Latest / INSIGHT TODAY / Sierra Leonean immigrant nurse from Maryland deported to ‘third country’ SPEAKS OUT

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Sierra Leonean immigrant nurse from Maryland deported to ‘third country’ SPEAKS OUT · INSIGHT TODAY

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  Speaker 1: The Trump administration continues to move forward with the deportation
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  Speaker 1: of immigrants to so-called third countries. These are countries they
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  Speaker 1: are not from nor have any ties to. Let's bring
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  Speaker 1: in MSNOW international reporter Ines de la Quintera, who has
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  Speaker 1: been speaking with families affected by these third country deportations. Ines,
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  Speaker 1: great to see you. You've been doing a lot of
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  Speaker 1: terrific reporting on this subject. Tell us more about what
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  Speaker 1: you've learned.
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  Speaker 2: Hey, good morning. Yeah. So last week we told you
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  Speaker 2: about a Texas pastor who'd been deported to Ghana despite
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  Speaker 2: having legal protections in the U.S. Well, we also spoke
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  Speaker 2: to a nurse who'd spent the last 30 years in Maryland.
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  Speaker 2: Her entire family are U.S.
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  Speaker 3: Citizens.
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  Speaker 2: So her son, her parents, her nine siblings. And yet
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  Speaker 2: she was also deported to a third country.
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  Speaker 4: The last time I seen my mom was July. The
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  Speaker 4: next time I see her, she's getting dragged. in Ghana
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  Speaker 4: because the video had gone viral.
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  Speaker 2: Mohammed never expected to see this.
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  Speaker 4: They were grabbing me.
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  Speaker 5: They bumped the back of my head on the stairs
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  Speaker 5: and then they forcefully took me in a minivan.
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  Speaker 2: His mother, Rabiatu, thousands of miles from home, seen here
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  Speaker 2: dragged by officials in Ghana. Preparing to force her back
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  Speaker 2: to her native Sierra Leone, a country she fled decades
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  Speaker 2: ago during the civil war.
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  Speaker 5: I felt lost. Because I went to the United States
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  Speaker 5: when I was younger. I considered it my second home.
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  Speaker 5: All my life I've been there.
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  Speaker 2: Mo was born in the U.S.
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  Speaker 4: This is when I was like in about third grade
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  Speaker 4: in our apartment, like 2001, 2002, in Silver Spring.
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  Speaker 2: And the rest of Rabiatu's family, her parents and nine siblings,
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  Speaker 2: eventually got U.S. citizenship. But after missing an immigration hearing,
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  Speaker 2: her asylum application was denied. She was able to remain
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  Speaker 2: in the U.S. with a renewable work permit. At a
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  Speaker 2: routine check-in with ICE last summer, she was arrested and
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  Speaker 2: held for months at a facility in Louisiana.
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  Speaker 4: The whole next day I'm calling her on the ICE
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  Speaker 4: lookup website. It's not saying where she is. It's saying
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  Speaker 4: she's not here. It's just like, you know, there's no
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  Speaker 4: record not found.
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  Speaker 6: I'm like, hmm.
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  Speaker 4: Then I get a text message from her cell phone,
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  Speaker 4: and the text message said I've been deported to Ghana.
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  Speaker 2: Rabiatu dedicated her life in the U.S. to serving others.
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  Speaker 2: A single mom, she has no criminal record and spent
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  Speaker 2: the last 30 years working as a nurse in Maryland,
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  Speaker 2: even putting her life on the line during the COVID pandemic.
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  Speaker 5: I fed people there. I stood by people there and
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  Speaker 5: made phone calls telling their loved ones that this is
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  Speaker 5: the end. I made sure I stood by them until
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  Speaker 5: they took their last breath.
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  Speaker 7: So we're just outside the Vixen Hotel, which is where
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  Speaker 7: a lot of the deportees are taken after arriving in Ghana.
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  Speaker 7: And then it's from here that they're forced back to
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  Speaker 7: their country of origin. We also know that some of
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  Speaker 7: the deportees are taken to military camps where they're held
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  Speaker 7: under armed guard.
