How the Deportation System Takes Its Toll on Families

The situation poses challenges most of us never could have predicted

Joanna Garcia Salazar is wrapping up a hectic workday at a middle school in San Leandro, California, a suburban town on the eastern shore of the San Francisco Bay. Her work desk is adorned with folk art by Bay Area artists, family photos, and artwork by her husband, Javier Salazar, who is currently living in Tijuana, Mexico. There is also a family portrait taken when her husband was incarcerated. Her daughter, Juliana Garcia Uribe, works at the school part time while also completing her third year in college at a nearby university.

Javier Salazar had been serving a 12-year prison sentence for an armed robbery committed in Reno, Nevada, of which he completed 11 years, serving the last four under the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection’s Conservation Camp Program. The state’s program has roughly 3,700 inmates working at fire camps across 27 counties.

Upon his release in 2014, Salazar was deported to Mexico, a country he left as a baby when his family immigrated to Oakland, California. Ironically, he boarded the plane to Tijuana at the Oakland International Airport, the city he had called home up until his incarceration. According to the San Jose Mercury News, between 2010 and 2018, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) chartered nearly a thousand flights in and out of Oakland carrying almost 43,000 detainees to either be transferred or deported—even though Oakland is a sanctuary city. “A lot of people don’t realize what happens after you get deported, what we go through,” Salazar says. “We have to adapt to a different life.”

For Garcia Salazar, her husband’s deportation shattered her family. While they have been accustomed to visiting Salazar in prison, the separation was painful and took a toll on the family’s finances. “A round trip to Tijuana was almost $700,” Garcia Salazar recalls. “This is not going to work. I was mentally preparing myself for that.” It wasn’t until a friend told her that the cheapest route was to fly into San Diego and cross the border on foot. As a U.S. citizen, she would have no problem making the trek into Tijuana as many times as the family’s finances allowed for it. Her travels by plane were becoming increasingly expensive; one way to alleviate some of the money spent was for Garcia Salazar to bring merchandise to sell back home.

While living in Tijuana, Salazar has found connections among other deportees, who work at call centers like himself. In recent years, call centers have gained popularity in Tijuana. While these jobs were often outsourced to India, companies like Redial BPO have found Tijuana and hiring recent deportees who already speak English to be a better trade-off.

Besides work, Salazar found solace in painting. First, he started drawing. Then his wife gave him his first set of paint, brushes, and a blank canvass. “His face lit up when I bought him the paint,” Salazar Garcia says. A striking contrast to how isolated and quiet he was when he first was released.

“My art has helped me out a lot,” he says. “Not only with my anxiety with being separated from my family, but also as a financial resource.” The colorful, yet haunting paintings reflect his duality as a Mexican-American and the struggles that come with being deported, all while using urban and ancestral symbolism. He posts his work on his Instagram account where he goes by the name of Deported Artist. Garcia Salazar took notice of her husband’s newfound therapy, and she began bringing the paintings back to the U.S. At first, the paintings hung around the walls of their house. It was not long before friends who visited took notice and asked if she would be interested in selling the artwork. In March of this year, Salazar’s work was part of an exhibit called “Keeping Families Together,” which was on display at an art gallery in Oakland called Galería Beso Maya.

In the fall of 2017, Garcia Salazar along with their daughter created an Instagram account called Hijas del Maíz. The account showcases Salazar’s artwork that people can purchase, family photos where they talk about dealing with family separation, and photos of folks who buy art or other merchandise from them when they set up shop at different vending pop-ups throughout the Bay Area.

Earlier this year, their daughter created Mariposa de Frontera, an extension of the Hijas del Maíz account, where Juliana can document her personal experience with how she is dealing with being separated from her father. She hopes that others who are going through something similar can find an ally in her. “I had been thinking about a way to put [our] story out there,” Juliana says. “I wanted to find a way to help children and donate funds to an organization helping families going through deportation.” A few months ago, Juliana debuted a pin that was originally one of her father’s paintings. The pin depicts the city of Oakland’s tree logo with Monarch butterflies emerging from its branches and flying out into the sky, an homage to the theme of migration that the butterflies make every year.

