【AI前沿】A Woman Was in the US Legally. She Was Deported Anyway

Vittoria ElliottPoliticsMay 15, 2026 6:00 AMA Woman Was in the US Legally. She Was Deported AnywayMaría de Jesús Estrada Juárez was applying for her green card and thought she was doing everything right. Instead, she was arrested and deported to Mexico.Photograph: Getty ImagesCommentLoaderSave StorySave this storyCommentLoaderSave StorySave this storyMaría de JesúsEstrada Juárez came to the US from Mexico in 1998 at 15 years old. Later, she was a recipient of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), thepolicymeant to protect undocumentedimmigrantswho arrived in the country as minors fromdeportation. When Estrada Juárez applied for a family-based green card in 2025, she thought she was doing everything right.Instead, she was detained at her green card interview in Sacramento, California, and deported to Mexico. Similar stories have played out across the country since President Donald Trump retook office. Last year, White House deputy chief of staff for policy and homeland security adviser Stephen Miller and thenDepartment of Homeland Securitysecretary Kristi Noem set a quota of3,000 arrests per day, andImmigration and Customs Enforcementhas hired 12,000 new agentsto supercharge the agency’s efforts.But in practice, the emphasis on detaining and deporting as many people as possible has meant that evenimmigrants in the USwith legal status have been caught up in the blitz, thrown into a system where they may bemoved out of the state, or the country, before they’re able to seek legal help. Immigration officers have appeared atimmigration court hearingsand green card interviews across the country, arresting people who are otherwise complying with the immigration process.On March 23, a federal judge ruled that Estrada Juárez’s deportation was unlawful, and she was able to return to the US on March 31. Estrada Juárez shared her experience with WIRED.This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.WIRED: Can you tell me what the actual deportation process looked like for you? How fast did it happen?María de Jesús Estrada Juárez:It happened pretty fast. I went to my appointment that I had for my green card, and I ended up being deported back to Mexico in less than 24 hours. It was very traumatic and very disturbing because I believed I was taking the right steps towards stability.There wasn’t much information given to me. After I was detained, I was told I was going to Tijuana. I was detained in Sacramento, but they took me to different facilities on the way down to Mexico. So it was Sacramento, Stockton, Bakersfield, Los Angeles, and the last one was San Ysidro. They were picking up different people on the way down.We heard all this stuff, about how DACA recipients were a target to be deported, and that’s not the protection that we were promised.Were you able to contact your family at all? Did they know where you were?Not all. Once I got detained, all my belongings, including my phone and medication, were put aside for me until I was released. I have anxiety and I’m a diabetic, so I had my Ozempic and the other medication that I use for my anxiety. When we got to the San Ysidro border, they gave me my belongings back.When I got to Tijuana, the first thing I did was text my daughter because when we got into the first part of the shelter where they registered us, they told us, you still cannot use your phone in this facility. But I needed to let my daughter know that I was OK, and that I was already being released in Mexico. So I went to the bathroom and I texted her, “Don’t call me back or text me back. I’m just texting you real quick to let you know I’m OK, and I’m already in Mexico.”That was Thursday, February 19, around 8:30 am. I was detained on February 18, around 11:30, so it took less than 24 hours for me to be deported.My daughter had been trying to search for me in the [US Citizenship and Immigration Services] tracker, the ICE tracker, and she could not find me there the whole time that I was moving down to San Ysidro.What happened when you got to Mexico?When I got to Tijuana, they turned us in to [the Mexican government] and they took us to a shelter where the Mexican government took us in.They helped figure out how we were going to get back to our hometowns. But I do have a friend that has a house in Tijuana, and she has family there, so I didn’t have to stay in the shelter until I got to my hometown, which is in Puebla, Mexico.How long were you in Mexico before you were able to return to the US?Forty days.What did your life look like coming back?I am an area manager for a chain of hotels, and I was able to come back for my job.When I came back I asked for a couple weeks off, even though I had been gone, because it felt like I was just waking up out of a dream. I needed to realize I was back at home. I had asked my daughter to pack up the house because she wasn’t going to be able to afford the living expenses. So when I came back to the house, seeing it packed and ready to go was depressing.