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By Dan Gooding
Associate News Editor
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Immigration agents on Friday detained a father in New Jersey, with his neighbors rallying around the family and raising thousands of dollars to try to help his legal fight.
Tonny Quesada-Ramirez's detention in South Orange is the latest case involving U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents detaining immigrants with pending legal status applications—a gray area that has seen agents avoid arrests until a decision is made.
A GoFundMe set up for Quesada-Ramirez, known to his community as Tony, quickly surpassed the $25,000 target and sat at over $36,000 as of Wednesday afternoon.
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Neighbor Shuly Adams, who started the fundraiser, wrote: "He was kind. He was easy to work with. He lit up when talking about his family, most of all his two sons, the older of whom has Down’s syndrome."
In a statement to Newsweek on Wednesday, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said that agents had arrested Quesada-Ramirez multiple times and repeated its message that pending applications did not prevent deportation.
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Tonny Quesada-Ramirez: What We Know
"Border Patrol encountered him on June 13, 2001, after entering the country illegally, and he was taken into ICE custody," DHS said. "On June 24, 2001, he was released from ICE custody on a promise to appear in court, and on October 16, 2001, he was ordered removed for failing to appear."
ICE arrested Quesada-Ramirez again October 24, 2010, before releasing him on bond the following March.
Quesada-Ramirez was detained Friday, August 7, alongside a handful of other men in the New Jersey village of South Orange. The Costa Rican national has lived in the U.S. for around 26 years, according to Adams, and lives with his wife and their two children.
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Some years ago, Adams said, Quesada-Ramirez started the process of obtaining a green card.
According to the GoFundMe, Adams first met him five years ago when he made a wooden cover for her radiator. He had been living in an apartment on her street, and she went back to him for other jobs over the years.
"Last year, we decided to build an addition onto our home. We turned to Tony. He and his team started on the job in April. Five months later, they have nearly completed it," Adams wrote, saying that the plan was to share a note with the local community about the team's work.
"We had, strangely, just finished writing those words when we got a phone call telling us that Tony had been handcuffed and arrested by ICE agents one block from our home."
ICE Detaining Immigrants With Applications Pending
Recent immigration enforcement actions have increasingly targeted people with pending applications before U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), reflecting the Trump administration's position that filing for an immigration benefit does not, by itself, shield someone from deportation.
Newsweek has reported on a series of cases involving immigrants seeking green cards or other forms of legal status who were detained by ICE during routine USCIS interviews or after their cases were flagged for enforcement review. USCIS policy guidance has emphasized that people who are removable under immigration law may be placed into removal proceedings even while an application is pending.
Administration officials argue that a pending application does not confer lawful immigration status. In a 2025 policy update, USCIS added language stating that beneficiaries of family-based petitions could be referred for removal proceedings if the agency determines they are deportable, noting that a petition "accords no immigration status nor does it bar removal."
The administration has said the changes are intended to strengthen immigration enforcement, combat fraud and ensure closer coordination between USCIS and ICE.
Critics, however, say the policy is sweeping up immigrants who are attempting to legalize their status through established channels and who have often spent months or years waiting for USCIS to adjudicate their cases. Immigration attorneys have argued that lengthy processing backlogs can leave applicants in a form of legal limbo, where they have filed the required paperwork and are awaiting a decision but remain vulnerable to enforcement action if their underlying visa or immigration status has expired.
The administration counters that immigration benefits remain discretionary and that applicants who are otherwise out of status can still be subject to removal while their cases are pending.
What Happens Next
Adams said that an attorney has been retained for Quesada-Ramirez, who is being held at Delaney Hall, an ICE detention center in Newark that has been the focus of protests and scrutiny from lawmakers and locals in recent months.
"He will remain in ICE custody pending removal proceedings," the DHS spokesperson said Wednesday. "To be clear, work authorization or a pending application do NOT confer legal status in the United States."
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Gabe Whisnant and Dave Siminoff.
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