Interview With My Friend Gaby
- 2 days ago
- 11 min read
Here is another personal story of one of my immigrant friends. As with Keren, I hope this interview allows you to see Gaby as a person, not a talking point. For a broader understanding of the complexities of immigration, please check out my series, starting with the Immigration Explainer.
This article is an AI summary of my interview with Gaby on October 21, 2025, with some quotes from Gaby interspersed. I've provided links to each section. I'll post a separate article with the full interview transcript.
Links to Each Section of This Post
Gaby’s Arrest, Detention, and Deportation
In this interview, Gaby recounts her experience being detained and deported from the United States after living in Carlsbad, New Mexico for over three years with her children. She explains that although her visa had expired, she remained in the U.S. on the advice of her lawyer because returning to Mexico could have resulted in imprisonment due to false accusations from her daughter’s father, who claimed she had kidnapped their child.
"For sure, I was illegal because I didn't return to Mexico for having my permissions on being in the United States. But it wasn't because I just wanted to. It was because I have a problem here in Mexico with the father of my daughter."
In June, while driving her children to swimming lessons, Gaby was stopped by law enforcement officers, including ICE agents. She describes being handcuffed in front of her children and treated like a criminal.
"I saw in the mirror that it was a lot of police, and I stopped. I was so scared, because I was sure that it was ICE. I was shocked. They said, 'You have to come with me.' And my kids were watching everything."
She was taken first to Roswell, New Mexico, held overnight in jail, and later transferred to an immigration detention center in El Paso, Texas.
While in custody, she received a call informing her that her daughter had been placed with her father, who allegedly claimed custody. Gaby says this was untrue and that she had full legal custody. Her daughter was temporarily placed with a host family and experienced significant emotional distress.
"[The lady said] 'I just want to let you know that you lost your custody.' And I was like, 'What?' And she's like, 'I don't know. My work is just to let you know.' And she ended the call. So I went to the jail thinking that I lost my daughter, and I didn't even know how long my process was going to be."
Gaby spent nearly two months in detention facilities. She describes harsh and dehumanizing conditions, including crowded sleeping arrangements, constant surveillance, limited communication with family, minimal personal belongings, restricted outdoor access, and what she perceived as psychological pressure designed to make detainees abandon their legal cases and accept deportation.
"It was awful. You do your necessities in front of all the ladies. You take a shower in front of all the ladies. You can’t scream, you can’t do a lot of things, because they punish you. And the way that they punish you is you can’t talk with your family. They always scream at us, and they treat us like animals."
"We feel so vulnerable, because the thing that they want is to get you to say, 'I don't want to be here. I just want my deportation.' Just to give you a hard time, just to quit.”
She reports ongoing trauma symptoms, including anxiety and difficulty sleeping with the lights off.
Eventually, she was deported—not to northern Mexico, where she is from, but to Tabasco in southern Mexico, which officials told her was to prevent her from easily reentering the U.S. She had limited money and resources upon arrival.
"So they dropped me in Tabasco and I had to buy a ticket for the airplane to go back to my house. It was awful, because I didn't have money. I just had ten percent of battery on my cell phone, and I was calling my parents and saying, 'I'm fine. I'm here.'"
Gaby explains that the large-scale law enforcement response stemmed from her daughter’s father requesting extradition based on kidnapping allegations. The Mexican consulate later determined the accusation was false and provided assistance, but by then she had already been detained and deported.
She concludes by describing the lasting emotional effects on herself and her six-year-old daughter, who now fears police officers and requires therapy due to trauma from witnessing her mother’s arrest and separation.
"My daughter was with a host family, and my daughter was crying. The family that had my daughter said to my mom at the end, 'She was so, so sad. She didn't eat. She didn’t want to do anything, because she wanted to go to her mom.'"
"It was the worst experience I have ever had. More, that the experience was in front of my kids. My daughter has problems with police. If she sees a policeman, she's like 'Mommy!' She doesn't want to go out of my house because she's thinking that something bad is going to happen."
More Details About the Detention Centers
Gaby broadens her account to describe what she sees as systemic problems within immigration detention centers. She says many detainees remain locked up for long periods while fighting their cases, including a 23-year-old woman from Iran who has reportedly spent three years in detention because returning to Iran could put her life at risk, yet other countries have refused to accept her.
