In February, an ICE agent directed Emilio, a Deaf man, to get onto a bus in southern Texas. By that point, Emilio had spent nine weeks in immigration detention and didn’t know what was going on. He asked for a sign language interpreter and told me he didn’t get one. It was only when he saw the Mexican flag that Emilio realized that he was not being deported to his home country of Venezuela; instead, he was entering a country where he had never lived.

“I don’t know people here,” said Emilio, who did not have his passport on him when he reached the border.

The bus first dropped him off in Villahermosa, and he made his way to Mexico City thanks to the financial support of fellow Deaf people. He’s been stuck in Mexico ever since.

“DHS is supposed to ensure that you are able to access the immigration process equally to a non-disabled person.”

Emilio’s last name and the last name of the other Deaf person, Edgar, who spoke with Mother Jones about their deportations, are being withheld due to fear of retribution as they pursue potential legal avenues to return to the United States.

Emilio was working at Amazon when he was detained at a check-in appointment for his asylum case in December 2025. He had been living in Texas for close to four years and expected his appointment to be routine, like the four before it had been. By early August, Emilio was unsure whether his asylum case was officially closed. (“I’m not being informed of anything,” he emailed me in Spanish.) A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson did not respond directly to a question about why Emilio was detained at his asylum check-in.

The surge in deportations under the second Trump administration has, by most accounts, overwhelmed America’s immigration system. Serious questions have emerged about whether officials have overlooked red flags in hiring in order to meet President Donald Trump’s demands. Detainees have reported going days and weeks without adequate food, water, or medication. For Deaf detainees, these problems are compounded by language deprivation. There is no publicly available information on how often Deaf people are given interpreters at various parts of the immigration process, let alone in detention centers.

Emilio didn’t know Mexican Sign Language when he arrived, which differs from Venezuelan Sign Language. Many countries in........

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