In Support of Application for Asylum (Form I-589)
I, Alan David Coronado Dávila, declare under penalty of perjury under the laws
of the United States that the following is true and correct to the best of my knowledge:
I. PERSONAL BACKGROUND
My name is Alan David Coronado Dávila. I was born on November 16, 2002, in Venezuela. I am a Venezuelan citizen. I am the son of Brigzen Aroldo Coronado Lobo and María Dalia Dávila Moreno, both of whom file their own separate asylum applications. My younger brother, Kevin David Coronado Dávila, is included as a derivative beneficiary in my father’s application. I am unmarried and have no children.
I arrived in the United States on October 4, 2018, through John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. I was fifteen years old at the time. I arrived with my mother and my younger brother; my father had already been living in the United States since February 2017. I have lived continuously in the United States since the date of my arrival and have not returned to Venezuela. I am now twenty-three years old. My entire adult life — every job I have held, every relationship I have built, every experience that has shaped who I am as an adult — has taken place in the United States.
I attended the International High School in New York City, where I completed my entire secondary education. Although I had begun secondary school in Venezuela before my departure, I enrolled in the International High School from the beginning when I arrived in the United States, and I graduated there in 2022. After graduating, I began working. I currently work in Bozeman, Montana, where I have lived since late 2024. I have a serious and stable relationship with a person who lives in Bozeman. My family is here: my father, my mother, my uncle Rodney Coronado Lobo — who is a lawful permanent resident of the United States and is married to a United States citizen, whom I also consider my aunt — and three cousins who were born or live in the United States. I have more family in the United States than I would have in Venezuela. The life I have built here is the only adult life I know.
II. MY MEMORIES OF VENEZUELA AND WHY I LEFT
I left Venezuela when I was fifteen years old. I did not leave as an adult who had built a life there and chosen to start over somewhere else. I left as a teenager, at an age when Venezuela was still the country of my childhood — not a place I had navigated independently as an adult.
What I remember of Venezuela is a mixture of ordinary childhood memories and experiences that, even then, told me something was deeply wrong with the country I was growing up in. I remember the violence in public spaces as something unremarkable, something people adapted to rather than confronted. One image that has stayed with me is witnessing a robbery on a school transport vehicle: a motorcyclist pulled up alongside the bus, reached through an open window, and took a Nintendo game device from the hands of a girl sitting near me. No one intervened. No one called for help. It happened in seconds, in plain view, and then it was over. That kind of incident was not exceptional in the Venezuela I grew up in. It was routine.
I also remember a serious injury I suffered as a teenager, shortly before my family left Venezuela. I sustained a deep laceration to my hand that severed several tendons and left my hand immobile. What I remember most clearly is not the injury itself, but what happened afterward: the difficulty of finding immediate help. A neighbor took me to a fire station, thinking it would be the fastest way to get medical attention. The firefighters covered the wound but were not equipped to treat it, and no one arranged for me to be taken to a hospital. I went home with my hand still immobile, without having received real medical care. I still wonder, when I think about it, why that happened — why a serious injury did not result in immediate medical attention, and why the people trying to help could not find a clear path to get me the care I needed.
Receiving proper treatment required traveling multiple times from Guarenas, where we lived, into Caracas — a long journey that included navigating the public transit system and the metro — to reach the Hospital Ortopédico Infantil, the Children’s Orthopedic Hospital in Caracas. I do not remember the exact number of trips, but I recall it was approximately five or more: initial consultations, diagnostic visits, the surgical procedure to reattach the tendons, and subsequent rehabilitation appointments. Each trip was its own ordeal — the distance, the cost, the time, the logistics of getting a teenager with a serious hand injury across a congested city using public transportation. The surgical procedure and the rehabilitation program that followed are documented in medical records from that hospital. But the difficulty of that entire process — the repeated obstacles, the absence of any straightforward path to care — left a lasting impression on me about what it meant to need help in Venezuela and to discover that the systems meant to provide it had largely broken down.
That same period was marked by another obstacle that reflects something important about life under that government. In order to leave Venezuela, I needed a valid travel document. My United States tourist visa was stamped in an expired passport, and obtaining a new or extended passport from the Venezuelan government was an extraordinarily difficult process at that time. The government was experiencing serious problems issuing travel documents to its own citizens. We ultimately had to use the medical records from my hand injury to petition for an extension of my passport on humanitarian grounds. A formally documented injury — certified and filed with the government — was the tool we needed to accomplish something as basic as obtaining a travel document. That experience captures something essential about what daily life under that government was like: even ordinary needs required extraordinary effort, bureaucratic obstacles, and in some cases, proof of suffering to obtain basic services.
