Two federal law enforcement officers coordinate with other officials on the ground during an enhanced immigration enforcement operation (Credit: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement)

A hit job by a disgruntled family on President Trump’s immigration policies was destroyed when, after a couple of twists, the stunning truth emerged.

Earlier this month, a report emerged that an 82-year-old Chilean legal immigrant and grandfather in poor health named Luis Leon, supposedly an Allentown, Pennsylvania resident, was arrested by ICE while Leon was trying to replace his green card. He first gained asylum in 1987.

Both Leon and his wife, who was also arrested, were then taken to a detention facility without being given a reason. While Leon’s wife was released roughly 10 hours later, Leon remained in custody.

Family members of Leon told The Morning Call that Leon died in custody before saying he was taken to a hospital in Guatemala.

From the Morning Call:

Relatives of 82-year-old Allentown resident Luis Leon are headed to a Guatemalan hospital Saturday in hopes of reuniting with the man they say disappeared without a trace into the American immigration system a month ago — and who, for a time, they thought was dead.

The last time anyone in the family saw Leon was June 20, when he went with his wife to a Philadelphia immigration office to have his lost green card replaced.

There, the family says, he was handcuffed by two officers, who led him away without explanation. His wife, who speaks little English, was left behind and kept in the building for 10 hours until she was released to her granddaughter, the family says.

But then a twist emerged. Guatemala authorities issued a press release on Tuesday saying no one named Luis Leon ever entered the country.

UPDATE: Guatemala’s Migration Institute says that they have no records of this man being in Guatemala.

They say ICE had not deported any South Americans to Guatemala. They also say they checked border records and there has been no entry with his name, age, and nationality. https://t.co/R9w1OzXqUs pic.twitter.com/ttiZTirWXr

— Aaron Reichlin-Melnick (@ReichlinMelnick) July 21, 2025

The Department of Homeland Security confirmed what the Guatemalans said about Leon in a press release and added that there is only one record of Leon entering America, from a decade ago.

The family of the individual allegedly told reporters he was handcuffed and taken by federal officers at a green card appointment in Philadelphia. This claim is completely false. There is no record of the man appearing at any green card appointment in or around the area of Philadelphia on June 20, 2025.

Furthermore, ICE has not deported Luis Leon—a Chilean national—to Guatemala, as his family members have said. ICE’s only record of this individual entering the U.S. is in 2015 from Chile under the visa waiver program.

Then Chilean journalist José María del Pino dropped the biggest twist of all. He shared a death certificate that showed that a person with the same name, birth date, and Chile’s unique national ID number (RUT) as Leon died in Chile in 2019.

This means the family was almost certainly using a dead man to sabotage the Trump Administration!

Fox News’s Bill Melugin perfectly sums up the entire saga in his tweet.

It appears to have been all made up by the family, which has since gone dark and stopped responding to the press. Here’s what happened since the story first ran in The Morning Call, an Allentown, PA newspaper.

– Records in Chile show a man with his same name and date of birth died in Chile in 2019.

– Guatemala says they have no record of him being deported to its country.

– DHS says there is no record of him appearing at any green card appointment in the Philly area, and they say ICE never arrested him.

– DHS says they never deported him, and their only record of him entering the US is in 2015 from Chile via the visa waiver program, not an asylum grant from the 1980s as the family claimed.

– His granddaughter claimed he was sick in a Guatemalan hospital with pneumonia after ICE deported him, and that he was traumatized (after first claiming he was dead). A doctor at the hospital she claimed he was at says there is no record of him being there.

NEW: It appears another hoax has been attempted. Family members of an 82-year-old Chilean man in PA went to the media claiming ICE arrested him while renewing a green card in Philly, that he died in ICE custody, then that he was secretly deported to Guatemala. The story went… pic.twitter.com/a1jRXT6qBu

— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) July 22, 2025

Also, The Morning Call published two stories with photographs purported to be of Luis Leon that were actually from a man who died back in 2021. The photos were proved by a woman claiming to be Leon’s granddaughter.

This stupid saga could have been avoided had The Morning Call reporters done their jobs and investigated the claims. But they just wanted to push a narrative instead.

Just another reason why no one trusts the media anymore.