OMAHA — A 21-year-old Salvadoran woman who crossed into the United States as an “unaccompanied minor” and found a home in Lincoln was let go from a two-month ICE detention per a March 13 order by a federal judge in Omaha.

Days before, an undocumented father of three who had been pulled over and arrested by federal agents while driving to his Omaha job was reunited with his family after an immigration judge granted his release on bond. He had been behind bars for two months.

The two, who still face deportation proceedings but were allowed to build their cases outside of jail, are among four migrants represented by the American Civil Liberties Union of Nebraska who over about a month’s span were released from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody.

ACLU Nebraska a week ago described those legal moments as affirmation of due process and a “streak of victories” that started with the Feb. 20 release of Joel Angel-Becerril, a young Omaha DACA recipient, and Lorena Alarcon-Alarcon, an undocumented immigrant mother living in Schuyler, Nebraska.

But a new ruling by the federal 8th Circuit Court of Appeals — which covers Nebraska — throws continuation of that streak into doubt.

Wednesday, a panel on the appeals court decided 2-1 that federal law doesn’t require a shot at bond for undocumented immigrants, even if they have lived inside the country for years without a criminal record.

Affirms Trump Policy

The decision sides with the Trump administration on a controversial reinterpretation of federal law. U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi’s social media reaction: “MASSIVE COURT VICTORY against activist judges and for President Trump’s law and order agenda!”

At issue is a federal policy issued last summer, and backed by the Board of Immigration Appeals, which called for mandatory detention of nearly all undocumented immigrants. It was a pivot from the longstanding practice allowing migrants who had lived years in the country a chance for bond.

The mass detention policy fueled a legal morass, including a historic number of legal challenges nationwide and dozens filed on behalf of migrants in Nebraska.

Federal judges had overwhelmingly rejected the Trump reinterpretation, according to a Politico analysis, but Reuters reported this week that the number of immigration bond hearings recently plummeted.

Now Wednesday’s 8th Circuit ruling, which aligns with a similar 5th Circuit split decision in February, has area immigration attorneys studying local implications and next steps.

Nebraska ACLU officials declined to comment other than to say the nonprofit is digesting the ruling and they expect it will affect their team’s approach. “But we’re not giving up.”

Longtime Omaha-based immigration attorney Bassel El-Kasaby said lawyers in the circuit’s coverage area — which also includes Iowa, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota, Arkansas and Minnesota —will be busy analyzing whether exceptions or “wiggle room” exists.

One option, he said, is requesting a look by the full circuit court.

Others point to Texas, where Politico reporting discovered that federal judges bound by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals found a possible legal route around that decision, based on due-process grounds.

‘Hell I Went Through’

Meanwhile, one of the ACLU Nebraska clients recently released from detention said she was grateful to God and a legal team that included her original attorney Raul Guerra — for the support needed “to get out of the hell I went through.”

Virginia Lissbeth Pineda Lemus, the Salvadoran migrant who had been held at the Lincoln County Jail on an ICE hold since January, was blunt in the criticism her lawyers said reflected her overall “traumatizing” experience.

She declined interviews but said in a translated statement provided by the ACLU: “I feel like I was treated more like an animal than a person. While I am so relieved to be free, I will be praying for others I met in ICE custody who deserve the same opportunity that I had.”

Pineda originally was arrested on domestic assault charges in January. Available court records said that ICE “encountered” her at the Lancaster County Jail the same day she was charged. After posting bond on the state charges, she was taken into ICE custody, and the feds initiated deportation proceedings.

ACLU attorney Jamel J.W. Connor, who helped represent Pineda, said the domestic assault charges had been dismissed and that she has apparently reunited with her boyfriend. Her lawyers said Pineda crossed the Mexico-U.S. border at age 16 as an unaccompanied minor without relatives traveling with or waiting for her.

Because of individual circumstances related to an earlier detention, Omaha-based Senior U.S. District Judge John Gerrard ordered her “outright release, rather than a bond hearing,” as Pineda battles against removal from the country. Connor lauded Gerrard’s March 13 order as well as the other recent ACLU wins as a “check on federal overreach.”

“As ICE continues to scale up its operations, we are going to keep doing what we can for community members who are being unjustly detained without due process,” she said in an interview prior to Wednesday’s ruling.

Salvadoran Father Of Three

In the situation of the father of three from El Salvador, Jorge Calderon Rivera had been detained two months in Nebraska’s McCook ICE facility before his release on bond. His lawyers said he had lived in Omaha for about a decade. They said he had never been convicted of a crime and that while he was in his homeland, he had supported law enforcement efforts to stop gang activity.

A video that circulated on social media showed law enforcement agents in two unmarked cars stopping him on Jan. 17. One agent, wearing blue jeans, a hood and a vest labeled “POLICE Federal Agent,” talked to Calderon just outside his red car. Without incident, the agent handcuffed and frisked Calderon before guiding him to sit in the unmarked law enforcement vehicle.

Calderon’s attorneys say he had seen police lights flashing behind him and pulled toward the curb thinking the driver wanted to pass. Instead one of the vehicles pulled in front of Calderon’s car and the other behind it.

A court record described the agents as part of the “Omaha Fugitive Operations Team” that had been “conducting enforcement operations” in Omaha. The record said that Calderon, during the stop, admitted to being a citizen of El Salvador and illegally present in the U.S., and the officers detained him. The report said ICE issued an arrest warrant and later started deportation proceedings.

The Center for Immigrant and Refugee Advancement is assisting Calderon with deportation proceedings and enlisted ACLU Nebraska’s help with the federal habeas litigation that led to his bond hearing.

CIRA senior attorney Ariel Magaña Linares cited factual discrepancies and inconsistencies in the federal law enforcement report regarding Calderon, including a line that said he was not married and had no children.

U.S. District Judge Susan Bazis on March 3 ordered immigration officials to provide Calderon with a bond hearing in accordance with his rights under immigration law and the U.S. Constitution. An immigration judge later granted his release on bond.

Magaña Linares said Calderon today is with his wife and children while his deportation case plays out.

‘Troubling Break’

He described the moment as “a reminder that when due process is fairly applied, immigrants can often show they are family-oriented, hardworking and contributing members to their communities.”

U.S. Department of Justice representatives who handle local detention-related litigation did not respond to a request for comment.

CIRA officials called Wednesday’s ruling a “troubling break,” from decades of immigration law. In a statement, the group said it expects increased pressure for migrants to accept deportation without a battle or lawyer. But CIRA won’t stop its work, the nonprofit said.

“We will continue to stand alongside our communities, fight for due process, and ensure that every person has a fair chance to be heard.”

This story was published by Nebraska Examiner, an editorially independent newsroom providing a hard-hitting, daily flow of news. Read the original article: https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2026/03/25/nebraska-cases-highlight-legal-m...