While the sale of Salazar’s paintings and other merchandise by the mother and daughter duo have helped alleviate some economic hardships, they mask how agonizing the past five years have been since Salazar was deported. They were used to going on trips to see him while he was incarcerated, but now that he is more than 500 miles away, the distance has exacerbated their anxiety and depression. At first, they were reluctant to talk about it. However, they have learned how imperative it is to share their story, especially now with more anti-immigrant rhetoric under the Trump administration.

“Just because they were deported, just because, yes, they committed a crime— they are people too. We are all human,” Garcia Salazar says. “People don’t know the pain that we go through.” According to the NAACP, between 1980 and 2015, the number of people incarcerated in the United States increased from roughly 500,000 to over 2.2 million.

Garcia Salazar tearfully recalls having two miscarriages and having to hide them from her older kids to prevent them from causing the family more pain. “We still go through things,” she adds. “Whenever I visit him and it’s time to leave, I always think, when is this going to end?”

Similarly, Juliana also hopes that their story sheds light on what it is like for families after they have been separated. “This whole concept of deportation isn’t new, but the separation of families is now coming to light,” she says. “People think that the deportation is the hardest part. But ‘the after’ is the hardest because you have to continue dealing with the deportation in ways that most people don’t see.”

Earlier this month, California Gov.Gavin Newson pardoned three men that had committed crimes as young adults, served their time, and were set to be deported to Cambodia or Vietnam. One of the men, Saman Pho, 44, of Oakland, served 12 years in prison. His case sparked a rally and a petition by the organization Asian Americans Advancing Justice.

Salazar says that while deportations have skyrocketed under the Trump administration, they were still happening under the Obama administration. “Of course, [President] Obama is better than Trump,” he notes. “But a lot of people have the misconception that immigration was better under Obama, but there were still a lot of people being deported straight from prison.” Salazar claims seeing people who were incarcerated for “petty crimes” being deported. Under Obama, a record 3 million people were deported.

Garcia Salazar doesn’t believe her husband’s case would have turned out differently if was released under Trump versus Obama. If fact, she would not have wanted to see her husband be transferred from prison to an immigration detention center to try and fight his case. “I would not want to see him go through that,” she says. “In a way, I’m glad that it went the way it did. At least I can call him whenever I want, and we can go and visit him.”

The family’s trips to Tijuana are not just to go see Salazar and spend time with him. The plane rides have been replaced by car rides. Whenever Garcia Salazar plans a trip, other family members besides her kids join in. The trunk of their SUV gets filled with donation bags—everything from clothes and toiletries to school supplies. Mother and daughter have teamed up with Border Angels, a non-profit that advocates for humane immigration reform through direct community engagement.

The donations are distributed among those who have been recently deported or are waiting for an asylum hearing in Tijuana. The donations they collect back home end up at Emmanuel Orphanage, also located in Tijuana. “Two years ago, Javier and I brought presents for the kids, and we spent Christmas with them,” Garcia Salazar recalls. They shared the story on social media and were able to raise $500, which they used for a dinner for the kids and to stock up the orphanage’s pantry.

The donations they collect are not limited to what they give to Border Angels or to the orphanage, the family is also aware of how poverty-stricken certain areas along the border are. “We make goodie bags and distribute them along the road when we are coming back home,” Garcia Salazar says. “Sure, there are people at the orphanage and shelters, but what about the people out on the streets? We don’t think about that.” It is this family’s selfless mentality of helping others—even as they deal with their own hardships—that has earned them love and respect from the Bay Area Latinx community.

For Juliana, while helping the less fortunate, talking about her family’s experience, launching her business to help other organizations that help immigrants, and juggling work and her college experience, it remains painful to share what her family is going through. “My hope is that there’s someone who can help us find a way to legally bring my dad back,” a tearful Juliana says. “I’m taking everything as it comes.”

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