Both citizens await deportation to Nicaragua at the Migration Operations Center (MOC), which has been operating in Guantanamo for decades. Until February 2025<\/a>, migrants arriving at the facility were those intercepted by U.S. authorities at sea as they attempted to reach the country’s shores, mainly from Cuba and Haiti. <\/p>\n\n The Nicaraguans arrived at MOC between late March and early April 2025. Both gave their testimonies via telephone to Marisol Dom\u00ednguez Ruiz, an attorney with the National Prison Project of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)<\/a>, the organization leading the lawsuit. CONFIDENCIAL<\/strong> has copies of the three court filings. <\/p>\n\n “Being here is terrible. It has affected me negatively. Sometimes I feel depressed. We live locked in the small room 23 hours a day. I spend my time lying down; I don’t know anything about what’s going on,” lamented L\u00f3pez Jarqu\u00edn in his account to the lawyer on April 26, 2025.<\/p>\n\n Suazo-Muller said that when he speaks with the attorneys, he\u2019s \u201cafraid to say everything openly\u201d because the calls are on speakerphone and there\u2019s always a guard nearby who \u201ccan hear what I\u2019m saying.\u201d<\/p>\n\n “I fear being punished or suffering reprisals from the guards for saying something that bothers them,” the Nicaraguan said when he spoke to the lawyer on April 21.<\/p>\n\n The lawsuit by the two Nicaraguans imprisoned at Guantanamo seeks to represent all detainees in similar circumstances, alleging violations of rights guaranteed by the First and Fifth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, including the rights of access to legal representation and family communication.<\/p>\n\n The situation at the Guantanamo immigration facility has historically been opaque, with little public information about what goes on there. International human rights organizations have denounced that the military base operates in a legal vacuum where the same legal guarantees regarding immigration that apply in U.S. territory do not apply.<\/p>\n\n Ariel Ruiz Soto, an analyst and researcher at the Migration Policy Institute,<\/a> explained that migrants sent to Guant\u00e1namo are stripped of their right to \u201cdue process,\u201d which in the U.S. \u201cguarantees\u201d that anyone, regardless of immigration status, \u201chas the right to legal representation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n \u201cA person who ends up in Guant\u00e1namo, since it’s considered outside U.S. territory, has less access to communication, and legal representation is much more opaque,\u201d the expert said in an interview with CONFIDENCIAL<\/strong> and the program Esta Semana.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n According to the lawsuit, detainees face \u201cextreme obstacles\u201d in communicating with their attorneys, as in-person legal visits are not allowed and scheduled phone calls often \u201cdon\u2019t happen.\u201d<\/p>\n\n When L\u00f3pez Jarqu\u00edn and Suazo-Muller speak with their attorneys, it’s under conditions that violate attorney-client confidentiality. \u201cMigrants are shackled and placed under physical restraints, while officers remain nearby, listening in on their conversations,\u201d the legal filing states. <\/p>\n\n In addition, there is no reliable mechanism for the detainees to send or receive legal documents. Lawyers for L\u00f3pez Jarqu\u00edn and Suazo-Muller have sent documents through the channels designated by the government, without receiving confirmation of delivery or obtaining the requested signatures. <\/p>\n\n In addition, officials have “incorrectly” informed migrants that they “do not need legal representation” because they have final orders of deportation, actively discouraging their access to “legal counsel.” Such action ignores the numerous legal options available, even for people with deportation orders. <\/p>\n\n “Since I arrived at Guant\u00e1namo, I was never told I had the right to speak to a lawyer. I have only been able to have legal calls because my lawyer arranged one with me, not because I could request it,” Suazo-Muller denounced.<\/p>\n\n “I was surprised to have received no information on how to contact a lawyer and I never saw any posters with information on how to talk to one. I have not received any pamphlets, flyers or posters on how to contact a lawyer,” the Nicaraguan stressed.