Continuous massive incursions across the southern border of the United States, coupled with inadequate vetting, have placed immigration at the center of political discourse over the past decade. And while it’s true that the American electorate mandated President Donald Trump’s administration to deport amid the escalating number of undocumented immigrants in the country, the justice system must not ignore cases of genuine refuge.

That is the case of Daniel Arcadis Solano, the son of a Baptist pastor from Cuba, who has been detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) since June 2026 in Miami, Florida, after being stopped by police for a minor traffic violation. He is now at risk of deportation after his request for permanent residency was denied earlier this month at the Otay Mesa Detention Center in San Diego, California.

The NGO Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) is calling for him to be permitted to remain in the country with his family, as he would be at serious risk of imprisonment or forcible induction into the Cuban military were he to be forced to return.

As I mentioned in a past article, in 2022, a political police officer threatened his father, pastor Arcadis Solano Silvera of the Fourth Baptist Church in Santiago de Cuba, to send Daniel, then 15, to perform Mandatory Military Service. Then, the official cited Article 6 of the Castroist Family Code: minors “may not be separated from their mothers, fathers, and relatives, unless determined by the competent authorities in special circumstances.”

The code was fought by that evangelical community on the island, since it violated religious freedom, freedom of expression, limited the right of parents to teach their values to their children, and advanced gender ideology.

So, in a sense, Daniel and his family are not only refugees of totalitarianism, but also of its imposition of gender ideology policies. They are the ones who are being resisted by the Trump administration in its domestic foreign policies. It would be a contradiction to send back a persecuted Christian to a dictatorship that is pushing those policies and has the largest number of political prisoners in the Western Hemisphere.

Israel Matos, an exiled translator and editor with a background in evangelical leadership on the island, noted for this article that the pressures faced by faith leaders in Cuba have been extensively documented since 1959. These pressures, he explained, “are not limited to surveillance, interrogations, threats, or restrictions imposed on the exercise of their ministry; rather, there is a particularly cruel dimension to this intimidation: the vulnerability of their families.”

Daniel’s father has a decades-long, documented history of being targeted by the Cuban regime, according to CSW. “He was repeatedly threatened with the destruction or forced closure of his church and was assigned a political police agent who monitored his movements, harassed him and, on multiple occasions, detained him for interrogation.”

In an effort to protect his son, Pastor Solano Silvera and his wife, Yadely Jaume, made the decision to flee Cuba, CSW stated, to several countries, until they arrived in Mexico in July 2023. There they began the online process, in use by U.S. Border Control at the time, to register for an appointment before entering America. They were permitted entry and filed for residency in the U.S. under the Cuban Adjustment Act in September 2024.

In Open Doors’ ranking, Cuba is number 24 on its World Watch List of persecution against Christians, and its activities and wider churches “are under constant scrutiny” by the authorities.

Since 2018, the evangelical community has built the most important civil society movement against State policies, and since 2025, has given birth to the most far-reaching independent political voices in Cuba, some of them facing prison right now, like the influencers Ernesto Ricardo Medina and Anna Bensi.

Matos observes that when a pastor refuses to subordinate his conscience or “moderate” his voice in the face of injustice, lies, or corruption, “the consequences can extend to his wife, his children, and key leaders within his congregation,” thereby compromising “the rights and safety of individuals who should not have to suffer the consequences of their family members’ beliefs or actions.”

“The bonds of love and responsibility that connect a pastor to his family are used by the authorities as tools for intimidation, repression, and coercion,” he remarked.

Daniel, who turned 18 in 2025, graduated from high school in Miami and was planning to enlist and serve in the U.S. Marine Corps. His father, who works full-time as a hospice chaplain, told CSW that a Marine Corps sergeant, the Miami Baptist Association, and a number of other individuals have provided letters attesting to his son’s good character, and that, aside from the traffic citation, he has no other criminal record.

Matos noted that, given the political context in Cuba — where there are no safeguards against potential state retaliation — the risk faced by Daniel regarding a possible deportation (as the son of an exiled pastor) “cannot be assessed as if his story began and ended solely with his own actions.”

“Religious persecution or the repression of religious freedom does not always manifest through physical assault, a judicial sentence, or a prison cell,” the interviewee clarified. “It also operates through fear, uncertainty, and bureaucracy.”

For the Trump administration it would be a win, as is cracking down on illegal immigration and criminal networks, to protect the real refugees who have loved this country. A Cuban family that fled persecution is crying for help now.