The wife of an active-duty US soldier was deported to Honduras on Monday, confirmed by family members and the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Cristy Maryori Villafranca-Trejo, 18, who immigrated to the US in 2016, is the seventh spouse or parent of an active-duty service member to be deported during President Donald Trump's second-term immigration crackdown.
According to AP, more than 50 family members of US soldiers have been detained in federal immigration facilities since the Trump administration rescinded protections for military families. In some cases, DHS released service members' spouses after media coverage and lawmakers intervened.
Villafranca-Trejo's husband, Sergeant Hedar Leonel Turcios Juarez, stationed at Fort Bliss, Texas, said he has struggled to fulfill his military duties since his wife was arrested on July 11 outside a Walmart near the base. He now cares for their 6-year-old daughter, takes her to school instead of morning training, and has postponed plans to transfer to another base.
"I don't know if I can continue with this job," Turcios Juarez said about his military career. "I have to plan to both complete my military duties and take care of my family."
DHS confirmed Villafranca-Trejo's deportation, stating she "received full due process." According to DHS, she received a final removal order from an immigration judge in 2017 for failing to appear at a hearing. However, her husband said she never received notice of the hearing and only learned of the order when they applied for a green card after marrying in 2022.
Turcios Juarez, a Honduran native, became a US citizen in 2024 after enlisting two years prior. Her motion to reopen her case was denied in May last year, and an appeal to the Board of Immigration Appeals is pending. She had also been waiting about a year for a decision on her application for the "military parole-in-place" program, which allows immediate family members of service members to stay in the US while applying for a green card.
"We have followed every rule," Turcios Juarez said. "We have done everything possible to resolve this issue."
Before Trump's second term, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) typically allowed immediate family members of service members to adjust their legal status even if they had deportation orders, according to Dan Gividen, former principal deputy counsel at ICE from 2016 to 2019 under Trump. "If an active-duty soldier marries someone and that allows her to get a green card, you would not arrest them, let alone enforce a removal order," Gividen said.
The office of Democratic Congresswoman Veronica Escobar, who represents El Paso, confirmed a congressional inquiry into Villafranca-Trejo's case, and Escobar visited her at the Camp East Montana detention center in Texas earlier this month. "My heart breaks for her, for her children, and for the soldier—who must feel betrayed by the very country he is sacrificing for," Escobar said.
Turcios Juarez said he has not yet figured out how to explain to his daughter what happened to her mother, but insisted he still wants to serve the country. "I love my job, I want to keep doing this," he said about the military. "It's just that I don't know how to continue."