<\/p>\n\n L\u00f3pez Jarqu\u00edn said that the Guant\u00e1namo guards did not inform him that he had the right to speak to a lawyer, and only asked him about his illnesses and assigned him to a room with six beds.<\/p>\n\n The Nicaraguan received legal help because a family member requested the support of a lawyer, who scheduled a call. “I was afraid of retaliation for having a legal call. I was worried that the guards would delay my departure and not let me out because I had that call,” he said. <\/p>\n\n The migrant assured that “I have not been convicted of any crime in the United States or in Nicaragua. In early February (2025), the Louisiana Police detained me following a noise complaint, but to my knowledge, I was not charged with any crime.”<\/p>\n\n Nicaraguan detainees and others at Guant\u00e1namo are allowed, in theory, one five-minute personal phone call a day. In practice, however, many can only communicate with their families once a week, according to the lawsuit. <\/p>\n\n Calls are “restricted” to phone numbers in the United States, leaving those with family only in their home countries unreachable.<\/p>\n\n “(The call with relatives) is not private, the guards are always there and the calls are on loudspeaker. It is not comfortable to talk with two or three people listening, I don’t feel I can share personal information,” commented L\u00f3pez Jarqu\u00edn.<\/p>\n\n During the rare family calls, officers immediately disconnect the line if migrants “mention that they are at Guantanamo,” talk about their conditions of confinement or any topic the officers deem inappropriate, further suspending future phone privileges, according to the lawsuit.<\/p>\n\n “I have been allowed to speak to my family about 20 times. I cannot give information about my stay in Guant\u00e1namo. I can’t say where I am or details about my condition,” Suazo-Muller said.<\/p>\n\n The lawyers warn that the restrictions imposed on migrants at Guantanamo are “significantly more severe” than those applied to people in U.S. immigration detention centers, federal prisons and even prisoners in military custody at the Guantanamo naval base itself.<\/p>\n\n The lawsuit document reveals other abuses at Guant\u00e1namo:<\/p>\n\n “We have one hour of recess a day. But there is nowhere to go. Only a week ago we got a television, which people can watch during that hour. The conditions are isolated,” said L\u00f3pez Jarqu\u00edn.<\/p>\n\n Migrants sent to Guantanamo are held in two different facilities within the naval base:<\/p>\n\n On January 29, 2025, U.S. President Donald Trump ordered to expand the Guantanamo naval base by 30,000 beds, “to detain the worst criminal illegal immigrants<\/a> who are a threat to the American people.”<\/p>\n\n Senior Pentagon officials assured the U.S. Congress that this “expansion” has not occurred. Moreover, in order to control these 30,000 deportees, the Defense Department “would have to mobilize approximately 9,000 military personnel to Guantanamo to support the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) personnel running the operation,” according to a report in The New York Times<\/a>, published in early April.<\/p>\n\n For the first time in history, the United States is using the Guantanamo naval base to detain migrants – mostly citizens of Venezuela and Nicaragua – who were initially apprehended on U.S. soil.<\/p>\n\n Ariel Ruiz Soto indicated that, as of early May 2025, almost 500 immigrants have been sent to the U.S. base, although this number varies each week.<\/p>\n\n “As of today (May 8), we still don’t know how many of the 500 remain in Guantanamo,” said the Migration Policy Institute analyst.<\/p>\n\n Of the Nicaraguans in Guant\u00e1namo, only the cases of L\u00f3pez Jarqu\u00edn and Suazo-Muller are known, and of the 40 deported to Nicaragua on April 3.<\/a> Both the U.S. government and the governments of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo are keeping the dates and number of deportations secret. <\/p>\n\n “Today Nicaraguan brothers who were imprisoned in Guant\u00e1namo arrived; that is, they are imprisoned in the United States and sent to Guant\u00e1namo,” Ortega said in an official act on April 30.<\/a> However, the president or spokeswoman Rosario Murillo have not specified the number of Nicaraguans detained in Guantanamo. <\/p>\n\n During April there were three flights with Nicaraguan deportees from the U.S. that stopped at the Guant\u00e1namo naval base: on the 3rd, 17th and 30th, according to a report by Thomas Cartwright<\/a>, who tracks U.S. deportation flights since 2020. He is part of the NGO Witness at the Border<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n The three flights with deportees departed from Alexandria, Louisiana, made a stop in Guantanamo, and then redirected to Managua, according to the report.