Attorney Highlights Cuban Migrant Arrests on Route Between Miami-Dade and the Keys

Immigration attorney Avelino González has issued a public warning, pointing out that the route from Miami-Dade County to the Florida Keys has effectively become a border where ICE is daily detaining Cubans holding I-220A documents.

The statement was made during a conversation with journalist Gloria Ordaz on Telemundo 51's program "Encuentro Virtual."

González emphasized that the area between Miami-Dade and the Keys has morphed into a sort of internal border where immigration authorities are ramping up checks on Cubans with irregular status.

"Raids are happening every day," González warned. "What's happening between Miami-Dade and the Keys is practically a border," he added.

The attorney shared the story of one of his clients, a Cuban national who was detained while traveling from Marathon to Miami. His wife, also holding an I-220A document, is terrified of visiting him, fearing arrest on the way.

"She's terrified… she thinks if she heads to Marathon, they might stop her too," González explained.

González also pointed out that even those with pending appeals are not safe: "There are people with pending appeals at the Board of Immigration Appeals in Virginia, supposedly untouchable, yet they've been caught and ended up in Mexico within four days."

Despite the climate of fear, González remains hopeful about legal avenues: "I haven't lost faith in the federal appeals circuits. There's still potential for something to happen in a federal appeals circuit."

The I-220A document allows for the temporary release under supervision of migrants detained by ICE but does not provide a definitive immigration status or protection against future arrests. Without being equivalent to formal admission or parole, it prevents Cubans from leveraging the Cuban Adjustment Act to apply for permanent residency.

González criticized the legal trap as intentional: "The reality is it's done on purpose. If they block residency, ICE doesn't consider pending applications, and when you appear before a judge, that judge has no jurisdiction over that application. Therefore, your only option is asylum… and most people end up being deported."

The situation worsened after Trump's presidential proclamation in December 2025, which halted all immigration processes for citizens from 19 countries, including Cuba and Venezuela. This encompasses status adjustments, stay extensions, and status changes.

Statistics highlight the scope of the issue. According to a recent analysis by the Cato Institute, based on data from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), approved residencies for Cubans plummeted by 99.8%: from over 10,000 monthly in February 2025 to just 15 in January 2026. Concurrently, ICE detentions of Cubans surged by 463% since October 2024.

In April, a federal judge in Maryland ordered the reactivation of residency applications for 83 immigrant plaintiffs, declaring the indefinite suspension by the Trump administration illegal. In March, attorneys had already filed a federal class-action lawsuit over delays affecting more than 100,000 Cuban residencies.

Telemundo 51 political analyst Alex Penelas believes that this immigration policy will have little electoral impact on Republican candidates ahead of the November 2026 elections.

"The political impact will be minimal, even though some may have relatives voting in the elections, but the generation most affected by these decisions is frankly the least likely to participate in elections," he argued.

Penelas noted that new Cuban immigrants are more focused on daily survival than civic participation. "They're more concerned, Gloria, about day-to-day survival, sending food, medicine, aid to family in Cuba. What they lacked in Cuba, they don't exercise here either," he asserted.

"The strong Cuban vote in this community comes from the historic exile… and the numbers demonstrate it," Penelas concluded, referencing the electoral bloc that remains pivotal in primaries and the general elections in November.