Jose Yugar-Cruz is a 37-year-old father sitting in an immigration detention center in Iowa, waiting to be deported to the Democratic Republic of the Congo — a country he has never visited, where he has no family, and whose language he does not speak.

A federal court already ruled that Jose cannot be sent back to his home country in South America because a judge found it more likely than not that he would face torture or persecution there. That ruling was supposed to protect him. Instead, the government found a workaround: send him somewhere else entirely.

While detained, Jose lost his mother. He has been unable to support his children. He has spent nearly two years behind bars despite a court order meant to keep him safe. "I lost my mother while detained. I can't help my children. I'm here detained," he said, according to CBS News. "I feel like a person who has no value."

No person should feel that way. And no government should be able to use a legal technicality to strip away protections a court already granted.

The Trump administration has been signing agreements with countries around the world — including the DRC — to accept deportees who are not their own citizens. These agreements are described as temporary, but for people like Jose, there is no clear path home and no guarantee of safety. His attorney asked that he at least be sent to a Spanish-speaking country. The government refused.

Jose still has faith. "I still have faith that maybe some miracle could happen in my case," he told CBS News.

We're asking for that miracle to be human decency. Stop the deportation of Jose Yugar-Cruz. Bring him back before a court. Let him make his case. No one who has been granted legal protection from persecution should be exiled to a country they've never known.