"If she returns to Iran, they’re gonna kill her. So she's fighting, asking other countries to accept her, and they say no, because she's from Iran."
Gaby describes the conditions as physically and psychologically damaging.
"I was feeling that I was dying over there. Like, if I stay one more day here, I will die. I don't know how people stay one year over there."
She claims medical care is minimal and only provided in severe situations. According to her, detainees experiencing anxiety are often given medication that sedates them rather than receiving meaningful mental health support. She also alleges poor food quality, limited access to fresh fruits and vegetables, and that better food is only provided during official inspections.
"They don't give us fruit and vegetables. All the vegetables that they give you are in the freezer; they are not natural. Just one day, they gave us an orange, and that day they gave us a huge chicken. And we were like, 'Oh my gosh, this is like caviar or something!' But after that, they told us, 'Yeah, it was a supervision for human resources.”
She believes detainees are pressured to give up their cases and accept deportation because of harsh treatment.
"We knew that there was a lady fighting for the rights of the people, and they wouldn't let her enter the detention. Because if she entered, ICE is gonna be in problems because they treat you like animals. Guess what? I have my dog, and I don't treat my dog like that."
She explains that many detainees must pay for legal assistance and even personal hygiene products, creating financial barriers to fighting their cases. Detainees are told that they are no longer allowed to request asylum.
She shares the story of a Venezuelan woman who crossed multiple countries to reach the United States and now remains detained without a lawyer because she cannot afford one. Gaby also mentions another woman who has lived in the U.S. for decades and is monitored by ICE due to immigration status issues, living in constant fear of re-detention.
"There are a lot of friends from Colombia, Venezuela, Mexico, Brazil… they have a lot of different stories, because my situation is not the same as theirs. But treat[ment] that they gave us, it was the worst."
Gaby concludes by emphasizing that, regardless of individual circumstances, she believes detainees are treated poorly. She notes that she has been barred from returning to the United States for 10 years and could face prison time if she reenters. Although her younger child is a U.S. citizen, she says the experience left her unwilling to return.
"They punished me for 10 years with no visa and no return to the United States. If I return, they’re going to put me in jail for two to 20 years. It depends on whatever I do. I was like, I don't want to ever return to the United States after this."
Although her younger child is a U.S. citizen, she says the experience left her unwilling to return.
Gaby’s Personal Situation with Her Daughter’s Father
Gaby discusses her current life in Chihuahua, Mexico, where she lives with her two children, Luciana and Emiliano. She explains that Luciana’s father also lives in Chihuahua and that she continues to face legal conflicts with him. According to Gaby, he has not seen Luciana in four years and previously showed little involvement in her life. She believes his actions—including accusing her of kidnapping—are motivated by anger over her remarriage and a desire to control or harm her rather than genuine concern for their daughter.
For safety reasons, Gaby and her children are living with her parents in a secured residential area, while her husband lives about an hour away. Her lawyer advised this arrangement because she fears Luciana’s father could harm her. She says this separation has been emotionally painful and has caused her to miss important family moments.
Gaby speculates that Luciana’s father may have reported her to Mexican authorities in hopes of receiving money for turning in an undocumented immigrant. She maintains that the kidnapping accusations were false and financially motivated. She emphasizes that Luciana has been the primary victim of the situation, experiencing trauma from both the detention incident and ongoing family conflict.
"[My ex] is a super bad person. If you give an immigrant to ICE, they give you money. So I'm sure he asked for the money just to see me like that. I don't have to think about it, because he's always saying that I'm rich and he wants my money. The only victim here is Luciana [my daughter]. I can be in jail if you want, ten years, but the only one who was hurt here was Luciana."
Gaby also reveals that her relationship with Luciana’s father involved sexual abuse, emotional abuse, and financial control. She says she was pressured by her own father to marry him after becoming pregnant.
"When I realized that I was pregnant, I was like, 'No!' I was like, just crying and crying, crying, and my dad forced me to get married with him. I was like, 'I don't want it. I don't want it. I don't want it.' But it was a huge problem in my house, because [my dad] has a macho man thinking."
