Due Process
Immigration. 1,100 words, 5 minute read. With Claude Sonnet and Midjourney.
Mateo Suarez's trowel kissed the wet concrete in smooth, practiced strokes. Dawn hadn't yet whispered over the Albuquerque construction site, but the foreman had them starting early to outrun the summer heat. Rancheras hummed from a nearby pickup. Coffee steam performed lazy ballet above thermoses.
Then—black SUV. Slamming doors. Boots on gravel. Conversations evaporating mid-word.
The three figures materialized like crows through the half-light, navy uniforms swallowing whatever dawn had managed to seep into the sky. Those letters—ICE—catching construction floodlights like warning flares.
(Mateo's mouth: suddenly Death Valley. His heart: suddenly a jackhammer. His hands: suddenly possessed by some desperate automation, smoothing concrete as if invisibility might be achieved through diligence.)
"ID check," announced the lead agent, a man whose jawline appeared to have been constructed from the same materials Mateo was laying. Mirrored sunglasses transformed his eyes into twin silver dollars. "Everyone line up."
Mateo joined the shuffling workers. His fingers found the folded papers in his breast pocket—asylum application, work authorization, biometrics receipt—creased and soft from constant handling, worry beads for the documented-yet-not.
The agent—Brennan, according to the name badge partially eclipsed by tactical pen—took the papers with obvious distaste.
"These look photocopied," he said, squinting performatively at the watermark. "Where'd you get them?"
"From government office," Mateo replied, accent thickening with anxiety. "I cross at El Paso port of entry, ask for asylum. Everything legal. My mother is citizen. Lives here."
"Your mother?" Brennan's eyebrows achieved momentary escape velocity. "Convenient."
The cuffs arrived before Mateo could explain further—cold metal biting skin, clicking with administrative finality.
As they guided him toward the SUV, Mateo called back desperately: "Dave! Please call my mother, Elena Suarez-Williams! Tell her they take me!"
The foreman's nod was small enough to be deniable later, should anyone ask.
---
Elena Suarez-Williams had worn theoretical holes in the detention center's linoleum through forty minutes of pacing. The bench she'd abandoned—hard plastic, the color of spoiled butter—seemed designed to complement the fluorescent lights that transformed everything into a bureaucratic jaundice.
Behind bulletproof glass, the receptionist's acrylic nails performed a percussion solo against her keyboard.
"Ma'am," she said without looking up, "as I've told you repeatedly, visitation requests take five to seven business days to process."
Elena pressed her palms against the counter. At sixty-three, she had survived Venezuela's economic collapse, solo immigration, engineering school while working nights, and single motherhood. She refused to be defeated by bad highlights and worse manners.
"And as I've told you," Elena replied, voice carrying steel forged in male-dominated board meetings, "my son has a pending asylum application. He entered legally. He followed every procedure correctly. And now I hear he's scheduled for deportation tomorrow morning?"
The woman finally looked up, boredom worn like defensive armor. "If he's on the deportation list, there's really no point in processing a visitation request, is there?"
Before Elena could respond with the dangerous heat unfurling in her chest, the door opened to admit Jessica, her daughter-in-law, accompanied by a tall man carrying a briefcase that had clearly experienced numerous legal battles.
"Elena," Jessica called, embracing her before turning to the receptionist. "I'm Jessica Suarez, attorney-at-law, and this is Perry Hoffman from the Immigrant Justice Project. We've filed an emergency habeas petition with Judge Sandoval. She's ordered the immediate production of Mateo Suarez in her courtroom tomorrow at 9 a.m."
---
Courtroom 3B: smaller than its wood paneling and high ceilings aspired to suggest. Air conditioning surrendering to New Mexico summer. Wooden benches polished by years of anxious shifting.
Mateo sat between Jessica and Perry Hoffman, borrowed dress shirt forming a cardboard collar around his neck. Across the aisle, Agent Brennan flipped through a manila folder with hands better suited to handcuffs than paperwork.
The courtroom hummed with unexpected attendance—ICE agents, department attorneys, Mateo's construction colleagues, legal observers, reporters. His private nightmare had somehow transformed into public theater.
Judge Sandoval entered—compact woman, silver hair imprisoned in severe bun.
After preliminaries, Perry Hoffman explained Mateo's unlawful detention and the attempt to deport him despite his pending asylum claim.
Brennan defended himself: "Your Honor, I had reason to believe the documentation was falsified. The watermark appeared suspect."
The questioning was surgical: Had he verified through official databases? Had he contacted the assigned asylum officer?
"There wasn't time, Your Honor," Brennan insisted. "The executive order emphasizes expediting suspicious cases."
"The executive order doesn't suspend the Constitution," Judge Sandoval countered. "Due process isn't optional."
The government attorney intervened: "The issue, Your Honor, is whether non-citizens on U.S. soil are entitled to the same due process as citizens."
"The Fifth Amendment doesn't say 'no citizen shall be deprived of liberty without due process.' It says 'no person.'" The judge's voice carried two centuries of precedent. "Agent Brennan, how do we know for certain this man is who he claims to be? Or that this woman is really his mother?"
A murmur rippled courtroom-wide.
"How do we 'know' anyone is who they claim to be?" She turned to her clerk. "Mr. Reynolds, how do you know I'm Judge Sandoval?"
The clerk blinked like a suddenly illuminated owl. "You have identification, Your Honor. And I've worked with you for years."
"Documents that could be forged, by Agent Brennan's reasoning," she noted. "Agent, how would you feel if you were detained while the government verified your citizenship?"
Brennan's face achieved tomato status. "That's different. I was born here."
"And your proof of that is...?"
"Birth certificate. Social Security card."
"Documents," the judge said, letting significance saturate the courtroom. "Since 2002, at least 1,500 U.S. citizens have been mistakenly detained or deported because agents skipped due process protections in their rush to deport people who 'looked illegal.'"
The courtroom had achieved perfect stillness, as if collectively holding its breath.
"I find that Mr. Suarez was unlawfully detained," Judge Sandoval declared. "He is to be released immediately to continue with his scheduled asylum proceedings."
---
Outside, sunlight assaulted them after the courtroom's dim formality. Mateo blinked upward at New Mexico's relentless blue.
"When I studied for my citizenship test," Elena said quietly, "I learned that the Constitution protects 'persons,' not just 'citizens.' It seemed strange then. Now I understand why."
Mateo glanced back. Through the closing courthouse door, he caught Brennan still sitting alone, staring at his hands. For a moment, their eyes connected, and Mateo recognized the expression—the same disorientation Venezuelans displayed when realizing trusted systems had betrayed them, that rules could change overnight.
It was the face of a man discovering that the line between belonging and exile was thinner than previously imagined—and that perhaps this line ran not between citizens and non-citizens, but between those protected by due process and those who were not.