Human Impact Project

Jose Sanchez was detained by ICE in November 2025 and deported to Mexico despite having a pending citizenship case. He died in January 2026 while attempting to cross the Rio Grande to return to his family in San Antonio. His partner, Tiffany Barrera, is a U.S. citizen and mother of five.

Flor Ivet Vargas-Loya, a DACA recipient and mother of two U.S. citizen children ages 17 and 19, was handcuffed and detained by ICE on Christmas Eve while shopping at a T.J. Maxx in Phoenix's West Valley. She and her husband operate the El Taco Loko restaurant and a food truck in Laveen, and she is the sole provider for her children following her husband's deportation. At the time of her arrest, she was awaiting a delayed DACA renewal, had no new criminal charges, and was wearing an ankle monitor after being released on bond following about a month in immigration detention earlier in the year. Her attorney said she had been fully complying with her orders, and she had a court hearing scheduled for 2028. She is being held at the Florence Processing Center. Arizona lawmakers called for her release, with state Sen. Analise Ortiz saying, 'People like Flor and her husband are entrepreneurs who contribute to their community.'

Immigration officials detained two U.S. citizen siblings in a Mission Bay parking lot in late December. The siblings were held in the basement of the Edward J. Schwartz Federal Building for most of the day before being released to their father. The family believes the incident was a case of racial profiling and reports that officers used physical force during the arrest.

Malik Velimetov, 21, born in Turkmenistan but raised in Key West, was taken into custody by US Border Patrol on December 28, 2025, while traveling with his family on US 1 in Marathon. He was detained for a month at Florida's immigration detention center in the Everglades due to his pending asylum case and was released with an electronic monitor. His family, including his parents and 17-year-old sister, were also taken into custody and separated from him.

Arturo Rafael Brito Goncalvez, a 22-year-old Venezuelan pilot, was detained by ICE during a scheduled immigration appointment in Westerville, Ohio. His family claims he entered the country legally in 2023 with valid visas and employment authorization. He is fighting deportation and fears returning to Venezuela due to political persecution.

Federal agents arrested a teacher at a Chicago daycare in front of parents and children; the educator had a work permit and can be heard telling authorities she had papers. In a separate incident in Los Angeles, federal immigration agents arrested a U.S. citizen during a Home Depot raid and drove away with his 1-year-old daughter still in the vehicle; the child and her grandmother are both U.S. citizens.

ICE agents detained a pregnant woman at Karmel Mall in South Minneapolis, holding her face-down on the ground while handcuffed. Witnesses reported that she was unable to breathe during the detention and shouted that she was pregnant. Bystanders protested the incident, with dozens of neighbors gathering at the scene and pelting agents with snowballs. Video of the encounter circulated on social media documenting the use of force during the detention.

Tiago Alexandre Sousa-Martins, a 30-year-old Portuguese immigrant who arrived in the U.S. at age 13 and became a licensed general contractor and homeowner in Baltimore, was shot multiple times by ICE agents during a targeted enforcement operation in Glen Burnie, Maryland, on Christmas Eve while driving to an electrical job. Agents said they fired after Sousa-Martins allegedly tried to run them over; his van then crashed into a tree. Anne Arundel County Police later contradicted DHS's account, saying one person DHS identified as a passenger in the van was actually already in ICE custody in a separate vehicle at the time of the shooting. Sousa-Martins was hospitalized for about two weeks with spine, lung and thigh injuries before being detained at facilities in Maryland and Virginia, where his attorneys said ICE denied him prescribed medication and physical therapy. He had applied for a visa for trafficking survivors, citing abuse by his father, and was protected from deportation under a Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling. After pleading guilty to damaging government property and being sentenced to time served, a federal judge granted his habeas petition and ordered his release after nearly nine months in custody, reuniting him with his partner and two young sons. "Today, I can finally say I am free," he said, while advocacy group We Are CASA said it continues seeking accountability from ICE.

Lucía Pedro Juan and Francisco Gaspar-Andrés, a couple married 25 years, were arrested during a traffic stop in Florida in September 2025 and transferred to Fort Bliss ICE detention facility in El Paso. They were held separately and ICE agents ordered them not to communicate during processing. Pedro Juan was deported to Guatemala on November 28 without being allowed to see her husband. Gaspar-Andrés died on December 3 at a hospital in El Paso after 10 weeks in custody. At least 30 people died in ICE custody during 2025.

Donna Hughes-Brown, a 59-year-old Irish citizen who has lived in the U.S. since age 11 (47 years), was detained by ICE in July 2025 upon returning to Chicago from a trip to Ireland visiting relatives. She was held on moral turpitude charges tied to two overdrawn checks totaling less than $80 written more than a decade earlier. After being detained at the airport, she was transferred to Campbell County Detention Center in Kentucky, where she reported unsanitary conditions, pest infestations, and inadequate food and utilities. Her case drew attention after her husband testified before Congress, prompting Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to promise a review. She was released just before Christmas and reunited with her family in Missouri, avoiding deportation, and said she will not visit Ireland again until she becomes a naturalized U.S. citizen for fear of future detention.

