ICE deports convicted sex offender who abused his own daughter in Virginia

Federal authorities removed a convicted child sex offender and illegal immigrant from the country after he pleaded guilty to sexually abusing his teenage daughter in Virginia, a case that throws fresh light on Gov. Abigail Spanberger's decision to sever the state's cooperation with ICE.

The Department of Homeland Security announced the deportation of Marcelo Vasquez Reyna, a Mexican national convicted in Albemarle County of a charge involving a parent violating a child between the ages of 15 and 17. The underlying offense dates back to 2018. Vasquez Reyna pleaded guilty in March and was sentenced to five years and six months in prison, with five years of that sentence suspended, meaning he faced roughly six months of actual incarceration before ICE carried out his removal.

DHS posted the announcement on X, using blunt language that left no room for ambiguity about the agency's posture toward offenders in the country illegally.

The department wrote on X:

"ICE has DEPORTED Marcelo Vasquez-Reyna, a depraved freak who sexually abused HIS OWN DAUGHTER."

The post continued:

"criminals like this sicko have NO sanctuary in our nation."

Vasquez Reyna faced repeated arrests before his guilty plea

Court records from the Albemarle County Circuit Criminal Division show the conviction and sentence. But the case stretches further back than a single guilty plea. Local outlet ABC 7 reported that Vasquez Reyna was arrested in March following his conviction and also faced additional charges of attempted rape and abduction.

The Daily Progress, a Charlottesville-area newspaper, reported that Vasquez Reyna was repeatedly arrested on charges of groping his teenage daughter and attempting to rape her using force. The paper described the victim as living in fear of further attacks.

That detail deserves emphasis. This was not a single incident that slipped through the cracks. Local authorities arrested this man more than once on allegations involving his own child. And through it all, the question of his immigration status, and what federal authorities could or should have done sooner, hangs over the case.

Fox News Digital reached out to Spanberger's office, the Albemarle County Police Department, and the Albemarle County Commonwealth's Attorney's Office for comment. No responses were noted.

Spanberger severed Virginia's ties to ICE on day one

The Vasquez Reyna deportation lands in the middle of an ongoing clash between federal immigration enforcement and Virginia's Democratic governor. Abigail Spanberger, on her first day in office, rescinded an executive order issued by her predecessor, Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, that had directed state law enforcement agencies to assist federal immigration enforcement authorities.

She went further. Spanberger ordered state and local law enforcement agencies to terminate all 287(g) agreements with ICE, the cooperative arrangements that allow local officers to perform certain immigration enforcement functions under federal supervision. She also signed an order prohibiting ICE from using state property as a staging area, processing location, or operations base for federal civil immigration enforcement activities.

In practical terms, Spanberger built a wall, not on the border, but between Virginia's law enforcement apparatus and the federal agents tasked with removing criminal illegal immigrants. The policy choice stands in stark contrast to the legal victories the Trump administration has secured in federal court to expand expedited removal nationwide.

Whether Spanberger's orders delayed or complicated ICE's ability to locate and remove Vasquez Reyna remains an open question. What is not open to question is the direction she chose: less cooperation, not more, at a time when cases like this one were already making headlines across the state.

Virginia's pattern of illegal immigrant crime extends beyond Albemarle County

Vasquez Reyna's case is not an isolated incident in Virginia. The state has seen a series of high-profile cases involving illegal immigrants accused of violent and sexual crimes, several of them concentrated in Fairfax County, just north of Albemarle.

DHS described an incident involving Nehemia Noel Fuentes-Banegas, an illegal immigrant who, according to the department, left a home in Annandale following an argument while armed with two knives. He emerged from brush in a wooded area, grabbed a Fairfax County police officer's gun, and attempted to disarm him. One officer fired his service weapon, and a second officer simultaneously deployed a Taser. A bullet grazed Fuentes-Banegas' shoulder.

ICE had lodged a detainer in July asking Fairfax County officials not to release Fuentes-Banegas. The current legal status of the case, whether he was formally charged or what happened after the confrontation, is not clear from available reporting.

The Trump administration has consistently pushed to restore and strengthen ICE's enforcement tools, including overruling internal resistance to reinstate ICE traffic stops after a brief suspension.

Then there is the case of Israel Flores Ortiz, an 18-year-old illegal immigrant accused of groping several underage girls at a Fairfax County high school. He has been accused but not convicted; his current legal status is unclear. But the accumulation of cases, a convicted child sex offender in Albemarle, an armed confrontation with police in Fairfax, alleged sexual assaults at a high school, forms a pattern that voters can see plainly, even if their governor prefers not to.

Spanberger's enforcement rollback faces a federal government moving in the opposite direction

The contrast between Richmond and Washington could hardly be sharper. While Spanberger was terminating 287(g) agreements and barring ICE from state property, the federal government was moving aggressively to expand its enforcement footprint. Courts have backed that expansion in several key rulings, including a federal judge's decision to strike down Illinois tuition benefits for illegal immigrants, another signal that the legal landscape is shifting against sanctuary-style policies.

Spanberger's decision to roll back Youngkin's cooperation order was a political choice. She made it on her first day, before any review of its operational effects, before weighing whether ICE cooperation had helped Virginia law enforcement identify or remove dangerous individuals. The speed of the action suggests ideology drove the timeline, not evidence.

And the consequences of that choice fall not on the governor, but on the people who live in communities where convicted sex offenders, armed suspects, and accused predators circulate, sometimes for years, before federal authorities can act. The victim in the Vasquez Reyna case lived in fear of further attacks, according to The Daily Progress. She is the person who paid the price.

The broader political standoff over immigration enforcement continues to play out across multiple fronts, including legislative battles in the Senate where the administration has signaled willingness to use emergency powers if Congress fails to act.

None of those Washington fights mattered much to a teenage girl in Albemarle County who was repeatedly victimized by her own father, a man who should never have been in a position to harm anyone, and who is now, finally, out of the country. The system worked in the end. The question is why it took so long, and why Virginia's governor spent her first hours in office making it harder.