Father and Son Separated During Routine ICE Appointment in Lower Manhattan
An unexpected turn at a routine immigration check-in led to a Chinese asylum-seeker and his young son being taken into custody by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Lower Manhattan. Advocates say the child’s whereabouts remain unknown after the pair were split up and the father was transferred hundreds of miles away.
Fei Zheng and his six-year-old son, Yuanxin, arrived at 26 Federal Plaza on Nov. 26 for a scheduled meeting with ICE agents, accompanied by community supporters. Instead of a simple check-in, both were detained, with Zheng sent to the Orange County Correction Facility in Goshen, New York, roughly 65 miles north of the city.
Community advocate Jennie Spector, who was present during the arrest, expressed deep concern: “We do not know where his six-year-old son is, and he has not been told where his six-year-old son is.”
Background and Previous Detentions
According to reports, this marks the third time Zheng and his son have been held by ICE since they crossed the U.S. border last spring. After their most recent release in late October, the family settled in Queens, where Yuanxin had just enrolled in first grade at an elementary school in Astoria.
“He said to me, ‘I did what they said I should do. I came in for this check-in.’ And yet they arrested him and his son,” Spector told reporters in the aftermath of the detention.
Official Response and Ongoing Advocacy
In response to the allegations, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson stated, “ICE does not separate families… Mr. Zheng had the right and the ability to depart the country as a family and willfully chose to not comply.”
Spector strongly disputes that characterization: “For them to say they don’t separate families is just an outright lie because we know that they do and they did in this situation. And we know that they’ve done it with many other families.” She also highlighted ICE’s stated policy, noting the agency “does not detain unaccompanied children except in rare instances.”
Advocates are now mobilizing legal assistance and seeking support from local elected officials to secure Zheng’s release and reunite him with Yuanxin. Spector emphasized the urgency: “This is the case for so many of these families and individuals who are going in and following immigration law as mandated, yet they’re being arrested and detained and being disappeared. Right now, his son is disappeared.”
Public Reaction
Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani took to social media to denounce the separation, writing, “Six-year-old Yuanxin had just enrolled in the first grade at an elementary school in Astoria. Now he’s in custody, alone. ICE won’t say where. This cruelty serves no one. It must end.”
Reflecting on the child’s disrupted routine, Spector added, “I’m sure he was really enjoying being in school and that’s where he should be. That’s where a six-year-old should be — with other children and learning and being with their parents and not separated and in detention.”