Families Deserve Freedom, Not Detention: ‘No One Would Like To Go Through What We Went Through’

This Women’s History Month, we’ve highlighted the story of immigrant rights advocate Jeanette Vizguerra, who was kept separated from her children and grandchildren for nine months after being abducted by ICE while on a break outside her Target store last March. She finally won her freedom in late last year, reuniting with her four children – three of whom as U.S. citizens and one of whom is a permanent resident – just days before Christmas. 

“I need to return home,” Jeanette said, “not only for my family and my grandchildren, but also for my community, which needs me.”

But did you know that in certain cases where children also lack legal immigration status, entire families may be targeted for detention? Under the Trump administration, the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas, has been reopened under a lucrative contract with private prison company CoreCivic. In the past, migrant family jails and private prison profiteers have been accused of serious mistreatment of people in their custody. But under the current administration, the situation that these individuals are facing may become even worse due to gutting of key oversight.

Just weeks ago, Dilley was the site of a measles outbreak that ground all movement to a halt in order to prevent the spread of illness to families that have already been languishing under ongoing conditions, including racist abuse, worm-filled food, and medical neglect that has seriously endangered the lives of children and their parents. 

One mom, Kheilin Valero Marcano, feared for her 18-month-old toddler’s life after she became seriously ill at the CoreCivic facility – and only continued to deteriorate. 

“It began with a fever, then a cough that wouldn’t ease. Her nose clogged with thick mucus. Her breathing grew strained and wheezy,” NBC News reported. By the time that detention staff decided to get Amalia to a hospital, she had to be treated for pneumonia, Covid-19, RSV and respiratory distress. “Thank God,” Valero Marcano said when staff acknowledged Valeria needed urgent medical attention. “Because you haven’t done anything.”

Other mothers have shared how their children are being detained beyond the legal limit of 20 days set out by the decades-old Flores Agreement, which Children’s Rights said sets “the national standards for the treatment, placement, and release of all immigrant children detained in the custody of the federal government.” 

One of those children is nine-year-old Kenek, a special needs child who spent four times the 20-day limit before he and his mom, Vilma Bautista Torres, were released.

“Kenek, who has severe autism, grew increasingly disoriented and distressed as the weeks dragged on without access to therapy, she said, hitting himself, crying through the night and begging her to let him return to his school in Louisiana,” NBC News reported. Kenek “relies on specialized schooling and daily therapy to regulate his emotions and behavior. At Dilley, she said, those supports vanished.” 

Even trying to get some fresh air proved traumatic for the child, because he thought stepping outside meant they were going home, the mom said. Soon, they just stayed indoors out of fear that going outside would be too triggering for him. “No one would like to go through what we went through,” Bautista Torres said. 

But the administration has detained dozens of children for even longer periods of time, repeating an abusive trend from the president’s first term, when 40% of kids were held beyond the legal limit of 20 days. Leecia Welch, Children’s Rights Deputy Litigation Director and legal advocate, says she’s counted more than 30 children who’ve been detained for over 100 days under his second administration. “We’ve started to use 100 days as a benchmark for prioritizing cases,” she said, “because so many children are exceeding 20 days.”

One Russian family shared how they tried to approach an ICE officer about how their five-year-old twins had now been detained past the legal limit. Instead, the officer told them to “take it up with his boss,” NBC News continued. “Who’s that?” asked Aleksei, the family’s dad. “Trump,” the officer replied. 

When the family then tried to follow-up with a written complaint, a different ICE officer lied and falsely claimed the 20-day rule “is not applicable anymore.” While the administration has repeatedly sought to terminate the Flores Agreement, it has been blocked by the courts and the rule remains in effect.

But Christian Hinojosa and her 13-year-old son, Gustavo Santino-Josa, would have no way of knowing that, after they were detained for more than four months. “Until today I don’t know what we did wrong to get detained. I’ve seen my mom cry almost daily and I ask God that we can go out and go home soon,” Gustavo said during a phone interview. “My mom says that as long as there is hope it is worth fighting for.” 

Hinojosa shared that life has been difficult for the teen, who has seen some of the friends he’s made deported. Gustavo also felt frustration when five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos and his dad were released following immense public outcry and a court order. “My son says, ‘That’s unfair, Mama. What’s the difference between him and us?’” Hinojosa said. 

Gustavo has every right to be upset: children do not belong in detention, period. “Medical and other experts have long documented that family detention can lead to life-long damage to health and development, causing health problems including post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, developmental regressions, suicidal behavior, weight loss, sleep disturbance, and frequent infections,” Human Rights Watch said in 2021. 

“The American Academy of Pediatrics warned the government that detention ‘is associated with poorer health outcomes, higher rates of psychological distress, and suicidality making the situation worse for already vulnerable women and children.’ Studies have shown that immigrant children who were detained experienced a tenfold increase in psychiatric disorders while adults suffered a threefold increase.”

“Even detaining families for days or weeks inflicts severe harm,” Human Rights Watch continued. “DHS’s own medical experts stated as whistleblowers in 2021 that ‘any amount of detention can be harmful to children.’ Studies have shown that the experience of detention for children is ‘acutely stressful…even when detention is brief’ and that ‘any incarceration is damaging for immigrant children, especially those with high levels of previous trauma exposure.’”

But in good news for Christian and Gustavo, they finally won their freedom late last month and returned home to San Antonio, where Christian can carry out her essential work as a home health aide. When three in five women work in caregiving, mass detention policies not only hurt families, they hurt patients and the economy.

Aury, another mom who along with her three children spent more than 50 days at Dilley, is trying to get their lives back in order to the extent of her abilities. Aury is also back at work as a housekeeper. “Care work is at the center of our communities and our family life, and a cornerstone of our economy,” as the National Domestic Workers Alliance has said. “It’s the work that is done before any other work can be done.”

Aury’s three children “are doing well, very happy to be going back to school,” she told Scripp News. “We were left with a lesson. Every day before sleeping, we pray and thank God for freedom, for life, for food. And we also pray for the people who are still being held there. May God give them freedom soon.” This is what all these families deserve: the chance to thrive, contribute, and be together. This isn’t just a Women’s History Month reminder, it should be a daily reminder.