I want to note that the difficulty of obtaining Venezuelan travel documents has not changed. As of today, Venezuela does not maintain an operational embassy in the United States. My current Venezuelan passport is expired, and I have no practical way to renew it from within the United States. This is not a choice I have made — it is a consequence of the Venezuelan government’s failure to maintain consular services here, and it reflects the broader reality of what it means to be a Venezuelan citizen abroad under this government.
III. MY POLITICAL VIEWS AND MY IDENTITY AS SOMEONE FORMED IN THE UNITED STATES
I grew up in a household where opposition to the Chavista government was openly expressed. My father, Brigzen Aroldo Coronado Lobo, opposed the government and said so clearly within our family and social circle. That political environment shaped my own understanding of Venezuela’s government and its impact on ordinary people’s lives. As I grew older — both during my last years in Venezuela and throughout my adult life in the United States — I developed my own views, consistent with those of my family: I believe the Venezuelan government has been responsible for the destruction of the country’s institutions, the erosion of basic rights, and the suffering of millions of people.
These views were not something I kept private. Among my friends, my family, and the people who knew me, my opposition to the Chavista government was known and openly expressed. I am prepared to support this with declarations from individuals who can attest to my political views. My opposition to the Venezuelan government is genuine and has been consistent throughout my adult life.
But I want to explain something about my situation that goes beyond my personal political opinions. I am not simply a person who disagrees with the Venezuelan government. I am a person who, from the Venezuelan government’s perspective, embodies a specific and suspicious profile. I left Venezuela at fifteen. I lived in the United States throughout my entire adult life. I held Temporary Protected Status — a form of protection granted by the United States government — for several years, until that designation was terminated in November 2025. My father opposed the government openly within his personal and community circle in Venezuela, and that was known among those who knew him. My uncle, Rodney Coronado Lobo, had a publicly visible association with government-aligned political organizations in Venezuela and now lives as a lawful permanent resident in the United States, married to an American citizen, with daughters who are American citizens.
When I try to imagine how Venezuelan authorities would see me if I returned today, I do not think they would see a neutral person. I think they would see a young man who spent his entire adult life in the United States, who received American immigration protection through TPS, whose family has deep roots here, and who comes from a household with a known history of opposition to the government within their social and community environment. In the current political environment in Venezuela — where laws now formally criminalize perceived sympathy with American interests or support for international pressure against the government — that profile alone is enough to generate suspicion, questioning, and risk.
IV. MY TEMPORARY PROTECTED STATUS AND ITS TERMINATION
I obtained Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Venezuela, which was first granted to me with an effective date of August 8, 2022. My TPS was subsequently renewed, covering me through September 10, 2025. During this period, I was authorized to live and work lawfully in the United States.
On November 7, 2025, the Department of Homeland Security terminated the 2021 Venezuela TPS designation. My TPS terminated on that date. I no longer hold TPS or any other lawful immigration status. The loss of TPS made the prospect of being forced to return to Venezuela suddenly and concretely real in a way it had not been before.
I want to be honest about why I did not apply for asylum earlier. When TPS was terminated, I was dealing with significant uncertainty and instability. I was trying to find stable employment and was not immediately in a position to focus on preparing a legal filing. It took time to stabilize my situation — I eventually found work through the Uber platform, which gave me a degree of income stability. At the same time, my father — who has always been the one in our family to research and navigate these kinds of processes — was going through the same disruption I was, and we were working together to find the right path forward. We sought legal advice from an attorney in December 2025, but after several months concluded that the approach being proposed did not honestly reflect our situation. After ending that relationship in April 2026, we reorganized and prepared our applications based on what is true. I am filing within a reasonable period following the changed circumstances that eliminated my lawful status in the United States.
V. THE LEGAL AND POLITICAL FRAMEWORK THAT SHAPES MY FEAR
My fear of returning to Venezuela is not based solely on general conditions in the country, though those conditions are severe. It is also grounded in specific legal developments that demonstrate how the Venezuelan government has formalized the persecution of individuals it perceives as connected to American interests or opposed to its authority.
In November 2024, the Venezuelan National Assembly enacted the Ley Orgánica Libertador Simón Bolívar contra el Bloqueo Imperialista y en Defensa de la República Bolivariana de Venezuela (Organic Law Libertador Simón Bolívar against the Imperialist Blockade and in Defense of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela), published in Official Gazette No. 6,859 Extraordinary on November 29, 2024. This law criminalizes, with prison sentences of twenty-five to thirty years, any conduct the government characterizes as promoting, supporting, or facilitating international sanctions or actions against Venezuela’s sovereignty. The language is deliberately broad: it encompasses not only direct action but perceived sympathy, indirect support, or conduct the government interprets as favorable to foreign interests. The law also creates a National Registry of suspected individuals, with immediate administrative consequences including asset freezes and prohibitions on entering Venezuela.
