Human Impact Project

Benjamin, 16, and his brother Dennis were stopped by Buffalo police in August 2025 during a traffic stop; DHS agents then arrested both brothers despite their possession of Special Immigrant Juvenile Status and Deferred Action protections from deportation. ICE officers questioned them, told them the U.S. would pay $2,000 for self-deportation, and presented them with English-language papers without explanation; Benjamin signed, believing he had no choice. Dennis, who had just turned 18, was deported to Ecuador while Benjamin was transported to a shelter in Texas, then moved to a shelter in Groton, Connecticut, where he spent two months unable to understand why he was being held despite having been previously vetted and approved for release to his father. Benjamin wrote that he felt "trapped" and "like a delinquent," confined to three rooms with no outdoor access without staff supervision. He was released 143 days after his arrest, four days after lawyers filed a lawsuit challenging his detention.

In August 2025, a 6-year-old New York City public school student and her mother, an Ecuadorian family who had sought asylum, were deported after being detained during an ICE check-in on August 12 and removed on August 19. The family's asylum application had been denied with a deportation order issued in June 2024. The student's older sibling, age 16, remains in the United States. New York officials, including Gov. Kathy Hochul, condemned the deportation.

Ted Jones, a 24-year-old British man, was deported from the United States to Britain in August 2025 after ICE identified a 2022 drink-driving conviction and visa irregularities. Jones moved to the US as a child and was removed during the Trump administration's immigration enforcement operations. According to ICE data, 212 people were deported from the US to the UK between Trump's inauguration and October 2025, compared to the same period under the Biden administration.

The Washington Post interviewed 16 former detainees of El Salvador's Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) to document conditions inside the megaprison where the U.S. has deported migrants. Detainees reported beatings, isolation, sexual assault, and other forms of mistreatment within the facility.

Guillermo Medina Reyes, a 31-year-old San Jose tattoo artist and Mexican national, was arrested in Berkeley on July 27 following an alleged vehicle theft crime spree. Reyes had been fighting ICE deportation efforts, with a judge barring his detention two weeks prior to the arrest. He was charged with multiple felonies including carjacking, vehicle theft, and grand theft. Reyes faces criminal prosecution and potential imprisonment, followed by deportation proceedings.

A Hmong refugee who arrived in the United States in 1978 at age five was detained by ICE on July 30, 2025, during a routine annual check-in and later deported to Laos. She died in Laos, according to a June 26, 2026 statement from the Southeast Asian Freedom Network. Her green card had expired in 1995 and was revoked in 2007, and she is survived by her husband, Scott Bailey, and their four children.

An 82-year-old man from Pennsylvania was deported to Guatemala after being apprehended during a visit to an ICE office to replace his lost green card. He had lived in the U.S. for nearly 40 years and was granted political asylum in 1987. His family initially could not locate him and later learned he was in a hospital in Guatemala. Guatemala has an agreement with the Trump administration to receive deported immigrants of other nationalities.

A family facing ICE enforcement operations decided to self-deport but were unable to bring their 6-year-old German Shepherd, Draco, on their flight due to airline size restrictions. The family surrendered the dog they had raised for over five years to the Los Angeles County Department of Animal Care and Control. Pet surrenders from families affected by recent immigration enforcement operations have occurred in Southern California.

Leonardo José Colmenares Solórzano, a 31-year-old former youth soccer coach from Venezuela, was detained by CBP agents at a scheduled border appointment in October 2024 after they photographed his tattoos. Internal DHS data showed he had no criminal history and no U.S. or foreign convictions or charges. He was deported to CECOT prison in El Salvador on March 15, 2025, under the Alien Enemies Act as part of a group of 238 Venezuelan deportees labeled as terrorists and gang members despite DHS data showing most had no U.S. criminal convictions. While incarcerated, Colmenares reported being tortured—guards stomped on his hands, poured filthy water in his ears, and threatened beatings. He was returned to Venezuela on July 18, 2025, as part of a prisoner swap.

More than 230 Venezuelan men held in U.S. immigration custody were expelled to El Salvador in March 2025 under the Trump administration's invocation of the Alien Enemies Act and detained for months in the CECOT maximum-security prison, where they allege torture. A proposed class-action lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, led by plaintiffs Andry Omar Blanco Bonilla, Wild Yahare Chirinos Romero and Jerce Egbunik Reyes Barrios, accuses aviation companies CSI Aviation and GlobalX of civil rights violations, false imprisonment and negligence for carrying out the flights despite a federal judge's order to halt or return them. The complaint alleges passengers were told they were being returned to Venezuela but instead were taken to El Salvador and held incommunicado for months while subjected to severe abuse. The case has been assigned to U.S. District Judge James Boasberg, who also presided over earlier litigation involving the same deportation flights.

Juana McIntosh, a Guatemalan national and spouse of a U.S. Air Force member, was detained by ICE during a green card interview appointment at a USCIS office in Atlanta while her husband was deployed overseas. She had been granted Parole in Place as a military spouse and was in the process of adjusting her status when she was taken into custody based on a previous removal order from 2012.

