PORTLAND, Ore. (KATU) — A Gresham family, including a young child, has been detained by immigration authorities.
The incident is renewing the debate whether the Department of Homeland Security can detain someone seeking asylum.
Multiple reports said that on Jan. 16, a 7-year-old girl was outside a hospital in east Portland seeking treatment for a nosebleed that wouldn’t stop. Shortly after, federal agents detained the girl, her mother and father.
“U.S. Border Patrol arrested Yohendry De Jesus Crespo and Darianny Liseth Gonzalez de Crespo, two illegal aliens from Venezuela, along with their minor child in Portland, Oregon. These parents illegally entered U.S. with their daughter in 2024 through the disastrous CBP One app and were RELEASED into the country by the Biden administration. Any application for asylum does not preclude immigration enforcement,” the Department of Homeland Security told KATU.
According to legal experts, asylum seekers can legally be detained during the process.
“The government can detain anyone who has an immigration court case, but detention is more likely if your immigration court is ended,” the Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project (ASAP) says.
U.S. Rep. Maxine Dexter, D-Oregon, is on a two-day visit to Dilley, Texas, where she says the family is being held.
“There have been multiple courts that have established that this is not consistent with the law. These are active asylum seekers who have followed the law,” Dexter told KATU when pressed on the executive branch’s authority to decide how the asylum process works and what she is trying to challenge.
President Joe Biden’s administration changed the process when it ended a process called “safe third country,” when “U.S. officials could fly [asylum seekers] to another country and demand they seek asylum from that country instead,” according to the American Immigration Council.
The Biden administration also streamlined the asylum-seeking process by allowing people to apply through a phone app.
Republicans have argued just like the Biden administration changed the process, the Trump administration can do the same.
However, multiple federal judges have released detainees due to alleged inhumane conditions at detention centers.
A 1997 court ruling prohibits minors from being held in immigration detention centers for more than 20 days.
“We know the Flores settlement established that 20 days is the duration, the maximum duration acceptable for keeping a child in detention. Today is 20 days that Diana Crespo has been detained,” Dexter said.
Dexter noted she tried entering the detention center to visit the family but was denied access despite giving a seven-day advance notice, a requirement DHS Secretary Kristi Noem made for congressional visits.
DHS has confirmed there is an active measles outbreak in the Dilley, Texas detention center.
The Gresham family is being held at the same detention center that 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos and his father were sent to before a judge ordered their release.
Dexter said it is that kind of congressional pressure she is aiming for.
The Oregon Nurses Association called the actions, “alarming, chilling, and deeply shameful.”
“No parent should ever be forced to weigh their child’s health against the risk of detention. No child should be subjected to this level of fear. Every child deserves access to quality and timely healthcare,” ONA said. “When law enforcement actions intrude into medical spaces, patient care is compromised—and in this case, a child’s well-being was placed at risk. This unjustified action raises urgent and disturbing questions that demand answers. Did the child ever receive the healthcare they needed?”
