Early one morning behind the airport in La Lima, Honduras, before the first planeload of deportees landed, Sister Idalina Bordignon was meeting with her staff about an unsettling situation. Every day, parents were arriving without their children, and they were asking questions like What do I do if I don't know where my child is' and Do I lose my rights as a parent if I'm deported' An American aid worker suggested a quick analysis of each case to determine which agencies or nonprofits might help the families. We'll never have time for all this, Idalina thought. The Trump administration was sending too many people to Honduras too quickly, and soon the reception center that she oversees would be packed with more than 100 people who were exhausted, hungry, and in shock. They would need to be processed into the country as quickly as possible to make room for the next planeload. Shackled to a seat on one of those planes was a 39-year-old single mother named Claudia. After she emerged from...
learn more