On January 3, 2026, the Venezuelan government published Decree No. 5,200 in Official Gazette No. 6,954 Extraordinary, declaring a State of External Commotion across the entire national territory. The decree was issued in the context of events surrounding the capture of Nicolás Maduro on that date, which the government characterized as an armed attack by the United States. Article 5 ordered the immediate search and capture of any person involved in the promotion or support of what the government described as a United States attack against Venezuela. The scope of that language — promotion and support, not only direct participation — is what concerns me.
I am a Venezuelan who spent more than seven years in the United States, who held TPS granted by the United States government, and who comes from a family with documented connections to American life and institutions. I did not participate in any action against Venezuela. But under the framework these laws create, what matters is not only what I did — it is what the government concludes about who I am and what my years in the United States represent. That conclusion, I believe, would not be favorable to me.
VI. WHY RETURNING TO VENEZUELA WOULD BE ESPECIALLY DANGEROUS FOR ME
There is a dimension of my situation that is specific to me and that I want to explain clearly: I do not know Venezuela as an adult. I left at fifteen. I have never worked there, never rented an apartment there, never navigated its bureaucratic systems independently, never dealt with its checkpoints, its colectivos — armed pro-government groups that enforce political loyalty through intimidation and violence within communities — or any of the daily realities that a Venezuelan adult learns to manage over years of living there.
That absence of experience is not simply an inconvenience. It is a form of vulnerability. An adult who has lived in Venezuela knows, through experience, what to say and what not to say, how to behave at a checkpoint, what topics to avoid in conversation, which neighbors to trust, how to present oneself to avoid drawing attention from groups or authorities looking for signs of disloyalty. I do not have that knowledge. I would be returning as someone who looks Venezuelan, carries a Venezuelan name, but thinks, speaks, and moves through the world like someone formed entirely in the United States. That combination — Venezuelan identity, American formation, years of TPS, family ties deeply rooted in the United States — is precisely what makes a person like me visible and suspicious in the eyes of the Venezuelan government and those who act on its behalf.
I also have no meaningful support network in Venezuela. My father, my mother, and my brother are here. My uncle, my aunt, and my cousins are here. The person I am in a relationship with is here. The relationships that form the fabric of my daily life are all in the United States. If I were forced to return to Venezuela, I would be going alone, to a country I do not know as an adult, without protection, without support, and with a profile that I believe would make me a target for suspicion and persecution.
VII. WHY I CANNOT SEEK PROTECTION IN VENEZUELA
I cannot seek protection from Venezuelan authorities because the Venezuelan government is the source of the threat I fear. Venezuela has no functioning independent judiciary capable of protecting individuals from government persecution. It has no free press that could expose abuses. Civil society organizations that once provided some measure of protection have been dismantled, exiled, or silenced.
Relocating within Venezuela would not protect me. The Venezuelan government’s security apparatus — including the SEBIN (Servicio Bolivariano de Inteligencia Nacional, or Bolivarian National Intelligence Service), which functions as the government’s political police and has been associated with arbitrary detention and the suppression of dissent, and the DGCIM (Dirección General de Contrainteligencia Militar, or General Directorate of Military Counterintelligence), the military intelligence body responsible for internal surveillance and political repression — operates throughout the entire national territory. The colectivos, armed pro-government groups that enforce political loyalty through intimidation and violence at the community level, are present across Venezuela’s cities and towns. There is no safe location within the country for someone with my profile.
VIII. CONCLUSION
I am asking the United States government for protection from being returned to Venezuela. I am twenty-three years old. I have lived in this country since I was fifteen. I completed my education here, built my adult life here, and formed the relationships and values that define who I am here. Venezuela is the country of my birth and my earliest memories, but it is not a country where I could live safely today.
My fear is genuine and specific. It is not the fear of someone who simply prefers to live in the United States. It is the fear of someone who, based on who he is, where he has lived, what his family looks like, and what the Venezuelan government has formally established as grounds for persecution, has concrete and well-founded reasons to believe that returning would put his life and freedom at serious risk.
I have been honest in this declaration. I have described my memories, my circumstances, and my fears as accurately as I can. I respectfully request the protection I am seeking.
I declare under penalty of perjury under the laws of the United States of America that the foregoing is true and correct to the best of my knowledge and belief.
Executed on: ___________________________
_______________________________________
Alan David Coronado Dávila
Date of Birth: November 16, 2002
Bozeman, Montana