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  Speaker 5: The hotel room where I was is on the second floor.
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  Speaker 5: And then they dragged me down like a log, made
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  Speaker 5: sure they took me all the way downstairs. I said,
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  Speaker 5: I'm afraid to go to Sierra Leone. My life would
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  Speaker 5: be in danger.
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  Speaker 2: Experts tell us what happened to Rabiatu is a clear
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  Speaker 2: case of refoulement, the forced return of refugees or asylum
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  Speaker 2: seekers to a country where they may be at risk.
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  Speaker 2: It's prohibited under international law.
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  Speaker 3: It's clear the only reason why the U.S. is doing
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  Speaker 3: this is because U.S. courts have made clear orders that
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  Speaker 3: these persons cannot be sent to their countries of origin.
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  Speaker 3: What we've been able to establish is that oftentimes in
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  Speaker 3: the middle of the 90s, they're driven to the Ghana-Togo border.
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  Speaker 3: They don't hand them over to the Togolese officials through
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  Speaker 3: the formal border.
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  Speaker 2: The Ghanaian government denies the allegations. The deportees that are
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  Speaker 2: being brought here from the U.S., what kind of status
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  Speaker 2: are they being given in Ghana? As I've said, they
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  Speaker 2: can stay here for 90 days. And what happens after
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  Speaker 2: those 90 days?
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  Speaker 4: After 90 days, they are required to go back.
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  Speaker 2: Rabiatu says she left Sierra Leone as quickly as she
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  Speaker 2: could and fled to a neighboring country, where she is
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  Speaker 2: now stranded with no legal status and no right to work.
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  Speaker 2: while her American parents and American son anxiously wait for
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  Speaker 2: her to come home.
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  Speaker 6: This is my daughter.
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  Speaker 3: It's so bad.
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  Speaker 4: It's bigger than just my mom. There's so many people
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  Speaker 4: in this situation, and our president himself, he's married to
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  Speaker 4: somebody that was not born in America. What's the difference
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  Speaker 4: between somebody like that and somebody like my mom?
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  Speaker 2: So we asked DHS about Rabiatu's case. We didn't get
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  Speaker 2: any kind of comment specific to her case. We did
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  Speaker 2: get a more general statement. They say that third country
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  Speaker 2: removals are an essential public safety tool that remove the
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  Speaker 2: most dangerous criminals from our streets. Neither Rabiatu nor the
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  Speaker 2: pastor we reported on last week had any kind of
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  Speaker 2: criminal record.
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  Speaker 1: MSNOW international reporter Inesla Quintero, thank you again for this
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  Speaker 1: terrific reporting. And Molly, This is something I think our
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  Speaker 1: country's going to be grappling with for many years to come.
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  Speaker 1: We can certainly say this. This goes far, far, far
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  Speaker 1: beyond President Trump's original promise of just deporting the worst
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  Speaker 1: of the worst.
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  Speaker 6: Yeah, and this is why Trump is polling. So, you know, remember,
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  Speaker 6: immigration was one of the very few spots where they
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  Speaker 6: could really campaign, where they really felt they were ahead
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  Speaker 6: of it. And now, because of stuff like this, they're
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  Speaker 6: underwater on immigration. And that's because I don't think people
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  Speaker 6: ever saw it coming like this. And remember, this is
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  Speaker 6: a woman who's a nurse. We're a country where we
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  Speaker 6: need nurses. We have an older generation that's getting older.
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  Speaker 6: We need people to take care of them. And it's
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  Speaker 6: just not, she's not only, she's not a criminal, she's
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  Speaker 6: probably one of the most useful members of American society, right?
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  Speaker 6: Doing a job that we desperately need for people who
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  Speaker 6: are in need. And so it's a really good example
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  Speaker 6: of the many ways in which this immigration policy is cruel, unnecessary,
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  Speaker 6: and and hurting a lot of people.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and politically deeply unpopular.
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  Speaker 2: Hey, it's Rachel.
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  Speaker 2: Thanks.