Five Nicaraguans Two Years after Banishment
Healing, Surviving, and Longing for home
Two years after they were banished, five of the 222 released political prisoners share their stories of resilience and their faith that someday they’ll see a free Nicaragua.
HAVANA TIMES – The sight of Managua growing smaller and smaller under the wings of the Boeing 767 – rented by the US government to transport 222 political prisoners of the Ortega-Murillo regime to Washington – is one of the memories the freed prisoners still hold of Operacion Nicas Bienvenidos (Operation Nicas Welcome), on February 9, 2023.
There were difficult negotiations with the Ortega regime right up until the last minute, in an operation that cost the US government about one million dollars. The group of 189 men and 33 women were thrust into a life they had never planned. Two years later, many are still adjusting.
Among the exiles were young university students who in these two years have managed to resume their studies; mothers who were reunited with their children; and farm leaders who remain steadfast in their cause. All of them continue to cling to the hope of seeing a free Nicaragua, without the Ortega dictatorship.
On Sunday, February 9, 2025, part of the group of 222 exiled Nicaraguans gathered in Washington to commemorate the second anniversary of their release and denounce the continuing human rights crisis in Nicaragua. The group issued a statement denouncing their continuing political persecution and expressing concern for the more than 30 denationalized Nicaraguans (part of another group of 135 political prisoners released and exiled to Guatemala in September 2024) who remain in limbo in Guatemala, after the United States Safe Mobility Program denied their applications for resettlement.
Confidencial spoke with several of the group released two years ago, to find out how they were doing after another year in exile, and how they felt on this second anniversary of that early morning when they left Nicaragua. Among tales of hardships the challenges of banishment, and their nostalgia for Nicaragua, several shared their stories of the resilience that pushes them forward.
Two banished student resume their studies in Madrid
Two years ago, Kevin Solis and Samantha Jiron, along with 220 other Nicaraguans, were banished and stripped of their nationality. Samantha describes her second year in banishment as “difficult,” due to issues related to her mental health. “I was overcome by depression and continued to be in denial about where I was [in the US] and everything I had been through. That made my adjustment more complex,” the student leader recalls.
Currently, the two young people are living in Spain, trying to rebuild their lives. They have both resumed their university studies but haven’t forgotten that morning.
“I still remember that February 9, 2023 (…) The person sitting beside me (another political prisoner) told me: ‘this is the last time I’m going to see Nicaragua.’ He was elderly, so his comment moved me greatly. I looked over and managed to spot the big Air Force area at the airport,” Solis told Confidencial.
Kevin and Samantha were only in the United States for 18 months. On September 5, 2024, they moved to Spain. The Complutense University of Madrid opened its doors to them to continue the studies the dictatorship stole from them in Nicaragua. Kevin resumed his studies in Political Science, and Samantha her Journalism career.
I had to start all over from zero, because of the difficulty of not having any record of my previous classes,” states Solis. Before his release he spent 1,099 days unjustly imprisoned after plain-clothed police grabbed him on February 6, 2020, on the outskirts of the former Central American University campus in Managua.
First steps in journalism
Samantha also had to start her studies from scratch. She proudly notes that the university both she and Kevin attend enjoys great prestige and is among the best in the world.
“I was born in Nicaragua on January 16, 2000, but today I am no longer Nicaraguan (…) I can’t deny that I still don’t know how to welcome into my heart a new country, a new culture, new food, but it’s a country that has extended its hands and offered me a home,” Samantha confessed one day, speaking in front of the microphone of the program Cronica de las seis. The program is broadcast on Inforadio, the radio station of the Complutense University in Madrid where journalism students work as part of their professional practice. During this period, the former Nicaragua student leader has had the opportunity to anchor the station’s news broadcast, as well as do some reporting.
“I’ve been well received here, but it’s still hard,” Samantha continues. “Still, I feel that here (in Spain) I’ve adapted much faster than in the United States.” The young woman was imprisoned for a year and three months in the Nicaraguan women’s prison known as La Esperanza, where she shared a cell with common prisoners.