<\/p>\n\n The April 30 flight was the eighth with Nicaraguans deported from the United States to arrive in Managua, during the first months of the Trump Administration, according to a CONFIDENCIAL<\/strong> analysis<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n The Nicaraguans’ lawsuit names high-level government officials and federal institutions as responsible:<\/p>\n\n The lawsuit, filed before a federal judge in Washington, D.C., is being promoted by several leading immigrant rights and civil rights organizations including: the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU); the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR)<\/a>; and the International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP).<\/a><\/p>\n\n Analyst Ruiz Soto warned that there is a possibility that Rodolfo L\u00f3pez Jarqu\u00edn and Johon Suazo-Muller could be deported to Nicaragua, if the governments of both countries reach an agreement to expedite their repatriation. <\/p>\n\n He also recalled that “the case, as we have seen in others, is going to take weeks or months to run its course”.<\/p>\n\n The investigator explained that the lawyers of the civil organizations will seek to stop the deportation under the argument that both Nicaraguans have “the right to be heard”. They must also demonstrate that the U.S. government did not follow due process to deport them in the first case. <\/p>\n\n “The lawyers are going to try to get them to return to the United States, to give them a general hearing in front of an immigration court,” Ruiz Soto said.<\/p>\n\n In his court testimony, Nicaraguan Johon Suazo-Muller expressed that he has “a special fear of being deported” to Nicaragua, or “of being held in prison in El Salvador”.<\/p>\n\n “I was trying to apply for asylum (in the United States). I was looking for a better life,” he emphasized.<\/p>\n\n Meanwhile, Rodolfo L\u00f3pez Jarqu\u00edn said, “There are many rumors and things that people say about who will be deported and when, because we are desperate to know what is happening and when we will get out of here. It is very difficult psychologically.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Nicaraguans Rodolfo Joel L\u00f3pez Jarqu\u00edn and Johon Elias Suazo-Muller arrived in the United States on different dates and by different routes, although since late April 2025 they share the same fate: they are leading a class action lawsuit over the “severe restrictions imposed” by the U.S. government against migrants detained at the U.S. military base […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":166428,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_eb_attr":"","_eb_data_table":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[15445,15446],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-166509","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-english","category-nation"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\u201cWe\u2019re locked up 23 hours a day\u201d<\/h2>\n\n
![\"Nicaraguan](\"https:\/\/confidencial.digital\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Rodolfo-Joel-Lopez-Jarquin-1024x631.jpg\")
Migrants denied rights at Guantanamo Bay<\/h2>\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/confidencial.digital\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Migrantes-presos-en-Guantanamo.jpg\")
Obstacles to the right of defense<\/h2>\n\n
![\"File](\"https:\/\/confidencial.digital\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/Base-en-Guantanamo-1024x578.jpg\")
Family Communication Restricted<\/h2>\n\n
Arbitrary interrogation and punishment<\/h2>\n\n
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![\"\"](\"https:\/\/confidencial.digital\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/Centro-de-detencion-de-Guantanamo.jpg\")
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Three flights from Guantanamo to Nicaragua<\/h2>\n\n
![\"Deportation](\"https:\/\/confidencial.digital\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Avion-con-deportados-1024x619.jpg\")
Lawsuit against officials and institutions<\/h2>\n\n
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![\"\"](\"https:\/\/confidencial.digital\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Funcionarios-estadounidense-demandados-1024x732.jpg\")