ICE Nabs Veteran’s Wife During Routine Check-In!

Hand holding sign with Deportation Order text.

A retired American soldier is begging the same country he fought for not to deport his wife.

Story Snapshot

A 20-year Army and Texas National Guard veteran is fighting to stop his wife’s deportation.
Immigration officials point to a 2005 removal order and two illegal entries as their legal basis.
His wife has no criminal record and was detained at a routine immigration check-in.
The case shows how tougher policies now hit even military families who try to follow the rules.

A veteran’s toughest battle starts in a Dallas waiting room

Retired staff sergeant Wilmer Trujillo spent about 20 years in the United States Army and the Texas National Guard, serving in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, and South Korea, and says this fight for his wife is the hardest one he has ever faced.^[1] He drove her to a normal immigration check-in in Dallas, something they had done many times. He waited in the lobby, expecting another routine visit. Instead, an officer finally walked out and told him, “Your wife is being detained and deported.”^[4]

His wife, forty-year-old Honduran native Arelys Barahona-Martinez, had been checking in with immigration officials for years without trouble.^[1] She has no criminal record, according to what the Department of Homeland Security and their lawyer have shared with reporters.^[1]^[3] Trujillo says they believed they were doing everything “by the book” and moving toward a stable status through the system.^[4] That is part of why the sudden detention hit him so hard. He described the moment he heard the news as the moment “my heart broke.”^[4]

The legal landmine buried back in 2005

The Department of Homeland Security said Barahona-Martinez entered the United States illegally in 2005 and again in 2018, and that an immigration judge issued a final removal order on November 2, 2005.^[1]^[2] Officials also said she “received full due process” before that order.^[2] Her current lawyer has told reporters that she was not aware of that old order at the time and is now trying to get it rescinded, because it blocks her from normal paths to stay.^[2]

That twenty-year-old order is the key that unlocked her arrest. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, usually called ICE, says it detained her on June 10 because that old order is still active and enforceable.^[1]^[6] She is being held in an immigration detention center in Texas, after first being sent to a facility in Oklahoma in earlier reporting.^[1]^[6] A motion has been filed in a Texas court to stop her deportation until a judge can review the case, and ICE has acknowledged the filing and said she could be eligible for a stay, but has not promised to halt removal.^[2]

Family, service, and the new rules on immigration enforcement

Trujillo and Barahona-Martinez have been married for six years, and their lawyer says she could qualify for a green card because she is married to a United States citizen and has no criminal record, but that would require reopening the 2005 deportation case at the Department of Justice’s immigration court system.^[3] Trujillo says she is the “rock” and “backbone” of their family and that deporting her would rip his home apart.^[2] He stresses that he is not asking for favors, only a chance for her to finish her case outside a jail cell.^[1]

The Department of Homeland Security, under the current Trump administration, has taken a harder line. The agency has said more than once that military service “alone does not automatically exempt” people from the consequences of breaking immigration laws.^[2]^[16] During the Biden years, service by a troop or veteran’s close family was treated as a “significant mitigating factor” when deciding whether to deport.^[2]^[9]^[16] That softer guidance was scrapped in 2025 and replaced with rules that push officers to apply the law more strictly, even for military families.^[2]^[9]^[16]

Why military families now feel the system is turning on them

Barahona-Martinez is not the only military spouse caught in this new climate. Reports show she is at least the third military spouse in recent months detained during a scheduled immigration appointment, like a check-in or a green card interview.^[2]^[8] Other cases include a Marine veteran’s wife arrested at a green card interview in San Diego and released later on bond, and an Army staff sergeant’s wife taken from a base where they planned to live as newlyweds.^[12]^[11] These families thought they were fixing their status, not walking into a trap.

A 20-year U.S. military veteran is urging ICE to release his wife as she faces deportation. Retired staff sergeant Wilmer Trujillo tells CBS News' @camiloreports that his service should be taken into account, calling this experience the most difficult challenge he's ever faced.… pic.twitter.com/9RVnxJ8mqY

— CBS News (@CBSNews) June 17, 2026

Members of Congress have launched an inquiry into how long-standing protections for noncitizen service members and their relatives are breaking down.^[16] They point to cases where immigration officers detain parents of Marines or spouses of veterans instead of using tools meant to delay or avoid deportation when a military family is involved.^[16] From a common-sense conservative view, this hits a nerve: a country that depends on volunteers for war should not casually punish their families when other legal options exist, especially when those families are playing by the rules and checking in as ordered.