Active-duty US soldier’s El Salvadoran wife detained by ICE, could be deported to Mexico.
Sergeant First Class Jose Serrano, an active-duty US Army sergeant who served the military for 27 years, including several in Afghanistan, said the ICE is out of control after his wife Deisy Rivera Ortega, an El Salvadorian by birth, was detained by the ICE on April 14 in Texas. Ortega had an appointment at the immigration office in El Paso when she was arrested.Ortega came to the US in 2016 and was granted legal protection in 2019, CBS News reported. Because of her legal protection, Ortega can’t be deported to El Salvador but the administration told 51-year-old Serrano that his wife could be deported to Mexico. “I don’t really understand why, because she followed the rules of immigration by the T since day one,” Serrano said, adding that his wife had an active work permit at the time of her arrest.”I love the Army. (The) Army helped me out for almost 28 years. It’s not the Army, sir. It’s ICE,” Serrano said in his interview to the CBS. “ICE is out of control right now, taking away rights, as soldiers, that we have.”Serrano was born in Puerto Rico and the duo got married in 2022 He also submitted a Parole in Place application on behalf of his wife last year, a special program designed to offer deportation protections to military spouses or parents who are in the U.S. without legal status, but the case remained pending. The wife had a military ID labeling her as a spouse of an active-duty Army soldier. US service members can’t travel to Mexico. If Ortega is deported to Mexico where she knows no one, Serrano will have to either leave his Army career or his wife. He sufered from a traumatic brain injury, PTSD and depression and his mental health worsened after his wife’s arrest as he has not been sleeping.
DHS says Ortega is a criminal illegal alien
The DHS in its statement to CBS News said Ortega was ordered deported in 2019 after receiving full due process. The department termed her as a “criminal illegal alien” and said she was convicted of illegal entry into the US.
