A Brazilian influencer who spent months telling his nearly half a million Instagram followers not to worry about Trump’s immigration crackdown because ICE was only going after “criminals” just got (checks notes…) arrested by ICE.
Junior Pena was detained in New Jersey on Saturday after missing a court hearing related to his own immigration status, according to The New Republic. The irony is so thick you could spread it on toast.
THE DETAILS: Pena immigrated to the United States in 2009 and openly identifies as an immigrant on social media, frequently sharing stories of others who came to the U.S. seeking a better life. But he’s also been a vocal Trump supporter, explicitly defending the president’s immigration policies even as reports emerged of Brazilians being detained and deported in Trump’s first weeks back in office.
“Don’t panic, thinking they’re deporting everyone,” Pena told his followers in Portuguese after those reports surfaced. “There’s a news report showing ICE arresting [people], which even includes Brazilians, but they’re all criminals. All criminals. Don’t believe just any influencer.”
Well. About that.
OF COURSE: This is the thing about backing authoritarian immigration policies while being an immigrant yourself: the leopard doesn’t check your voting record before eating your face. Pena apparently believed the rules he was cheering on applied to everyone except him—a miscalculation that’s landed him in ICE custody while his friends scramble to raise $50,000 for legal fees.
The fundraising campaign his friends launched is a far cry from the confident dismissals Pena was issuing just weeks ago. Turns out “don’t believe just any influencer” was solid advice he should have taken himself.
WHY IT MATTERS: Pena’s arrest is a perfect encapsulation of how Trump’s immigration apparatus actually works: it’s not a precision tool targeting “criminals.” It’s a dragnet that catches anyone who trips up on the byzantine rules of the U.S. immigration system—including, apparently, the people who thought their loyalty would protect them.
Missing a court date is exactly the kind of administrative violation that can tank an immigrant’s status, regardless of how many pro-Trump posts they’ve made. The system Pena defended doesn’t care about his politics. It just chews people up.