Leonardo (a pseudonym), from Venezuela, worked seven years in the United States doing mitigation work on construction projects. He is married to a U.S. citizen, who had filed a petition for his green card. He held a work permit and an immigration judge's order granting him withholding of removal, which barred the government from returning him to Venezuela. ICE took him into custody at an ankle-monitor appointment and removed him to Mexico, a country he is not from. When a HUMSI team member met him outside the office of COMAR, Mexico's refugee agency, in Tapachula in September 2026, he had been stuck there for about eight months.