09/17/2025

Mass Deportations Bring a New Wave of Family Separations

As ICE ramps up arrests, hundreds of migrant children are being sent to shelters

Sulma Martinez had just left the dentist’s office with her 14-year-old twin daughters when an unmarked U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement vehicle pulled up behind her and flashed its blue lights. The officers asked for her papers.

Martinez, a 35-year-old originally from Honduras, had a work permit, a pending asylum claim and a pathway to a visa for crime victims. But none of that mattered, she said the officers told her.

They gave her a choice: She could head to a hotel and be deported with her daughters, or she could contest her removal and try to stay in the United States. If she chose the latter, she’d be arrested and the twins would be sent to a shelter for child immigrants.

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