Bowling Green celebrates Ernesto Manuel-Andres’ return home

Published 8:17 am Thursday, June 26, 2025

By David Horowitz

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Ernesto Manuel-Andres, a Bowling Green teenager who was detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents June 4 despite legal authorization to stay in the U.S., according to his attorneys, gets emotional as he receives hugs from loved ones as around 100 members of the community gathered to welcome him back home outside Teranga Academy on Wednesday evening, June 25, 2025. After 20 days of detainment, Manuel-Andres was released on bond Tuesday, and is entitled to remain undetained as long as he continues attending his hearings, according to Fugees Family, the main nonprofit that’s been supporting his release. GRACE MCDOWELL / BOWLING GREEN DAILY NEWS

DAVID MAMARIL HOROWITZ

david.horowitz@bgdailynews.com

 

As Ernesto Manuel-Andres walked a pathway with scores along either side, cheers of more than 100 echoed around the 18-year-old. In the Wednesday evening humidity — one day after his release from being locked up in Monroe, Louisiana — the celebration rang out across the field of Teranga Academy, where Manuel-Andres had attended high school before graduating last month.

Then, as he held a loved one, and the man held him back, they wept. One hundred went silent. Ten seconds passed, then 30 — time might as well have stood still.

One after another, others held him in similar embraces. Finally, two little girls clasped their arms around him, clutching miniature American flags.

“Thank you for your (being) here … and thank you for who prayed for me to get out of Louisiana, that you support me,” the 18-year-old told the crowd as he wiped his face.

“I’m happy to be at my house again in Kentucky.”

Luma Mufleh, the main organizer who has worked to free Manuel-Andres, told attendees it was them — community members across the area, the advocates — who helped make it happen.

“… the community of Bowling Green looked at Ernesto, a resident of our community, and said he’s ours,” said Manuel-Andres’ former Teranga Academy principal, Kristi Costellow. “When you see these difficult things happen, you can ask yourself, ‘What if it was my child? What if it was me?’

“And all I can say is that I’m thankful to be in Bowling Green, Kentucky, where we live in a community where people will see something that’s wrong, and they will keep at it until it’s made right.”

Raising signs of support and American flags, cheering for Manuel-Andres, were his supporters from across the area. Many — teachers, classmates, school administration, friends and others — knew him before his detainment; and numerous others — area residents, clergy and members of the advocacy group SOKY Indivisible — met him for the first time, celebrating the reunion all the same.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested and detained Manuel-Andres without a warrant June 4. The charge, which alleges that he entered the country unlawfully, doesn’t mention legal paperwork proving that he’s legally authorized to stay in the U.S., his attorneys have said.

He was released on a bond of $1,500 on Tuesday and has other hearings to come.

His release follows advocacy by the hundreds across multiple protests and prayer vigils, as well as widespread outreach to local, state and federal officials. A fundraiser for Manuel-Andres’ potential legal fees surpassed $30,000, with any remaining funds to go toward a legal and emergency fund for immigrant and refugee students.

Dana Beasley-Brown, one of the city commissioners who advocated for his return, spoke through tears about her own son, who will turn 18 this year.

“It went straight to my mom heart, just thinking about him as someone’s child,” Beasley-Brown said of the reunion. “ … That hug, that meant everything that he had been missing, so alone all that time. To finally feel that simplicity of just being able to touch someone who loves you and who knows your name, (that) is something that I don’t think you can take for granted. And (I’m) just grateful that he’s home and back with us.”

The celebration concluded with a call to advocate for others as well.

Mufleh recalled when, in April 2021, her brother was stopped by four large SUVs in Jordan. They took him away in a car while his two girls, 8 and 10, were left behind on the highway — and Mufleh’s parents, fearing retaliation, told her to not speak up, she said.

“In the past few months, we’ve seen that scene play out here — where people are taken out of their homes, out of the streets, when they have every legal right to be here, just like Ernesto,” Mufleh said.

“But the difference is you spoke up for what was right, you said, ‘Not in this town, not in our community, and not on our watch’ — and I’ve never been more inspired by the group here, to move mountains to bring him home.”

Within the past 24 hours, Mufleh said, six others had reached out about family members or loved ones who have gone missing.

“This is bigger than just Ernesto,” Mufleh said. “He is symbolic of something going on in our country, and you are symbolic of what should be going on in our country.”

“Thank you for restoring my faith in humanity and the goodness in people and the beauty in people, and for being here to bring him home.”

Manuel-Andres gave her a hug.

Chants of “Ernesto, we love you,” closed out her speech, as supporters were left to share the evening.

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