motherjonesmag Her abusive husband had hurt her too many times. So Carmen F., an immigrant from South America, called the police. He was soon deported. Then she applied for a U visa, a special visa that gives crime victims a pathway to permanent residency in the United States if they cooperated with law enforcement to get their perpetrators off the streets. Unfortunately, the wait time to receive one of these visas is often more than 15 years. There’s a massive backlog, and in the meantime the Trump administration has been deporting the applicants, contrary to longstanding ICE policy. The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, has defended the deportations, arguing that crime victims can return later if their visas are eventually approved. Last year, ICE detained Carmen (not her real name) and deported her and her young son back to their homeland—where her abusive ex was awaiting them at the airport. Mother Jones' Samantha Michaels reports at the link in our bio. 📷: Mother Jones illustration; Unsplash View all 19 comments