GUATEMALA CITY (AP) — The Guatemalan government on Sunday denied that U.S. authorities deported a Chilean man to the Central American country.
The Morning Call of Allentown, Pennsylvania, reported Luis Leon, 82, a legal permanent resident of the United States who won asylum in 1987, ended up in Guatemala after being handcuffed in a Philadelphia immigration office, where he went to replace his lost green card. The news report relied on family accounts.
The Morning Call reported Sunday that Leon was recovering from pneumonia in Guatemala and didn’t plan to return to the United States, according to his granddaughter.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement was looking into the circumstances, according to The Morning Call. ICE did not respond to questions from The Associated Press on Sunday.
The Guatemalan Migration Institute said in a statement that it coordinates with ICE on all deportations from the United States and that no one matched Leon’s name, age or citizenship.
Guatemala agreed in February to receive people deported from the United States who are from other Central American countries. Its agreement does not extend to Chileans.
The Trump administration has embraced deporting people to countries other than their own, including El Salvador, South Sudan and, last week, the African kingdom of Eswatini.
