A mother and three children with a scheduled date in June to self-deport were detained by immigration agents in Ferndale on the morning of Thursday, May 28, the woman’s lawyer said. The woman, who is from Guatemala, has a 14-year-old son for whom she had been trying to arrange guardianship before she was set to leave the country on June 19. The son found out about the detention of his mom and siblings when he returned from school on Thursday, said Gabe Harrison, her attorney. A federal Department of Homeland Security spokesperson wrote in an email on Friday, May 29 that the mother and kids were arrested in 2021 for entering the United States illegally. “Under the Biden Administration, she was RELEASED into the country, completely unvetted,” the spokesperson wrote, going on to confirm that she and the kids were detained on Thursday. “Being in detention is a choice,” the email continued. “Parents can take control of their departure (by self-deporting) and reserve the chance to come back the right legal way.” The spokesperson did not respond to the assertion that the woman and her children had already elected to self-deport, nor to a question about whether agents were aware when the woman was detained that she had a 14-year-old child at home. Harrison declined to make his client’s name public as he has not been able to speak with her since she was detained. The 14-year-old, who is the woman’s oldest son, is currently staying with family. The other children are approximately 12, 9 and 8 years old. A removal order for the woman and younger kids came into effect in January after a final appeal was denied in November, Harrison said. The oldest son, who entered the U.S. with his father separately, has no final removal order. The father has been deported, Harrison said, while the rest of the family has been living in Bellingham. The mom and three younger kids visited a government office in Tukwila on Tuesday, May 26 as part of the self-removal process through the CBP Home app, which offers a $2,600 financial incentive and is supposed to ensure that those who take that option will be deprioritized for enforcement. The app, launched last year by the Trump administration, is intended to allow immigrants to work with the U.S. government on their deportation, Harrison said. “Community members need to feel safe in that process if they’re going to engage in it.” On Wednesday, the mother was told to check in on Thursday in Ferndale to “wrap all this up,” Harrison said. The woman was afraid to go to the appointment, but he reassured her. Though he wasn’t able to go with her, he told her it wouldn’t make sense for agents to detain her at this point. That’s not how it played out. “She came into her check-in at 9:30 and never left,” Harrison said. At a Ferndale detention facility, Harrison was told the mom and kids would be flown to Texas later on Thursday, the same day they were detained. He raised the issue of the 14-year-old child alone at home, he said, but as of Thursday evening it appeared the mother and children would be transported anyway. Harrison believes they will likely be taken to a well-known family detention center in Dilley, Texas. At some point, the mom and children will then be deported to Guatemala, he said. Harrison works with hundreds of clients through the Bellingham-based immigration law firm he runs with his partner, Holly Pai. In a time of heightened immigration enforcement, people are interested in their options if they don’t want to keep fighting removal, he said. When they ask, he tells them about the CBP Home app. From now on, he said, he’ll have to offer the caveat that he has seen a situation where people went through the process on the app and faced detention anyway. “It’s just really disappointing,” he said. This story was updated at 11:15 a.m. on May 29, 2026 with comments from the Department of Homeland Security and additional information from Harrison. Due to incorrect information supplied by a source, a previous version of this story misstated the day on which the mother and kids visited a government office in Tukwila. They visited the office on Tuesday, May 26. The story was updated to reflect this change at 5:27 p.m. on June 2, 2026. Cascadia Daily News regrets the error. Sophia Gates covers rural Whatcom and Skagit counties. She is a Washington State Murrow Fellow whose work is underwritten by taxpayers and available outside CDN's paywall. Reach her at sophiagates@cascadiadaily.com; 360-922-3090 ext. 131.