It was day of heartbreak and tearful goodbyes at Miami International Airport on Sept. 4.
Eight children boarded a plane to travel to Guatemala, where they will live with their parents, who were deported under the Trump administration's enforcement of laws against immigrants in the U.S. without documentation.
Several of the children are U.S. citizens by birth but faced living in foster care if they remained in the nation and had no adults to care for them. They moved to a country some of them had never seen and will now attend schools in rural villages. In many cases, the schools will require tuition after the sixth grade.
The Guatemalan-Maya Center of Lake Worth Beach, a nonprofit that works with recent migrants from Central and South America,
arranged for the flight, and two members of its staff accompanied the children to Guatemala.
Adults and children both cried as the children prepared to go through security.
One father sent his four children to live with their mother in Guatemala, fearful that they would have no one to care for them if he ever was detained.
The cries of one child shook the terminal as he was taken to the plane. Aiden Romero had rarely been away from his siblings since parents self-deported in August after being detained leaving church near Greenacres.
“We see this almost daily, and it doesn’t get easier,” said Mayra Domingo Cardenas, the center’s program coordinator.
"It’s inhumane not to feel the pain in the children’s cries.”
Valentina Palm covers immigration and breaking news for The Palm Beach Post. Email her at vpalm@pbpost.com and follow her on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, at @ValenPalmB. Support local journalism: Subscribe today
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: See photos, video as 8 kids leave U.S. to live with deported parents
