Photos: Immigration activists protest detention of prominent journalist

Activists protest across the street from the U.S. Border Patrol station in McAllen, Texas.   (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

The McAllen Border Patrol Station where journalist Jose Antonio Vargas was taken Tuesday after he was detained at McAllen-Miller International Airport.   (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

Roxana Menchaca, 21, of Edinburg, Texas, with other activists seeking to elevate the attention to undocumented immigrants being detained. Menchaca, a U.S. citizen who was raised partly in Mexico, is the daughter of undocumented parents. “We are living the American dream but we are stuck in a cage.”   (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

Activists give a cheer after a planning meeting across the street from the McAllen Border Patrol Station where journalist Jose Antonio Vargas was taken.  (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

Jose Antonio Vargas, founder of Define American, holds a copy of “A Nation of Immigrants” by John F. Kennedy, a book he says he carries with him at all times, during his testimony at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on immigration reform in February.  (Susan Walsh / Associated Press)