Gaby Duarte believed the United States would offer her family protection after they fled political persecution in Venezuela.
“Over there we are going to feel safe, well, we will be safe in the United States,” she recalls, breaking down in tears as she describes how her husband, Carlos García, a former Venezuelan mayor and opponent of the Maduro regime, persuaded her to move to Ohio.
That sense of safety collapsed on Friday, when García was jailed, not by Venezuelan security forces, but by US immigration authorities. He was arrested by ICE agents during a routine check of his immigration status and is now awaiting trial at Butler County Jail in Hamilton, Ohio.
In 2017, the…