Cuban Trapped in Immigration Limbo: Stuck in U.S. Jail Without Deportation Destination

What began as a routine interaction with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Miami for Josué Rodríguez Pérez has spiraled into a nightmare. For over 40 days, he has been confined in a cell at the Natrona County Jail in Casper, Wyoming, with no country willing to accept him and an uncertain future ahead.

Rodríguez, who fled the Fidel Castro regime as a teenager alongside his father, has lived in the United States for more than 30 years. His life took a dramatic turn in 2012 when a credit card fraud conviction led to the loss of his permanent residency. Although a judge ordered his deportation, Cuba, as in many similar cases, refused to accept him.

For eight years, he worked legally as a truck driver in Florida, established a family, and attempted to rebuild his life. However, in June of this year, during his annual ICE appointment, Rodríguez was detained alongside over a dozen other Cubans, marking the beginning of an ordeal that saw him transferred between detention centers in Miami, Texas, Colorado, and ultimately Wyoming.

"You want to die. You beg God not to wake up in the morning, being so isolated," Rodríguez revealed in phone interviews from jail to WyoFile.

Without a Destination Country

Although courts ordered his deportation but not his imprisonment, the Cuban found himself shackled, moved from one facility to another, and held without a clear path forward. ICE attempted to deport him to Mexico, but he was never informed why the neighboring country refused to accept him or what would come next.

The uncertainty is exacerbated by the Donald Trump administration's push for agreements with third countries, even African nations like Rwanda or South Sudan, where Rodríguez fears for his life. "With Trump, they can do whatever they want," he expressed in desperation.

His sister, Monika Rodríguez, starkly summarized their ordeal. "He has served his time in prison, so he doesn't need more years in prison. If he needs to be deported, then go ahead. Deport him," she suggests.

At 16, Rodríguez arrived in Miami with his family, fleeing communism. Decades later, his life was marred by the loss of his first wife, a daughter, and a niece in a car accident. Overcome with guilt, he fell into drugs and financial crimes.

However, in prison, he found faith, studied, cared for fellow inmates, and emerged determined to rebuild himself. "I felt free inside prison, believe it or not. It was beautiful," he said. After his release, he financed his truck, worked, remarried, and supported his two surviving daughters. "Eight years of good behavior," Monika recalled, until the new immigration crackdown struck.

Broken Family and Fear of the Future

In Florida, his wife, daughters, and sister live in distress, without income and uncertain about his fate. "He is increasingly desperate and depressed," his family told WyoFile.

Rodríguez himself admitted contemplating a hunger strike. During 40 days in Casper, he didn’t see sunlight or have meaningful human contact. "It's horrible. I can't compare it to anything because I've never been through something like this," he recounted.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court ruled in 2001 that the government cannot indefinitely detain an immigrant without a real deportation plan. However, attorneys warn that even if Rodríguez is released, ICE could re-arrest him and attempt deportation again.

"This is my home, but it no longer is," Rodríguez's paradox encapsulates the plight of thousands of Cubans living between the hope of rebuilding their lives in the United States and the constant fear of being uprooted.

"It's not the same country, not the same freedom I knew," he lamented. "I feel deeply for this country. This is my home." Or at least, it used to be. Now he just wants to escape the limbo and find a place where he can start anew.