Greatest Gift

by Aran Myracle

On August 21st, 2025, Muhammad Zahid Chaudhry reported to the Department of Homeland Security office in Tukwila, Washington for his naturalization hearing. His wife, Melissa, was not permitted to enter the office with him, so she waited outside. 3 hours later ICE agents finally informed her that her husband had been removed to immigration detention hours before.

It was a hot day, and I was working outside because we’d had a leak in the office that closed our building for programming. The message came across the group signal chat: ICE detained Zahid. I couldn’t leave work on a Thursday evening, our busiest night of the week, and even if I could, there was nothing to be done in that moment. ICE had him.

The cage Zahid was placed in was less than 2 miles from where I work in downtown Tacoma, out on the tideflats amongst warehouses, on an EPA superfund site. 1500 human beings are caged there by GEO Group, a private security corporation, in violation of Washington state law. Our neighbors, friends, and family were kept in cages and subjected to mental and physical torture.

Zahid is my comrade in the veterans’ anti-war movement. He is a 100% disabled US Army veteran. He