Summary

“American Pie” actress Jasmine Mooney, a Canadian citizen, was detained by ICE while attempting to renew her work visa at the U.S.-Mexico border on March 3.

She described the experience as a “deeply disturbing psychological experiment,” including sleeping on a mat with “aluminum foil wrapped over my body like a dead body,” being transported in chains, and receiving inedible food.

Officials allegedly told her she was “unprofessional because I didn’t have a proper letterhead” on her paperwork.

After her release, Mooney credited media attention and her support network for securing her freedom.

  • Freshparsnip@lemm.ee
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    46 minutes ago

    Maybe some people will start to care more now that it’s happening to celebrities

  • Sam_Bass@lemmy.world
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    5 minutes ago

    Those people have been storing up their hatred for 150 years, passing to each new generation. Only way to combat it is to eradicate it at the source

  • Colloidal@programming.dev
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    2 hours ago

    She spent 11 days detained.

    “I was put in a cell, and I had to sleep on a mat with no blanket, no pillow, with an aluminum foil wrapped over my body like a dead body for two and a half days,” […] “I have never in my life seen anything so inhumane.” She went on to describe one incident when she and 30 other women were moved in the middle of the night to a facility in Arizona. During the ordeal, she was forced to be “up for 24 hours wrapped in chains.”

    From CBC.CA (Eagles is her mother’s surname):

    Eagles said the detainees at the San Luis facility have no sleeping mats or blankets or windows, and the lights are on all day and night.

    • conditional_soup@lemm.ee
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      49 minutes ago

      Jesus Christ, they already tried that shit with the lights in Trump I and the 9th circuit told them to fucking stop it. I distinctly remember because one of the judges was in a Japanese internment camp as a kid, and he ate that dipshit Trump attorney alive.

      And yet, here we are again.

    • JimmyMcGill@lemmy.world
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      22 minutes ago

      WTF

      Edit: Americans need to be on the street for this shit and everything else that’s happening

      I don’t care how, just get that dictator out of there

  • Gammelfisch@lemmy.world
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    1 hour ago

    Are these the privately owned detention centers? All I can say the USA has several Dachau’s and it could become worse.

    • chiliedogg@lemmy.world
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      13 minutes ago

      They’re ignoring the courts. What will suing do when there’s nobody enforcing the ruling when you “win”?

      • Guns0rWeD13@lemmy.world
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        1 hour ago

        this. the system is broken. the DOJ is owned. trump et al are above the law. they knew going in that the entire charade only operates under the threat of violence and they currently have a monopoly on that. if you don’t have stock in violence, you don’t have a place at the table. we all need to buy some stock.

  • StopTouchingYourPhone@lemmy.world
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    5 hours ago

    The family’s using her traumatic experience to publicize the inhumane conditions at those 3 detention centres, and raise awareness for her cellmates. They talk about constant lighting (torture), being moved at 3am to a different state (fucking with your lawyer), being chained and overcrowded.

    “There’s 30 other people in her cell that have not even been spoken to by a detention caseworker. So there are people in there whose families don’t know where their kids are.” - Jasmine’s father, Stephen Mooney, speaking on March 13th.

    These conditions should be common knowledge, and this traumatized family is doing what they can on that front.

    You and I are not more safe than she is. Our neighbours are not more safe than she is. Her escape does not make her the enemy of her cellmates. We’re all Venezuelan gang members (or whoever it’s ok to fuck with) if they take our papers and deem us so.

    Non-entertainment news source here.

    • Guns0rWeD13@lemmy.world
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      1 hour ago

      and if people don’t think political dissidents are on the list, they’re delusional. we may not be the priority yet, but they’re checking off demographics at an alarming rate.

  • jpreston2005@lemmy.world
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    7 hours ago

    When this is happening to even the beautiful white women, you know shit’s a thousand times worse for BIPOC… I know that we had issues with immigration during previous administrations, but they were nothing compared to this vile treatment.

  • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    These stories make me wish people hadn’t reelected Bush and Obama when both made it very clear they were supportive of fascist policies like torture, extraordinary rendition, drone bombings without accountability, permanent imprisonment, etc.

