When 22-year South Orange resident Tonny Quesada-Ramirez was arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on August 7 on Tichenor Avenue, he was representative of many recent ICE detainees.
Quesada-Ramirez was following the legal process for citizenship, he was paying taxes, and he had no criminal record.
In its lead story of August 27, 2026, “ICE Arrests Soar as People With No Criminal Record Are Increasingly Targeted”, The New York Times reported, “A surge in immigration arrests this summer has swept up thousands of people who had not previously been the focus of President Trump’s mass deportation campaign. They included people married to U.S. citizens, people who had entered legally and were pursuing an asylum claim, and others with a temporary legal status that the administration pushed to revoke. A majority of the immigrants arrested in July were people who were accused of violating civil immigration laws but who had not been charged with or convicted of a crime,… The share with a past violent criminal conviction fell to less than 4 percent.”
Read the story here: “ICE Arrests Soar as People With No Criminal Record Are Increasingly Targeted”
Through the work of South Orange Mayor Sheena Collum, Detention and Deportation Defense Initiative attorneys, local immigration attorney Kate Reilly, and the fundraising and networking of SOMA Community Cares, founded by Matt Bloom and Cynthia Galeota, Quesada-Ramirez and two other local men were released from detention at Delaney Hall in Newark a few days after their arrest.
Village Green reached out to ICE for information on the men taken. A DHS spokesperson responded with this information about Ramirez (and has provided no information about the other men):
“On August 7, 2026, ICE arrested Tonny Quesada Ramirez, an illegal alien from Costa Rica, during a targeted enforcement operation in South Orange, New Jersey. Border Patrol encountered him on June 13, 2001, after entering the country illegally, and he was taken into ICE custody. On June 24, 2001, he was released from ICE custody on a promise to appear in court, and on October 16, 2001, he was ordered removed for failing to appear. On October 24, 2010, ICE arrested him again, and on March 7, 2011, he was released from ICE custody on bond. He will remain in ICE custody pending removal proceedings. To be clear, work authorization or a pending application do NOT confer legal status in the United States.”
Village Green asked the spokesperson if Ramirez had a criminal record, a pending application or work authorization. The spokesperson has not replied to those questions.
Attorney Kate Reilly explained that, in Ramirez’s case, “the DDDI attorney filed the habeas writ and included information about the fact that he had a preliminary grant of cancellation of removal. After that was filed with the district court, before the judge could issue a decision, the government agreed to release him. So there was never actually a final decision on the habeas. The government exercised their discretion to release him.” The other men were release on a habeas writ.
Reilly said, “It’s most likely because they really don’t have any grounds to hold him. He has a preliminary grant, and that should protect him from actual removal until his case is finalized. What happens when you have a preliminary grant is, your case goes onto a shelf until the visa becomes available, and then you go back to court.”
Reilly, who now represents immigrants as an independent attorney, has a deep understanding of the immigration process stemming from her ten years at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and working as a trial attorney in the immigration court for the government.
Reilly says that she is no longer surprised by the tone and tactics of her former agency, but that it is a far cry from the more sober and lawful approach that preceded the second Trump Administration.
Noting the information released by ICE regarding Ramirez, Reilly said, “They rely on the fact that most people don’t have a sophisticated understanding. Immigration is complicated.”
Reilly said that Ramirez “doesn’t currently have status, but he is in the process of obtaining status.”
“He has done the things that he’s supposed to do. He does have a valid work authorization.”
“He and his wife applied for and were found eligible for something called ‘cancellation of removal,’ ” said Reilly, “which is a way to get a green card. But the issue with cancellation of removal is that it’s a particular category. So the judge said, ‘Okay, you’re eligible for this green card, but the green card is not immediately available.'”
Reilly explained that there are different visa categories for getting a green card: “You can’t just apply for a green card and get it. You have to be eligible for a green card based on some external thing. You might be eligible for a green card because your employer sponsors you for a green card. You might be eligible for a green card because your family member sponsors you for a green card. And then there are different sort of subcategories within each. And for certain categories, there’s no wait list for a green card. So if you’re the immediate relative of a U.S. citizen, and what that means is you’re the spouse, parent or child of a U.S. citizen, then there’s no wait list. There’s still a process to obtain it in terms of things that have to be filed, things that have to be established in biometrics, submitting evidence,” etc.
“Say, you get married to a U.S. citizen, you have to submit bonafides as a relationship. You can’t just submit a marriage certificate and say, ‘Okay, that’s it.’ And then I fill out one form and I get my green card. It’s a more complicated process. There are multiple forms you have to file. Each one of those has a filing fee attached to it that are pretty sizable. So it’s not like it suddenly becomes simple, but it is easier if you have an immediate relative who’s a U.S. citizen. Beyond that, in most of these other green card categories, there are wait lists. There’s a certain number of visas that are issued every year. If your category is oversubscribed, if there are more people who’ve been found eligible for it than there are visas currently available, then there’s a wait list.”
Reilly explained that the visa that Tonny and his wife qualified for is not currently available.
“The judge said you are eligible for it, but what they can do is reserve you a visa number, which means they put you on a list, and then when your name comes up on the list, then you can go back to court and finalize your application. So you’re not actually granted that benefit until that visa becomes available.” Reilly says that this happens “because something may also change in the meantime, say, there is a criminal encounter or something that makes you no longer eligible, then it may be that when your name comes up on the list, you don’t get it.”
“But provided things remain the same, when your visa number comes up, when your name comes up on the list, then you can get your green card.”
“In the meantime, you have a preliminary decision. So you are preliminarily approved, it’s just not final yet. So you can’t get your green card, but you can, based on that preliminary approval, get a work authorization based on that preliminary approval and a social security number.”
Yes, says Reilly, Ramirez and other immigrants awaiting green cards are paying taxes.
“Many people who are undocumented, they do pay taxes anyway — even if they don’t have a work authorization, because you can get a tax ID number, and many people do that. People pay their taxes that they’ll never get back. They’re not qualifying for social security or anything with that.”
Although Ramirez did not initially follow protocols when he entered the U.S., Reilly says he has been following the process since 2011 and has been an upstanding resident.
“Cancellation of removal,” said Reilly, “is a specific category that was created for people who’ve been present in the United States for a long time, who are able to establish what’s called ‘good moral character.’ You can establish you’ve been in the US over 10 years, you can establish good moral character. And that you have a US citizen or legal permanent resident immediate family member who would suffer exceptional and extremely unusual hardship if your were deported.” In Tonny’s case, those family members are his sons, one of whom has profound special needs.
Reilly says that “cancellation of removal” was created under the Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, which went into effect in April of 1997. She said it is limited to around 4,000 visas nationwide a year.
Reilly says that due process shouldn’t be a left or right, conservative or liberal matter.
For the “don’t tread on me” crowd, Reilly says, “on one side of your mouth, you talk about how important the constitution is and freedom of speech, but then with due process, no. But if it happened to them, if they were arrested without a warrant. If they were detained without the opportunity for a trial or the opportunity to be released with bail or bond. … People have a hard time understanding that the Constitution doesn’t only apply to people who are citizens of the United States, the Constitution exists to protect the people who are physically present in the United States from government overreach. The Constitution exists to protect us from the government, and it applies to every single person physically present in the United States.”
“That’s not me being idealistic. That’s just what it is.”
