President-elect Donald Trump’s vow to oversee massive deportations has immigrants nationwide—both legal and otherwise—racked with fear and unease amid an uncertain future, several told Newsweek in exclusive interviews.
One undocumented immigrant told Newsweek he felt “very paralyzed” in the aftermath of Trump’s victory, leaving him unsure whether he’ll ultimately be forced to return to Nigeria along with his mother and two siblings, who arrived in the U.S. in 2009.
“Lately, it’s been on my mind more, thinking about what my next steps are, and how that probably involves being out of the country,” he told Newsweek. “I’ve been here most of my life, I’ve been here since I was 7. This is all I know.”
“The American people re-elected President Trump by a resounding margin giving him a mandate to implement the promises he made on the campaign trail, like deporting migrant criminals and restoring our economic greatness,” Trump-Vance transition spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told Newsweek. “He will deliver.”
“We’ve definitely seen a decrease in activity in our portion of the border. … The vast majority are Mexican males. We see a few females and a few juveniles,” Thaddeus Cleveland, sheriff of Terrell County, Texas, and a former border patrol agent, told Newsweek. “We’ve slowed down. Our numbers are pretty much pre-Biden activity levels.”
While no local tax dollars were spent on such assistance, the county said in correspondence to Newsweek that it is now “taking precautionary measures due to the uncertainty of support and funding under the new administration.”
Facing the unknown
“We don’t even have the waiver, which is basically a forgiveness of his unauthorized entry,” Moreno told Newsweek. “We’ve been married for nearly eight years, and he has zero status. That’s one of the biggest problems. It’s so hard to even get the status of parole from deportation. We’re asking for the bare minimum of just allowing us to have peace of mind that our spouses won’t be deported. And we cannot even get that.”
“Immediately, it brings out a lot of uncertainty and fear,” the 31-year-old clinical researcher who requested anonymity told Newsweek. “DACA allowed me to get a job, pay for my education, allowed me to start a career and give back to my community by helping 𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘭𝘥ren with neurodevelopmental disabilities.”
‘Not all of us are criminals’
Perez told Newsweek via WhatsApp that the group made the trek due to the U.S. being “a country of opportunities” coupled with an unstable economy in her native country. A larger criminal gang presence back home spurred the individuals’ trip, where they eventually entered the U.S. through Ciudad Juárez, a Mexican city on the Rio Grande just south of El Paso, Texas.