Among those making the trip were Bruce and Cindy Carlson, formerly of Velva and now of Bismarck; Natasha Woitzel-Kolles, formerly at Zion Lutheran in Minot and now associate pastor at Good Shepherd Lutheran in Bismarck; and Ellery Dykeman, who was associate pastor at First Lutheran in Minot from 2018-2025 and now serves Oak Grove Lutheran Church in Richfield, Minnesota, just south of Minneapolis.

“What we saw, heard and learned was horrifying,” Bruce Carlson stated in remarks he prepared about the trip. “The immediate need is for humanitarian parole for Andrea Pedro-Francisco.”

It was in El Paso, Texas, that the group heard the story of Pedro-Francisco, a 23-year-old detainee in a heavily guarded and fortified El Paso detention center.

Pedro-Francisco had come to the United States from Guatemala at age 16 with her family as they sought asylum, a long process that they are continuing in Burnsville, Minnesota. Pedro-Francisco was working in housekeeping and was actively involved in her church. She was stopped and detained by immigration agents on Feb. 5.

Submitted Photo A group that includes former Minot-area residents prays at an El Paso, Texas, processing center for Andrea Pedro-Francisco and other detainees.

“They can’t deport her yet, because she does have that legal right to be heard in front of a judge,” Dykeman said. “The opportunity that arose to go visit her was very last minute. We didn’t even know if we would get in.”

Dykeman was one of only two allowed into the facility on April 17 with the young woman’s attorney.

Leaving their phones and watches behind and their passports as collateral, they sat in a dingy, cramped and chaotic waiting space for about a half hour, Dykeman said. Eventually, they were taken to a cinderblock room with metal benches and one-way mirrors to meet with Pedro-Francisco.

She talked about being forced to sleep on a third level bunk, even though she could barely climb that high because of the pain, Dykeman said.

Pedro-Francisco had been scheduled for surgery for painful ovarian cysts at the time of her detention. The family was prepared to cover the cost of the surgery.

Submitted Photo Shown at a news conference at the Minnesota State Capitol on April 23 are, from left, Ellery Dykeman, Vicki Schmidt and Deb White, who stand next to a photo of Andrea Pedro-Francisco.

“She could be out with her family right now, getting the surgery that she needs,” Dykeman said. “We have ways – as they have done – of parole and ankle monitors and things of that sort for people that are waiting for their court dates, just like the criminal justice system in the United States. There’s ways to do it that are not as cruel and we just are choosing not to do that right now.”

The educational trip to the border, loosely Lutheran-based but open to anyone, has been led by Vicki Schmidt for about 25 years and includes visits to Juarez, Mexico, and a chance to meet with Border Patrol agents and immigrants in various stages of having their immigration requests processed.

Dykeman said the trip impressed on him the need for immigration reform.

“I think there’s a way to have a secure border and have a means of allowing people to do what we say we want them to do legally, which is come here and work and help us and help our economy,” he said.

In the short term, the request is that people consider Pedro-Francisco’s plight and contact the El Paso Processing Facility to ask for her humanitarian release. Her first attempt at release recently was denied by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which concluded Pedro-Franciso’s health condition doesn’t require surgery at this time.

In a statement he wrote for a news conference at the Minnesota State Capitol April 23, Dykeman stated of his visit with Pedro-Francisco: “All I could see in her young, tired and scared face was my own 22- and 25-year-old daughters, and my dad heart broke. The smile she had in previous pictures seemed to be replaced by despair.”

Dykeman gave Pedro-Francisco a trinitarian blessing in the best Spanish he could remember, marking her forehead with a cross.

“Then I gave her the best dad hug I could muster as we all cried,” he said.

“She was working, paying taxes, supporting her community and now we are using our tax dollars to detain her, and thousands of others like her,” Dykeman said in his Capitol remarks. “There are tens of thousands of others like Andrea being detained here in our country in for-profit detention centers, wasting billions of our tax dollars and causing avoidable suffering and misery. All of the detainees are created in the image of God and deserve to be treated humanely and with dignity. This must change. We can do better.”