Sacramento, California – California Governor Gavin Newsom is calling on the Department of Homeland Security to immediately return a Venezuelan asylum seeker who was deported to El Salvador under disputed circumstances. In a letter sent Thursday to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Newsom raised alarm over the deportation of 31-year-old Andry Hernandez Romero, a gay makeup artist who had sought asylum in the U.S. last year, citing threats to his safety and concerns over his right to due process.
Hernandez Romero arrived at the U.S.-Mexico border in San Diego last August using the CBP One app — the official channel for asylum seekers under current federal policy. He was detained for months at the Otay Mesa Detention Center while awaiting a court hearing, according to his attorney Lindsay Toczylowski, CEO of the Immigrant Defenders Law Center.
But on March 13, Hernandez was inexplicably not brought to his scheduled hearing. A week later, Toczylowski learned he had been deported to El Salvador — and sent to CECOT, a high-security prison notorious for holding individuals without communication or release…