What Happened After An Immigration Lawyer Called Out U.S.-Based Venezuelan Gang Members
MIAMI, Fla. — Rolando Vazquez is an immigration lawyer who has been making waves within southern Florida’s immigrant community: He has been using his social media to specifically call out Venezuelan gang members who have made their way into the United States amid the ongoing crisis at our southern border.
Venezuelans have become one of the top nationalities to either illegally cross the U.S.-Mexico border and turn themselves in to Border Patrol to claim asylum or be allowed to legally enter the U.S. through a port of entry using the CBP One app to start their asylum claim. Vazquez was starting to hear from clients in Florida that people who had terrorized them in Venezuela or had worked for Nicolás Maduro’s regime had also made it into the U.S.
Vazquez, who uses Instagram to advertise his law practice, started to individually call out gang members, such as those who belong to El Tren de Aragua. El Tren de Aragua is the top criminal organization in Venezuela that is involved in everything from drug trafficking to human smuggling.
Speaking with Vazquez in his office, he kept his cool as he explained what happened after my friend and colleague Juan Mendoza was the first to report about his running war with the Venezuelan gang members. While he had gotten death threats for exposing gang members and their social media handles prior to Mendoza’s report, Vazquez said the threats became more concrete after Mendoza’s video gained a lot of traction on X and Instagram.
“Now we are going to kill you. We have the green light, tell Trump's witch to shield your house because we are going to blow it up,” was one message Vazquez got in Spanish after the report was published.
Gang members have also directly threatened his wife and children.
As he did before the report was released, Vazquez forwarded the threats and names to local, state, and federal law enforcement. He said he has had to take safety precautions “to a new level.” Wherever Vazquez goes, he’s armed. He also bought a ballistic vest.
“It was a wake-up call to a lot of people like, ‘Hey, this is now affecting U.S. citizens.’ It’s not like these people are in immigrant communities attacking other immigrants, now they’re attacking U.S. citizens…It’s going beyond the immigrant community,” Vazquez explained. “Who’s to say they won’t go after someone else, another U.S. citizen” after killing me?
With the influx of illegal immigrants who were processed by Border Patrol and released into the U.S. with court dates sometimes ten years away, the situation has led to crimes being committed by the new arrivals, whether it’s stealing from stores or selling drugs.
“They were upset,” Vazquez put simply about the gang members’ reaction to Mendoza’s story. “So apparently they have the green light to kill me…I’m sure that there are still ties to Venezuela. A few months ago, there was a mass prison break in Venezuela and a lot of these leaders escaped and they don’t know where they’re at. Well obviously, everyone is saying that they came to the U.S. through the [southern] border…They’ve set up their criminal organizations in the U.S.”
Vazquez said while gangs comprising of people within the immigrant community are not new in the U.S., he warned they have become stronger under the Biden administration as more of their people have been able to make their way into our country due to the border crisis.
“I would believe there are thousands of them all over the country…It’s gotten worse,” he added.
“I do feel like it’s an uphill battle, trying to get [the Department of Homeland Security] to do something because they’re actually initiating the problem. You see Texas put barriers up so people won’t cross, within hours or the next day, DHS is cutting down the barbed wire to let them in…So what I’m trying to get the U.S. to do is act together. We need to think of what we’re going to do as a community because the federal government is supporting this illegal entry…We’re not going to get help from them.”
Vazquez is concerned the gang will take big steps to target Americans and the country will be caught “flat-footed” because not much has been done, that he has seen, to counter the threat they pose.
Vazquez’s job dealing with the ripple effects of the border crisis on a daily basis is why he makes it loud and clear he is supporting former President Donald Trump in 2024. Trump campaign merchandise and memorabilia are sprinkled throughout the office. To enter his personal workspace, you have to get past a Trump 2024 doormat.
Vazquez believes Trump is the best candidate to handle not only the border crisis and its disastrous aftermath, but also the myriad of other problems the country has been faced with due to the horrible policies of the Biden administration.
Despite putting together a story downplaying the threat El Tren de Aragua poses to cities, the Chicago-Sun Times did acknowledge an incident where a Venezuelan man who was arrested in October on a charge of beating up his girlfriend in one of the migrant tents outside a Chicago Police station. He had tattoos that resembled those worn by the gang.
Kyle Williamson, former head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration office in El Paso, Texas, told the Sun-Times the gang is “a huge criminal threat.”
“They are coming in” across the border, says Williamson, who runs the West Texas Anti-Gang Center. “We are seeing them.”
What makes it difficult for police in Chicago to deal with the gang threat is woke bureaucracy. The Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability voted in September to permanently scrap Chicago’s gang databases because having them leads to racism. The vote was unanimous.