A federal judge yesterday ordered the release of 10 chronically ill immigrants in Pennsylvania from government custody, noting it would be “unconscionable and possibly barbaric” to risk exposing them to the virus in detention, reports Hamed Aleaziz for BuzzFeed News. The ruling comes amid continued calls to release immigrants, especially those with underlying medical conditions, from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody in response to the pandemic.

An employee at a South Georgia detention facility is the latest to test positive for COVID-19, Jeremy Redmon reports for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, forcing 33 detainees who may have had contact with the employee into quarantine. In a letter to the state’s congressional delegation, advocates wrote that the “threat of a COVID-19 outbreak in immigration detention centers is imminent.”

Meanwhile, a 29-year-old Guatemalan was deported after testing positive for COVID-19, fueling more appeals to release ICE detainees and sparking new concerns that the administration will deport immigrants who contract the virus, reports Dianne Solis for The Dallas Morning News. “The likelihood that the man contracted the virus in the U.S. and may have exposed dozens of others to it on his flight and in Central America has attorneys and advocates intensifying their calls for the release of detained immigrants,” Solis writes. The man is known as “patient 36” because he is just the 36th person with a confirmed COVID-19 case in Guatemala.

Welcome to Wednesday’s edition of Noorani’s Notes. Have a story you’d like us to include? Email me at [email protected].

CENSUS DAY – Today, April 1, is Census Day, a key reference point for those filling out the census. But the COVID-19 outbreak has further complicated efforts to increase census awareness and completion across the Latino community, Suzanne Gamboa reports for NBC News. In Austin, for example, “part of the plan for urging residents of the Dove Springs neighborhood to fill out census forms called for coaxing families at an Easter egg hunt, the soccer season opener, the César Chavez march and at the reopening of the recreation center.” But with local events cancelled, officials are being forced to abandon those plans and now worry they won’t be able ensure that those in immigrant communities fill out the form.

HEROES – The coronavirus pandemic is forcing Americans to rethink exactly who qualifies as an essential worker, writes Eladio Bobadilla, an assistant professor for the University of Kentucky, in an opinion piece for The Washington Post: “That includes farmworkers – the vast majority immigrants – who continue to work, often in poor conditions, to ensure America won’t go hungry.” Yet many of these immigrant farmworkers lack the economic support they need, and as we’ve Noted previously, the federal government’s coronavirus relief package has left many of them out. “The coronavirus pandemic will probably spurn a prolonged economic recovery program that will require substantial immigrant labor to keep Americans fed,” Bobadilla writes. For more info on farmworkers, check out the Forum’s latest infographic.

COUNTERPRODUCTIVE – The Trump administration’s hostility toward immigrants has not slowed the spread of COVID-19 and in fact is hurting America’s response to the pandemic, writes The New York Times Editorial Board. “The administration’s obsession with immigrants, undocumented, legal or aspiring, has infected its efforts to control the spread of a pandemic, exacerbating the crisis,” they write. The Editorial Board points out that fear of ICE among immigrants is preventing them from seeking the health care they need, while noting that immigrants are more likely to “live in crowded conditions, have little money and no paid sick leave, and so lack the ability to self-quarantine.” It also highlights that ICE has shown no intention to release nonviolent detainees even as judges in some states order them to do so out of health concerns.

DREAMERS – Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients — whose futures hinge on a Supreme Court decision this summer determining the fate of the program — constitute 27,000 of the doctors, nurses, paramedics and other health care workers on the front lines fighting the coronavirus pandemic, Richard Wolf writes for USA Today. But while they fight to keep their communities healthy, they’re also forced to worry they could be pulled from the workforce at any time. “I am treating people suspected of having COVID-19, and all I’m asking is to stay in this country and provide that care,” said Veronica Velasquez, a 27-year-old physical therapist in Los Angeles. “We’re definitely helping them stay alive.” Writing for Business Insider, Charles Davis also reports that DACA recipients will not get an extension on their biannual status renewals, or the nearly $500 accompanying fee. With legal counsel unable to meet their clients in person, Dreamers are rushing to file their paperwork by mail.

SOME GOOD NEWS – (It’s all relative.) Maddie, a seven-year-old Guatemalan girl who spent a record 250 days in detention, and her father were released yesterday from a family detention center in Pennsylvania following a federal judge’s ruling, reports Jeff Gammage for The Philadelphia Inquirer. Maddie spent more time in detention than any other child when she and her father were detained last spring after crossing the border and asking for asylum. She and her father were reunited with her mother in New Jersey, where they finally met the newest addition to the family: Maddie’s 5-month-old brother Aaron.

Thanks for reading,

Ali