The Louisiana Illuminator reports that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials placed a 21-year-old asylum seeker, Zharick Daniela Buitrago Ortiz, who is eight months pregnant, on a deportation flight on Wednesday afternoon, even though she was in medical distress.

According to her attorneys at the American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana and the Robert & Ethel Kennedy Human Rights Center, Ortiz experienced intense, shooting pain in her back and abdomen while waiting for a flight to Colombia, raising serious concerns about the risks to her health and the health of her unborn child during the roughly five-hour nonstop flight. 

The case has renewed scrutiny of ICE’s treatment of pregnant immigrants, as its stated policy is not to detain immigrants who are pregnant unless there are exceptional circumstances. 

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