At one point, she saw her husband being arrested and taken away. When agents got to Ana, she was asked her name, address and whether she had children. Pedro said Ana told the authorities she did have children.
But it wasn’t until eight days later when she said told an ICE official where she was being held that both she and her husband were still detained with two children at home.
US Immigration and Customs Enforcement/AFP/Getty Images
This image released by the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) shows a Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) officer guarding suspected illegal aliens on August 7, 2019.
That’s when the ICE officer asked her the children’s names and their dates of birth, Pedro said. Ana was then released to her family.
Immigration is a top priority for the Trump administration. Despite a spotlight on the border crisis, officials have also stressed the importance of ramping up enforcement within the United States.
Although past administrations have deported immigrants who are in the country illegally, the focus on who should be deported has shifted under Trump’s purview – and the Mississippi raid demonstrated that.
Pedro said his family came to the United States to work and for a better future.
Acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan defended the administration’s tactic of going after nonviolent undocumented immigrants in a recent interview, saying it’s part of a broader, comprehensive immigration enforcement strategy.
“We’ve got to start with our partners in Central America and Mexico. We’ve got to secure the border,” he told NBC News. “But we also have to have interior enforcement to stop this incentive, this work opportunity, that we have in the U.S. that employers are exploiting. And we’ve seen that in this case.”
Sourse: abcnews.go.com
