Texas Teen Deported After ICE Linked Tattoos to Gang Activity Only Got Ink Because It 'Looked Cool': Report

A Texas teenager was deported after U.S. immigration authorities mistakenly linked his tattoos to gang activity, despite him claiming he only got them because they "looked cool," according to reports.

On March 15, President Donald Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to deport over 200 Venezuelan migrants, claiming they were members of the Tren de Aragua gang, according to the New Republic.

This move bypassed due process and resulted in individuals being detained and sent to a Salvadoran prison without a proper legal review. Among those deported were individuals with no criminal record, including a young man who had gotten a tattoo in Dallas purely for aesthetic reasons.

"The men sent to do hard labor in a Salvadoran prison with no due process include: A tattoo artist seeking asylum who entered legally, a teen who got a tattoo in Dallas because he thought it looked cool, a 26-year-old whose tattoos his wife says are unrelated to a gang," Aaron Reichlin-Melnick of the American Immigration Council wrote on X.

Immigration authorities reportedly began detaining Latino men with tattoos under the assumption that they were tied to organized crime.

Many of these individuals, including asylum seekers, were allegedly targeted based solely on body art, regardless of whether they had any gang affiliation.

One detainee, Aguilera Agüero, had a tattoo featuring lyrics from Puerto Rican reggaeton star Anuel AA, which was reportedly wrongly cited as gang-related evidence.

Trump's invocation of the act has since been blocked by a federal judge, as reported by NPR. Families and legal experts are continuing to work on getting the detained migrants released.