News and Events
See SOS Co-Founder Mich Gonzalez on a live Univision national news interview on April 30, 2025 about the case of two Honduran mothers coerced into accepting deportation with their U.S. children, (ages 2, 4, and 7) from Louisiana, despite local coalition's best efforts to stop ICE's cruel and unlawful behavior.
“‘I could never get an answer to why my clients are being sent to the SHU, and the SHU is an exceptionally hard place to see people,’ [Katie] Blankenship says. ‘They don't even allow you to pass documents. There's literally no way to even get a signature on something. You can't hear each other. It's just an awful situation. That's just for legal representation, not for what the people inside are going through.’”
“‘Now the government has put their lives at even greater risk by releasing their full name and information yesterday,’ [Mich] Gonzalez [co-founder of Sanctuary of the South] says.”
“‘What is missing from any decision to reopen Glades is whether they have even come close to addressing the gross deficiencies that required them to close in the first place,’ said Katie Blankenship, immigration attorney and co-founding partner for Sanctuary of the South.”
“The council estimates it would cost $88 billion a year to deport 1 million immigrants. ‘They clearly have plans to reopen facilities or build new ones,’ [Mich] Gonzalez, the Louisiana attorney, said, ‘but in the meantime they are overcrowding the existing facilities.’"
“ Mich P. González, co-founder of Sanctuary of the South and attorney for one of the mothers, told NBC News that the mothers, who haven’t spoken publicly, ‘are scared and gravely worried about their safety’ and said naming them was ‘cruel and reckless.’”
Attorneys slam DHS for releasing deported moms' names and 'needlessly exposing them to danger'
NBC News | April 30, 2025
“‘I fully believe that Maksym Chernyak would be alive today but for him being detained by the Department of Homeland Security,’ said Katie Blankenship, a lawyer representing Tarasiuk. ‘They knew he had dangerously high blood pressure and chose to do nothing.’”
"This sounds like the stuff of nightmares. It is. It is also the current reality in the U.S. — a daily government-sponsored terrorism inflicted on millions of immigrants physically and emotionally targeted by the Trump administration. Many of these people were forced to flee their home countries due to violently destabilizing foreign policies by the U.S. government."
“ Katie Blankenship, managing partner for Sanctuary of the South, a human rights group, has been visiting the Krome North Service Processing Center in southern Florida where the Ukrainian refugee and at least one other detainee recently died. Blankenship is working with the family of the Ukrainian man to get an independent autopsy and file a wrongful death lawsuit.”