Approximately 10 days after the South Sudan deportation, five migrants from Jamaica, Cuba, Laos, Vietnam, and Yemen were deported to Eswatini (formerly Swaziland). The deportees were sent to Matsapha Correctional Center, the country's main maximum-security prison. Jamaican national Orville Etoria was able to return to his country at the end of September, but four others remain detained without charge and without permission to receive visitors. According to lawyers, the U.S.-Eswatini agreement provided for the transfer of 160 deportees in exchange for $5.1 million. One detainee, Cuban national Roberto Mosquera, remains imprisoned in the country where he never committed a crime and has no family or friends.

A 23-year-old woman who grew up in Cottonwood, Arizona since she was 4 months old, speaks English fluently, and graduated from Mingus Union High School was undocumented and ineligible for DACA after President Trump attempted to end the program during his first term; she worked two jobs to support herself and her family. On July 15, 2025, ICE raided Colt Grill restaurant where she worked, part of a broader raid on four Colt Grill locations in Yavapai County; federal prosecutors have indicted owners Robert and Brenda Clouston and two undocumented employees, accusing them of smuggling workers from Mexico and running a fake cleaning-company scheme to exploit them. During the raid, ICE officers used pepper spray to force workers out of hiding; she was questioned, arrested, and detained for months at multiple facilities including the Florence ICE processing center and Eloy Detention Center, where she reported harsh conditions including overcrowding, extreme cold, and an untreated rash. She was ultimately deported to Mexico, separated from her three U.S. citizen brothers and her family in the United States.

Tenzin, a 29-year-old Tibetan refugee originally from Nepal, arrived at Newark airport on July 12 and was detained after attempting to cross into Canada. He spent over six months in ICE detention in Batavia, NY, where his asylum case was dismissed by a judge due to an interpreter's illness, then targeted for deportation to Uganda under the Trump administration's pretermission policy. His attorney successfully intervened to have him deported to Canada instead, where he arrived on February 19.

Jackie Merlos, an undocumented immigrant mother from Honduras with a pending U-visa, was detained by CBP agents on June 28, 2025, at Peace Arch Park near the U.S.-Canada border during a family picnic. Merlos, a well-regarded local business owner who had lived in Portland, Oregon for decades, was held in a CBP facility for 12 days. An ICE agent then called Merlos' friend Mimi Lettunich, demanding she immediately pick up Merlos' four U.S. citizen children—9-year-old triplets and a 7-year-old—or they would be placed in foster care. Lettunich, who had not cared for young children in years and had a full-time job, took the children into her home. Federal authorities attempted to deport Merlos without proper documentation or due process, but a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order blocking the children's removal. As of July 2025, Merlos remained in ICE custody at a facility in Tacoma, Washington, separated from her children and facing formal removal proceedings.

Nicolle Orozco Forero, her husband Juan Sebastian Moreno Acosta, and their two sons were detained at the Dilley Immigration Processing Center in Texas in June 2025 after arriving for a routine ICE check-in appointment. The family, who had been living in Seattle for two years, were separated by gender during their three-week detention. Their son Juan David, who had a serious kidney condition requiring medical treatment including a recommended biopsy, was denied adequate medical care by ICE officials. Despite legal efforts and community mobilization including support from U.S. Representative Joaquin Castro, the family was eventually deported.

Ward Sakeik, a 22-year-old stateless Palestinian woman married to a U.S. citizen, was released from ICE detention on July 2, 2025, after being detained for nearly five months starting in February when she returned from her honeymoon. Sakeik, who has lived in the U.S. since age 8, was arrested at St. Thomas Airport in the U.S. Virgin Islands while under an order of supervision and with a green card application pending. The government attempted to deport her twice, including once while a federal court order was in place, before releasing her.

Two Southeast Asian migrants, clients of attorney Tin Thanh Nguyen, were deported to Eswatini in July 2025 and have been held in isolation without legal representation or explanation of charges. Neither the Vietnamese nor Laotian governments have publicly declined repatriation, and the governments have not had direct access to the men. The attorney states his clients wish to return to their home countries. The Trump administration has not explained why they were not repatriated to Vietnam or Laos, claiming such deportations are reserved for individuals their own countries will not accept—a claim the deportees' legal representatives dispute. A human rights lawyer in Eswatini sued authorities alleging the men were being denied legal representation while held in a maximum-security prison.

A Cuban citizen who had been under ICE supervision since 2006 was detained by ICE in July 2025. He was held at Camp 57 in Angola, Louisiana, then transferred to Arizona where he was scheduled for deportation to Mexico. The court granted a temporary restraining order blocking his removal, finding he was denied proper notice and hearing before being deported to a third-party country where he has no connections.

Carmen, a woman who fled domestic violence and obtained a restraining order against her abusive husband, applied for a U-Visa in March 2025 after he was deported. Despite having a pending U-Visa application and valid work authorization, she was detained during a June 2025 immigration check-in and deported in July 2025 along with her 8-year-old son. Upon arrival in her home country, her husband was waiting for her at the airport. She is now controlled by him—he confiscates her passports and phone, forbids her from leaving the house without permission, and she lives in constant fear.