They Separated Heidy Sánchez from Her Baby, Then Put Her on a Plane to Cuba

Heidy Sánchez Tejeda was detained last month by ICE agents, separated from her husband and infant daughter, whom she was breastfeeding, and deported to Cuba. Her lawyer said Heidy never committed a crime. She lived in Tampa, Florida, had a social security card and a driver’s license, and paid her taxes. The Trump administration has claimed that parents can decide to take their U.S.-born children with them when they are deported. Heidy says she wasn’t given that option.

TRANSCRIPT

“I went to the ICE interview on Tuesday and I was deported on Thursday. So, everything went really fast”, said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda. 

“They never asked me if I wanted to leave with my daughter. They never asked me. My daughter became nervous. She was asking me to breastfeed her. I told them: ‘Look, she needs to be breastfed’. They didn't care”, said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“My husband says he heard my screams from the other side of the door. ‘Please don't take her away. Please…’. It was very hard. It's very hard”, said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

Heidy Sánchez immigrated to the U.S. in 2019.

She lived with her husband and daughter in Tampa, Florida.

On April 22, Heidy was detained at a routine check-in at ICE offices

She was deported two days later. 

“On the flight we all came handcuffed as if we had committed a crime. We hadn’t.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“I had my social security number, my driver's license. I always paid my taxes with my husband. We always complied with everything.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“I’ve been with my husband for four years. It’ll be four years on May 7. What can I say? I like everything about him. Everything. And he knows it.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“My husband and I agreed to have a baby. I knew I would need fertility treatment. So we went to clinics and started a long treatment.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“I had an appointment at the clinic to take a blood test to find out if I was pregnant. That same day I took a pregnancy test at home, and because of my nervousness I thought it was negative. I said: ‘Oh, it failed again. We lost everything again.’ Then my husband said to me: ‘What's wrong with you?’ I said: ‘Nothing.’But he knew something was wrong. And at that exact moment,

they called from the clinic to give us the news that we were pregnant.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“Then we hugged each other, we cried, we planned so many things together. It was beautiful that day, and from then on every day was beautiful. When we made the gender reveal party. We planned everything, everything was so beautiful. She was the child we had longed for.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“Kailyn. Her name is Kailyn.”  said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“Right now, they’re struggling to get her to eat because I was the one who fed her.”

“Now she is saying all the time: ‘Mom, come. Mom, come.’ I had to record myself singing lullabies to get her to sleep because she doesn't sleep. She’s awake until the middle of the night. They don't know what to do with her anymore.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“We're seeing a lot of people that have been separated. A lot of people are being taken away from their families. There's a Venezuelan mom that was deported to Venezuela and the child was left here in foster care. In the same flight that we had Heidy, there was actually one of our clients that was a dad. He was the main provider of his family, and he was removed to Cuba.”, said Claudia Cañizares, Heidy’s lawyer. 

“This is a case [Heidy’s case] that for the public to bring awareness to what is going on currently in the U.S.”, said Claudia Cañizares, Heidy’s lawyer. 

Heidy’s lawyer says she never committed a crime

She got a deportation order for missing an immigration hearing in 2019 near the U.S.-Mexico border.

Heidy says she missed the hearing because she feared for her life.

“People were being kidnapped, people were being robbed over the documents and they would lose them. We kept pleading for the program to be cancelled because of this, because people couldn’t show up to the hearings. Heidy was one of those people.” said Claudia Cañizares, Heidy’s lawyer. 

“We had tried several things. We had already requested two or three times a motion to reopen or close the case, but it was never possible. The judge never wanted to. My husband had made a claim for me, the family petition. We are waiting for it. We’ve been waiting for two years and a few months. We still have no answer. We always tried to 

look for options, to do something so I could have legal status. I was able to go on with my normal life, and I went to my appointments with ICE.

When he [Trump] said he was going to do mass deportations you always tense up  a little bit, and say, ‘Wow, I could be on that list, it could happen to me.’ We always had the fear that it could happen. And it did.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

The Trump administration has said it gives parents the option of being deported with their U.S.-born children. 

Heidy says she was not given this option.

“[The agent] told me: ‘You are under ICE custody.’ I asked: ‘But why?’ He said: ‘That decision has already been made.” He saw my phone, which had a photo of my daughter, her father and me. He said: ‘Oh, she has a family photo. Call the father and have him come and get her.’

Just imagine. I started crying and told him: ‘Please don't take her away. Understand me. It took a long time and a long treatment before I could have my baby. Don't take her away from me.’ said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“The internet connection is bad in the house. Video calls don’t work well”, said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“Baby, what are you doing?”, said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“Mommy”, said the baby

“What?”, said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“We can't go out, because I’m tired. I just came from work”, said Heidy’s husband.

“Baby”, said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“I'll take you to Walmart later to buy you a little treat.” said Heidy’s husband.

“She knows.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“Kaylin, give mommy a kiss.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda. 

“Look at your room.”, said Heidy’s husband.

“Our room.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.

“It's still the same.” said Heidy’s husband.

“No, it's not the same. You're missing.” said Heidy’s mother in law. 

“I woke up each day to take care of my baby girl. I’d go to work. She’d wait for me to breastfeed her, bathe her, take care of her. Everything was focused on her because she was born at eight months. She’s a normal child. She’s very active, very happy. She likes to play a lot like every child. But she’s having epileptic seizures. She’s being treated by a neurologist. Just yesterday she had an appointment at the neurologist. She had a scan.”  said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda. 

“And I’m not there. And they say that she just shouted and said: ‘Mom, mom, mom,’ for me to defend her, to hold her, to support her. This separation is very hard, for me, for her.”, said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda. 

“She likes my shoes, my handbags, painting her nails, perfume, body cream. She's like an old lady. She imitated everything I did. Every day something beautiful happened because she was my miracle.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda. 

“It would be difficult to have a new life here.And everyone knows the conditions here.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda. 

“Our request is simple. That we be allowed to reunite our family again, that the three of us can be together again.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda. 

“Here I have no life. My life stayed there. Here I have nothing. We’re just staying in this house. It's not mine, it's not my mother's. I have nothing here. My life is there in Tampa. I breathe for that little girl in Tampa. Here I have nothing. Nothing.” said Heidy Sánchez Tejeda.