Longtime Texas court interpreter released from ICE custody
A longtime Texas court interpreter who was detained on immigration charges in March was released from ICE custody Thursday, her attorney told ABC News.
Meenu Batra, who has lived in the U.S. for about 35 years and has a "withholding of removal" order that prevents her from being deported to her home country of India due to fear of persecution, was arrested by authorities on March 17 at Texas' Valley International Airport while on her way to Milwaukee for a work trip.
She was held at the nearby El Valle Detention Facility in Raymondville, where she told ABC News in a phone interview that she felt "humiliated and treated like a criminal."
Her attorney, Deepak Ahluwalia, told ABC News that the Department of Homeland Security granted Batra parole two hours before a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order, mandating her immediate release.
In his order, Judge Rolando Olvera found, in part, that the government failed to explain why Batra was being detained for the first time in 25 years, siding with Ahluwalia's main arguments made in court filings.
Judge Olvera added the Batra was "afforded no procedural protection" before she was detained.
"Such risks are particularly important where, as here, Petitioner was arrested and detained for no discernible reason, with no identified change in circumstance bearing on the likelihood of removal, and with no country identified that she could even be sent to despite the IJ's order withholding her removal to India," the judge wrote.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said Batra was arrested March 17 "during a targeted enforcement operation."
"Batra was issued a final order of removal from an immigration judge in 2000. She first entered the country illegally at an unknown date and location. An activist judge appointed by Barack Obama RELEASED her from ICE custody on April 30," the spokesperson said. "We will continue to fight for the removal of illegal aliens who have no right to be in our country."
Batra, a 53-year-old single mother of four adult U.S. citizens, has been a certified court interpreter for more than 20 years.
In his order, Olvera also barred the Trump administration from detaining Batra without providing her notice detailing the reason for her re-detention, and enough time to respond to it.
"The federal district court's order today confirms what we have said from the beginning: the government cannot detain people first and justify it later," Ahluwalia said in a statement. "The Court has now ordered her release and made clear that due process is not optional. If the government seeks to take someone's liberty, it must provide notice and a fair opportunity to be heard."
According to the American Immigration Council and National Immigrant Justice Center, a person who is granted withholding of removal is "protected from being returned to his or her home country and receives the right to remain in the United States and work legally" -- however that person "cannot petition to bring family members to the United States, and does not gain a path to citizenship."
In response to the Trump administration's immigration crackdown, attorneys and immigrant rights groups have filed numerous lawsuits challenging the removal of migrants, including some with withholding of removal, to so-called "third countries" other than their own that are willing to accept them.
"This case is not just about Meenu," Ahluwalia said. "It reflects a broader and troubling pattern of enforcement actions that disregard basic legal protections. The Constitution applies to everyone on U.S. soil."
