10/23/2026
BREAKING🚨 ICE just locked up the man who feeds 8,000 Bronx neighbors a month, at his own immigration hearing. Now his food pantry is shut.
Aleksander Nilaj, an Albanian immigrant who founded the Open Hand food pantry in the Bronx in 2012, showed up for his immigration hearing at 26 Federal Plaza in Manhattan. ICE agents detained him instead. He is now held at Delaney Hall, a detention center in Newark, New Jersey.
Open Hand serves 7,000 to 8,000 people every month. On Thursday and Saturday mornings people line up on Lydig Avenue for fresh produce and staples. Nilaj has paid out of his own pocket to feed people. Now the staff say they can't keep up without him. Food distribution is frozen, and they say the pantry will close for good if he doesn't come back.
Nilaj has no criminal record. The only thing he's accused of is overstaying the temporary visa he legally arrived on in 2006. Rep. Ritchie Torres says Nilaj told him he has gone to multiple immigration hearings over the years, trying to follow every rule.
DHS says he "received due process" because a judge ordered him removed back in 2008, 18 years ago. "This administration will not ignore the rule of law," the agency said. As of July, 70.6% of people held in ICE detention had no criminal convictions, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse.
Edith Blitzer manages the building where Nilaj worked as superintendent. She says he has pre-existing health problems, including a bad back. "He's like another son to me," she said. "This never should have happened."
Torres has visited him inside Delaney Hall, where he has been sounding the alarm about inadequate health care. "Delaney has about a thousand inmates. None of them are serious offenders or violent offenders," Torres said. "Detaining a man who has dedicated his life to feeding those in need is not justice… It's cruelty."
Bronx Community Board 11 wrote to an immigration judge asking that he be released on bond. His attorney is filing a habeas petition hoping to get him out.
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