    None of this is new. It’s just louder now.

      • djsoren19@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        50 minutes ago

        No, it’s just at home now. The CIA has been torturing people in black sites around the globe for decades now. If anything, those conditions were far worse, since it doesn’t seem like any migrants detained are getting waterboarded yet.

        • Guns0rWeD13@lemmy.world
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          1 hour ago

          your original statement is correct, but i feel the need to speak up on behalf of obama.

          the terrorist kill list was a little shady, but it was effective (although messy).

          we really need to embrace the power of martial force for good. the good guys can’t always take the high road. sometimes there is no better solution than to just apply a hammer.

            • Count042@lemmy.ml
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              56 minutes ago

              You’re more respectful then the person you are responding to deserves.

              • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world
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                52 minutes ago

                People are less likely to listen to your point of view if you don’t approach them in good faith. I wish Democrats would learn this lesson.

            • Guns0rWeD13@lemmy.world
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              55 minutes ago

              do i really need to explain the nuance of this to you?

              was it idealistically right? no. was it acceptable collateral damage in war? yes.

              we firebombed entire civilian cities in WWII and we were the good guys. perspective is important.

              EDIT: i do agree with you about how we have allowed the power of the executive branch to expand to a point that is now a crisis, but i will still defend obama as a president.

              • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world
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                49 minutes ago

                I don’t think bombing campaigns in WWII are comparable to a president ordering illegal assassinations of American citizens by fiat.

                You can justify it to yourself if you like, but it’s not an opinion that these crimes have normalized the activities of Donald Trump. (Though it was a 20+ year process that, IMHO, started with George W. Bush and 9/11)

                • Guns0rWeD13@lemmy.world
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                  45 minutes ago

                  i’m not disagreeing with you. i’m just trying to bring some nuance to some of the statements that have been made.

                  and you keep saying that is was an authorized assassination, which is not true. it was collateral damage.

        • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world
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          57 minutes ago

          I didn’t see the comment, but my guess is they were likely referring to Gitmo or El Nuevo Chipote.

          Do you think these prisoners are being sent outside the country so they can be treated humanely?

  • RamblingPanda@lemmynsfw.com
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    15 hours ago

    I’m confused, did she even try to cross the border or was she just there to renew her visa? Why not just send her back for fuck’s sake?

    Edit:
    Okay, if I understood it correctly, she was already in the US and had a valid visa, which was about to expire. Her lawyer told her to go to the border to renew it, and as she was working in LA, that was the nearest border crossing. This makes it even more insane.

  • ms.lane@lemmy.world
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    16 hours ago

    Officials allegedly told her she was “unprofessional because I didn’t have a proper letterhead” on her paperwork.

    How dare her paperwork not wear a suit!

  • Ziggurat@jlai.lu
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    15 hours ago

    While the actress has some notoriety, huge part of the international trade relies on short term work visa. When Airbus builds a new factory in the US, or That a US factory chooses German industrial robots, you need to send people on short-term work visa to kickstart it.

      • venusaur@lemmy.world
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        16 hours ago

        At that point does it even matter? Like, if she were working another profession would they put it in the headline?

        • metaldream@sopuli.xyz
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          15 hours ago

          You’re only hearing about her because she has media connections in the first place.

        • PhobosAnomaly@feddit.uk
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          16 hours ago

          No, but I suspect the last line qualifies it’s inclusion, where her"status" and presence in the media field gave her an opportunity to amplify her story and provide the visibility it needed to get her freed.

          • rockhard@lemm.ee
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            9 hours ago

            Yes and it also raises visibility for the very real issues that people have raised concerns about. It’s one thing to detain and/or deport people without proper documentation. It’s another to act as though people with the proper documentation who are abiding the laws are also being detained and/or deported. Say nothing for the US citizens who are also being detained and/or deported.

        • null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          14 hours ago

          I don’t want to minimise her suffering but I’m sure there are many other people in similar situations that we haven’t heard about.

          • AA5B@lemmy.world
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            5 hours ago

            White, some level of fame, voluntarily coming in from the “right” side of the border, had some sort of paperwork, her work visa apparently hadn’t yet expired?