Working and studying in California after exile
The Group of Experts on Human Rights on Nicaragua (GHREN) documented the arbitrary detentions of 52 students between 2018 and 2024. All were subjected to interrogations, found guilty in bogus trials, and sentenced to years in prison for their activism. It was further made impossible for them to resume studying.
Student leader and political prisoner Max Jerez has now been living in the United States for two years. After arriving in the United States on what he too calls “the freedom flight,” he settled in San Francisco, California. He divides his time between work and part-time economics classes at the San Francisco City College, a community college that offers free education to all city residents. The course of study lasts two and a half years.
“I’m taking part-time Economics classes, doing my best to take advantage of the available time I have when I’m not working. Given my current situation, I’m not able to dedicate myself to being a full-time student. However, I feel I’m slowly making progress in my professional and academic development,” he explains.
Max’s first year in exile was one of “uncertainty, healing and adaptation.” He describes his second year in the United States as more “stable,” thanks to the “supportive people” who helped him. “Fortunately, I‘ve been able to count on a permanent job and focus on my personal growth (…) The biggest challenge in exile has been the cultural adaptation – adjusting to a new lifestyle and language, and the reality of having to start building a life all over again from nothing,” he says.
Jerez became involved in the April Rebellion of 2018, and that activism cost him his freedom. On July 5, 2021, the Ortega regime imprisoned him. He remained behind bars for 584 days, in the feared Managua jail known as El Chipote. Before all this happened, Max Jerez had distinguished himself for academic excellence and for mentoring other students.
Finally able to embrace her son
On January 7, 2021, the police of the Ortega regime arrested Julia Cristina Hernandez a second time for her active participation in the protests taking place in the city of Masaya. In a case plagued by violations of due process, she was sentenced to 18 years in prison and a 50,000 cordoba fine [approximately US $1,360]. She remained in prison until her release in February 2023.
Julia continues to live in the United States. Since arriving, she’s had to work between 40 and 60 hours a week to cover her expenses. However, in her second year of banishment, on October 29, 2024, she was reunited with her 14-year-old son Rigoberto Valentino.
“He’s with me now, and that’s one of the great joys I can share today. I’ve been able to hug my son again, although I’m still far from my family. My son is already in school, he’s been given medical insurance and because of his high grades he was able to enter a private school where I pay nothing,” says Hernandez.
Julia remains very resentful that the dictatorship put her on that plane and expelled her from Nicaragua. “If I didn’t get on the plane I would have had to go back to prison. That day (February 9, 2023) the plane was flying so high that I could see my country, and I felt great pain because I was leaving my son behind. My son is here with me now, but that doesn’t fill the emptiness I feel for being removed from my country,” states the former political prisoner.
Banished, but united in their hopes for freedom
Most of the 222 released political prisoners are determined to rebuild their lives, help their families, survive and heal. Some more than others remain involved in the struggle for Nicaragua’s freedom. One of those who remains dedicated to the struggle is former rural leader Medardo Mairena,
“I feel a moral commitment to continue the struggle (…) Our greatest focus continues to be on our brothers and sisters who continue resisting from prison – the political prisoners – and the families of the fatal victims, who lost their loved ones,” states Mairena.
Nicaraguan organizations in exile are continuing their international advocacy. They maintain their commitment to continue fighting for justice, freedom and democracy in Nicaragua.
In 2024, representatives of Nicaraguan opposition groups formed the Great Opposition Confederation in an effort to unite forces into a single bloc to oust the Ortega dictatorship.
In January 2024, members of the Monteverde Nicaraguan Democratic Concertation also announced their formation, as a political alliance made up of both individuals and social and political organizations. Their main objective is to achieve the democratic transition of Nicaragua.
None of the released political prisoners have forgotten their time in prison, but they remain optimistic and hold to the hope of seeing their country free of dictatorship. Meanwhile, In Nicaragua, the regime continues on with its policies of banishment and denationalization of Nicaraguan citizens and dissenters.
First published in Spanish by Confidencial and translated and posted in English by Havana Times.