Marcos Flores, bassist for local band Summer of Peril, was detained by ICE on December 23 while attempting to pick up a visitor's badge at Colorado Springs Air Force Academy. Flores, who was brought to the U.S. as a young child from Mexico, has been held at Aurora ICE Detention Center with his bond request denied despite community support and legal efforts. His case was affected by a federal policy memo reversing protections against no-bond detentions.

U.S. Army veteran Zahid Chaudhry, a green card holder and disabled veteran who has lived in the U.S. for 25 years, was released from ICE detention at the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma after more than three months. A federal judge ordered his release following a habeas hearing on December 22, 2025, calling his detention "flat out wrong." Chaudhry had been detained since August 2025 after being taken into custody at a citizenship interview, during which time he was separated from his wife and two young children and lost vision due to untreated thyroid eye disease. The government acknowledged it had cited an incorrect statute but maintains the detention was lawful, and the case continues before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Jose Gonzalez, a 53-year-old Mexican national who worked as a maitre d' at an upscale Palm Beach restaurant for 20 years, was detained on December 10 during a traffic stop and held at Alligator Alcatraz detention facility. Gonzalez was transferred to Krome Detention Center on December 22. He had a pending asylum application and valid work permit at the time of his detention.

A Columbus, Ohio mother and her three daughters, ages 18, 15, and 11, were pepper-sprayed by ICE agents on December 21, 2025, while driving near Easton Town Center. The mother reported that her eyes burned and the children cried after agents deployed spray into their open car window without activating police lights. The mother said she made no threatening gestures. ICE stated that agents had been involved in an incident at a nearby Dollar Tree where anti-ICE demonstrators had blocked their exit, though the agency did not clarify why pepper spray was deployed in the moving vehicle. A retired FBI Special Agent in Charge reviewed ICE's use-of-force policy and raised concerns about whether agents followed proper protocols, noting that verbal remarks alone do not justify force deployment. The mother filed an assault report with Columbus police.

Miguel Garcia Pazaran and his wife Dulce Maria Trejo Segura were pulled over by immigration agents while driving to work in Hillsboro, Oregon and detained without proper clothing. The couple was taken to a detention center in Tacoma and deported to Mexico within eight days, leaving behind their 2-year-old daughter Sofía, who is a U.S. citizen.

ICE agents arrested a Honduran mother and her two children, including a 4-year-old U.S. citizen, at a check-in appointment on December 20, 2025. The family was detained in hotel rooms for 18 days across multiple locations, including near LaGuardia Airport and Alexandria, Louisiana, during which they had minimal contact with the outside world. They were briefly placed on a plane to Honduras before being taken off due to a federal judge's temporary restraining order blocking their deportation, and were eventually released on January 7, 2026.

A family is calling for the release of an Arlington man detained by ICE, citing the health condition of his son.

Jeanette Vizguerra-Ramirez, a 43-year-old Mexican immigrant rights activist who has lived in the U.S. since 1997 and is the mother of four daughters (three U.S. citizens), was detained by ICE in a Target parking lot on March 17, 2025, the day after she marched in a protest against federal immigration policies. In 2011 an Immigration Judge denied her cancellation of removal but granted voluntary departure; she appealed, but in 2012 traveled to Mexico to see her dying mother, which was treated as a withdrawal of her appeal. She returned to the U.S. in 2013 without inspection and was later apprehended; ICE then issued a document purporting to reinstate her prior removal order. She filed a federal habeas corpus petition on March 18, 2025, arguing the reinstatement was procedurally deficient and that no valid removal order supports her detention, and a judge barred her removal from Colorado or the U.S. while the case proceeds. After nine months in custody at the GEO Group's Aurora facility, her attorney argued before Immigration Judge Brea Burgie that she was denied a bond hearing for 180 days because of the administration's disapproval of her activism and that she is not a flight risk given her daughters, one of whom recently joined the Air Force and had sought immigration relief on her mother's behalf, which the government denied. The judge did not rule immediately. Vizguerra has previously taken sanctuary in a Denver church and been named one of Time's 100 most influential people.

More than 560 students missed school in Willmar Public Schools on Monday due to rumors of an ICE enforcement operation. School officials quickly reassured families that schools were safe spaces and would not be entered by immigration agents. The rumors were based on federal authorities later identified as Homeland Security Investigations agents, not ICE, who had detained five or six people in the area over the weekend.

Families of immigrants arrested in a federal ICE surge in Maine are struggling to find basic information about their detained relatives as the government rapidly transfers them to detention facilities across multiple states. Erik Orellana-Mejia was arrested at his worksite on January 20 and has since been transferred to Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Louisiana, and Missouri. ICE has been building out detention and deportation infrastructure in New England and across the country to support intensified enforcement operations.