A video this week shows a woman being removed from a jetway at by federal agents, then led out a door onto the tarmac as onlookers shout, “Help us! ICE is here!”
agents arrested Chantal Alejandra Morales Rojas, who is from Ecuador, on Monday, the confirmed to The Denver Post. The agency said she entered the U.S. on Oct. 20, 2024, and overstayed her visa, which allowed her to remain in the country until Jan. 4, 2025.
She remains in ICE custody “pending removal proceedings,” an unidentified DHS spokesperson said in an email to The Post on Wednesday.
Woman is abducted by ICE at the Denver airport when trying to return home to Oakland. She’s detained by ICE at the Denver airport (Southwest Airlines), taken from the jetway and hustled into an unmarked van on the tarmac
— Sigurdur Nordal (@essenviews)
A created to pay for Rojas’ legal fees said she lives in Oakland, California, and has a work permit and pending asylum case. The crowdfunding campaign had raised more than $93,000 by Wednesday afternoon.
“This fundraiser is for a beloved Oakland resident who spent two years as the au pair for an ultimate frisbee family, becoming an integral part of their lives and the local community,” the fundraising post said.
The GoFundMe said Rojas was returning to Oakland when she was detained by ICE at the Denver airport and “hustled into an unmarked van.”
In the video, Rojas is seen being confronted by federal agents in plain clothes and taken from a jetway to a Southwest Airlines flight. The person recording the video tells the agents that Rojas’ lawyer is outside and advises Rojas not to speak to ICE.
“We’re going to be very nice to you,” the agent says to Rojas in the video before threatening to charge the person filming with interfering with their proceedings.
that the Trump administration is increasingly using a once-obscure statute, , to charge people with impeding or assaulting federal officers. The ICE agent cites that statute in the Denver airport video. Punishments for the federal crime range from a fine to 20 years in prison.
The Times found the Trump administration has , but that nearly half of the more than 400 cases resolved so far have unraveled and that “federal law enforcement has engaged in extensive misconduct” in its rush to meet the administration’s deportation orders.
In the video, Rojas is led through a door out to the tarmac while the person recording the video shouts, “Help us! ICE is here!”
Other people waiting at the Southwest gate begin crowding around, pulling out their phones to film and looking out the windows onto the tarmac.
The federal agent says, “We’re being very nice. We’re being very respectful.”
The person recording the video says: “(Expletive) you. This is (expletive) evil. You should be ashamed of yourself. Who gives a (expletive) if you’re being polite? (Expletive) you.”
A Southwest gate agent steps in and tells the person filming, “If you are on this flight and you speak to them like that, you will not board this flight.”
Southwest Airlines told The Post on Wednesday that the company cannot comment on the details of law enforcement activities, but that DHS and the have access to all passenger information as part of their responsibilities to clear travelers at airport security checkpoints.
The airline may deny boarding to customers it deems disruptive or who otherwise display behavior that could threaten the safety of others, the airline said.
“Southwest complies with applicable state and federal law when asked to share information about customers,” Lynn Lunsford, a Southwest Airlines spokesperson, said in a statement. “The airline has provided guidance to employees to help ensure appropriate legal documentation is presented by law enforcement agencies prior to interactions in the gate areas. Southwest is committed to providing a safe travel experience for all customers and employees.”
The airline said the person who filmed the video got to their destination that evening on a later flight. The Post could not independently confirm that.
When asked whether Rojas had a work permit and a pending asylum case, the unnamed ICE representative responded that work permits or pending legal cases do not confer “any type of legal status in the United States or prevent ICE from arresting or deporting an illegal alien from the country. … Each illegal alien receives due process.”
The GoFundMe page said Rojas was taken to an ICE detention facility. It was not immediately clear whether Rojas was being held at the run by .
Andrea Loya, executive director for local immigrant rights organization , said the group is worried about reported ICE activity at the airport as people wait for domestic flights.
“We have confirmed that this has been taking place since at least Wednesday night with a different woman being abducted outside of a Frontier flight,” Loya said. “ICE is showing that they will meet their number quotas by any means necessary.”
