Caught in Trump's Immigration Crackdown, N.J. Family Marks Mothers' Day Without Mom

For the last two decades, Jose has worked in the United States doing a variety of jobs — at Burger King, on construction sites, in a vitamin factory —  and spent long stints back home in El Salvador with his wife, Mirna, and two children, Karen and Bryan. 

A few years ago, amid escalating gang violence in El Salvador — which now has one of the highest homicide rates of any nation in the world — Jose took advantage of the Obama Administration's Central American Minors program. As a non-citizen with legal status, Jose was able to work with the refugee resettlement agency in New Jersey, the International Rescue Committee, to bring his children and wife into the U.S.

The family was vetted, with security checks and DNA tests, and last year they were given the okay to travel to Jose's home in Orange, N.J. But in August, President Trump's Department of Homeland Security abruptly cancelled the program as part of a larger crackdown on legal immigration. The children were still allowed to come since they had already been approved, and they arrived in March. But Mirna was not. She is marooned in El Salvador, unable to see her children this Mother's Day. 

Karen, 21, and Bryan, 14, are having trouble acclimating to life without their mother. Bryan said he misses her love, advice and home-cooked lunches.

Jose is having trouble figuring out how to raise the children and manage the household on his own. He is hoping to figure out another way to bring Mirna to the U.S., but he may not be able to stay much longer himself. That's because Trump recently cancelled the Temporary Protected Status program for Salvadorans that allowed him to live and work in the U.S. legally. He is mandated to leave the U.S. by next year.

President Trump rails against what he views as uncontrolled immigration from Central America, which he says brings gangs and drugs into the country. Eliminating programs that he calls immigration "loopholes," like the Central American Minors program and Temporary Protected Status, is part of how he has tried to seal the borders.

But one other feature of Trump Administration immigration policies — either by design or circumstance — is the separation of families. Cuts to refugee admissions make it harder for spouses and children to join their loved ones in the U.S.; a travel ban on several mostly Muslim countries keeps grandparents separated from grand kids and brothers separated from sisters; a new policy at the border means asylum seekers are detained in separate facilities from their children. 

WNYC's Matt Katz and Vera Carothers interviewed the family from El Salvador and discussed their story with host David Furst. Because of continued concern about Mirna's safety, Jose asked WNYC to withhold their last name. Click play to listen.