She later divorced him, which she believes triggered his retaliatory behavior. When she reported sexual abuse to police, she was told the statute of limitations had expired.
She describes rebuilding her life in Mexico after deportation as financially and emotionally difficult. The family has fewer opportunities than they had in the United States, and her husband struggles with frustration over their circumstances. Conflicts with Luciana’s father escalated once he learned she was living in the United States.
"Because he saw me happy, because he saw that I'm gonna do well, I'm gonna get married with the love of my life, and he's so angry because of that. So my baby suffered an abuse, you know?"
Throughout this segment, Gaby reiterates that she would never intentionally harm her children or disrupt their stability, and she expresses disbelief that anyone would harm children the way Luciana’s father has.
Gaby’s Time in the U.S. Before Her Arrest
Gaby explains more about how she and her current husband ended up staying in the United States. They were living in Mexico when they traveled to Carlsbad, New Mexico for vacation. During the trip, she experienced serious pregnancy complications and was placed on bedrest, making it unsafe to return to Mexico.
After their son Emiliano was born in the U.S., the couple decided to stay temporarily—initially planning to remain for only two years to save money and build financial security in Mexico. However, ongoing legal issues in Mexico prevented Gaby from returning as planned.
"My husband said, 'You know something, if we are here for a reason, we will stay here for a reason. If God gave us this situation, we have to find the best.'”
At the time of her arrest by ICE on June 27, 2025, her husband was in Mexico renewing documents, which left her alone in Carlsbad with the children except for her mother, who happened to be visiting. Gaby emphasizes how critical her mother’s presence was; without her, she does not know who would have cared for her young children during her nearly two-month detention.
"I can't imagine if my mom wasn't there. I don't know what—I don't have family there. I just had a few friends. Emiliano was so little, just to say to my friend, 'Take care of him.' I was two months in the detention center. Imagine that. I don’t know. I can't imagine if my mom wasn't there."
After her detention, her father traveled to Carlsbad to collect the family’s belongings and close out their housing.
She notes that she returned to Mexico on August 10, 2025, and that she spent her birthday in detention, contrasting it with the previous year when she had celebrated happily with her husband.
Reflecting on life in Carlsbad before her detention, Gaby describes it as generally positive. Although it was difficult being far from family and starting over, she says she felt safe and stable. She acknowledges experiencing some racism but also emphasizes that many people treated her well.
"Some people don't like the Mexicans, so you have to survive with that treatment. There's racist people, but not all. I have to say, there's more good people than bad people."
The couple chose to remain in New Mexico partly because it was considered a sanctuary state at the time, meaning local police did not inquire about immigration status, and because her husband had steady work driving trucks in the oil fields.
Deportation Chaos and Other People's Situations
Gaby describes the second detention facility in El Paso, Texas, where she was held for five days before deportation. She explains that it was a large, white, tent-style temporary holding facility where detainees were closely monitored by officers. While her stay there was relatively short, she met others—such as a Colombian woman—who had been waiting much longer for deportation.
Gaby says that detention and deportation procedures were constantly changing. The week before, Mexican detainees were reportedly returned to Ciudad Juárez at the border, but during her week, the policy shifted, and she was told she would be deported to southern Mexico.
"The rules change every week."
Detainees were required to wait until enough people were gathered for a flight, coordinated with the Mexican consulate. She ultimately waited five days before being flown to Tabasco, which she notes is about a three-day drive from her home in Chihuahua. Authorities told her they intentionally deported people far from the border to discourage reentry.
She also recounts other troubling stories from detainees she met, including a Venezuelan woman who was deported while her children were detained separately in the United States. According to Gaby, the woman spent months trying to locate her children but was given no information about where they were being held. Gaby emphasizes that family separation and uncertainty were common fears among detainees.
"I knew of a Venezuelan lady who got deported to her country, and she was waiting for her sons. She has been waiting for three months for her kids. She lost her kids because they were separated and put in another detention center. She is fighting for her kids, but she can't return to the United States. The government won't say where they are."
The segment ends with Gaby offering to connect Carrie with other former detainees who are willing to share their stories, underscoring her desire for others to understand what she believes are serious injustices within the detention system.
"I already told them, and they say, 'For sure, we want to talk with her. They have to know all the bad things that happen over there.'"
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