work, Slivko-Bathurst said.
“Essentially, it boils down to the fact that we have a very large immigrant population, documented and undocumented,” Slivko-Bathurst added. “There is just this constant fear among everybody, because there’s not a single person in Key West — it’s a two-by-four island — that doesn’t know somebody who is an immigrant, whatever status they may have.”
The detention of Luis Manuel Aviles gained national attention after his son, Joshua Aviles, posted about it Saturday on Facebook while on board the USS Abraham Lincoln.
“I just got a call that my dad was taken by ICE. If you know my dad, you know he is a hardworking, humble man who is always willing to help anyone if he can,” the post reads. “We have done everything through immigration to get his green card approved, and we are just waiting.”
The post continues: “This is heartbreaking for me. I don’t know how I can mentally continue working 12+ hour days knowing that my dad is somewhere, possibly being treated like a criminal. My dad’s only ‘crime’ was coming to this country to give my siblings and me a better life.”
The Navy said Saturday that the Lincoln had officially left the Middle East en route to the West Coast, a journey that could take a month or more.
