The wife worries.
All the time.
And when the children have finished crying and try to fall asleep while worrying, the wife finds a place to cry.
This has been the routine at the Armando Leonel Reyes Rodriguez home ever since immigration officials used duplicitous tactics to lure and then arrest the illegal immigrant.
“My husband’s arrest was one of the saddest days of my life,” his wife, Kenia Reyes, told me in her first remarks to any journalist. She answered questions in Spanish because she doesn’t speak English and didn’t want to share some details because she worried it might impact his case.
Fear is always a potent antidote to what’s right and just.
Reyes said she, her husband, and her oldest son walked and rode a bus from Honduras to El Paso, TX, in 2021. She said American officials took the family’s information and allowed them to enter the United States, which is a key point. The family was not turned away. As with many immigrants, her husband was fitted with an ankle monitor to keep track of his whereabouts.
She said a family in Dayton took them in, and the West Charleston Church of the Brethren in Tipp City welcomed them.
“The church has shown us love and affection since we arrived in this country,” she said. “I can’t describe how important their support is. They’re a blessing in our lives.”
In 2022, after their arrival, the couple had a second child, a boy, which means he’s an American citizen.
Reyes said her husband worked with another person remodeling homes (and has worked as a barber in the past). They joined a church, and her husband did his immigration check-ins as required by law.
Then ICE called her husband and asked him to go to its office to have his ankle bracelet removed. When he did, he was arrested for reasons that are still unclear. He’s been in the Butler County Jail since April 14.
America has had an illegal immigration problem for decades. And while the immigration debate is often framed as former President Biden’s policies vs. President Trump and whose polices are right and wrong, there’s a moral issue at play.
After welcoming families into the country and telling them what they have to do to stay, is it right to change the rules and deport law-abiding people, making them collateral damage in the immigration battle?
That’s an easy answer.
No.
When Trump announced his immigration crackdown, Americans overwhelmingly supported the effort because it was supposed to target criminals. But in addition, the immigration crackdown has deported American citizens, targeted immigrants with legal status, and ignored judges’ orders to bring back unlawfully deported people.
So the government has embarked on deportations for any reason, which is why the Trump immigration policy is losing support.
By all accounts, Rodriguez has no criminal record.
“He’s a good husband, father, friend, a good person, and he was also complying with the supervision procedures they set,” his wife said.
She worries about the impact her husband’s arrest has on her children and on her.
“My children aren’t well,” she said. “They miss their father a lot. They cry a lot. They wait for him every day at home. My children don’t understand why their father was arrested.”
She added, “My greatest fear is that my children and I will be separated from my husband,” she said.
Despite the family’s difficulties, Reyes realizes they’re not alone.
“We have a great and powerful God, and we know that for him, nothing is impossible,” she said. “I send a big hug to all the families affected by the situation in this country.”
Ray Marcano’s column appears on these pages each Sunday.
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