Immigration rights activist walking from Pittsburgh to ICE detention center in Clearfield County

An immigration rights activist is set to walk more than 100 miles from Pittsburgh to Clearfield County to highlight immigration rights. 

On Monday, Jaime Martinez was on the second day of his walk to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Clearfield County. The journey to the Moshannon Valley Processing Center, the largest immigrant detention center in the Northeast, will take eight days, said Martinez, the founder and executive director of Pittsburgh-based immigration rights group Frontline Dignity.  

"We need to be calling upon our partners all across the state to recognize what's going on in this facility, bring scrutiny to it and eventually shut it down," Martinez told KDKA. 

Martinez said commissioners out there will soon vote on whether to renew their contract with the GEO Group, the private, for-profit corporation that manages the center. Martinez alleges abuse is happening at the facility, and many of those detained have no criminal convictions. KDKA reached out to ICE for comment, but did not hear back on Tuesday. 

Randy Cordova-Flores, who police said they pulled over for a traffic violation earlier this year in Springdale, Allegheny County, is at the Moshannon Valley Processing Center. Police said he failed to report to his immigration hearings. However, his sister says he has an asylum case pending and did not have a criminal record. 

"We'll be leaving that detention facility that day with an air of triumph, while also recognizing that those detainees don't have the freedom to walk in the way which we did," Martinez said. 

Inspired by a trek he took in Spain and civil rights marches, Martinez decided a pilgrimage was the way to bring awareness to the 130-mile journey, which started on Sunday at the ICE office on Pittsburgh's South Side. Martinez said others have joined his walk. 

"A hope that we can treat our immigrants with the respect and dignity in this country that they deserve," Martinez said. 

Martinez said he expects to reach the facility in Clearfield County around noon on Sunday.