WESLACO, Texas (AP) \u2014 These days, Juanita says a prayer every time she steps off the driveway of her modest rural home.<\/p>\n
The 41-year-old mother, who crossed into the United States from Mexico more than two decades ago and married an American carpenter, fears federal agents may be on the hunt for her.<\/p>\n
As she was about to leave for the pharmacy late last month, her husband called with a frantic warning: Immigration enforcement officers were swarming the store\u2019s parking lot. Juanita, who is prediabetic, skipped filling medications that treat her nutrient deficiencies. She also couldn\u2019t risk being detained because she has to care for her 17-year-old daughter, who has Down syndrome.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf I am caught, who\u2019s going to help my daughter?\u201d Juanita asks in Spanish, through an interpreter. Some people quoted in this story insisted that The Associated Press publish only their first names because of concerns over their immigration status.<\/p>\n
As the Trump administration intensifies deportation activity around the country, some immigrants \u2014 including many who have lived in Texas\u2019s southern tip for decades \u2014 are unwilling to leave their homes, even for necessary medical care.<\/p>\n
Tucked behind the freeway strip malls, roadside taquerias and vast citrus groves that span this 160-mile stretch of the Rio Grande Valley are people like Juanita, who need critical medical care in one of the nation\u2019s poorest and unhealthiest regions. For generations, Mexican families have harmoniously settled \u2014 some legally, some not \u2014 in this predominately Latino community where immigration status was once hardly top of mind.<\/p>\n
A \u2018very dangerous situation\u2019<\/p>\n
Deportations and tougher restrictions will come with consequences, says Mark Krikorian, the director of the Center for Immigration Studies, a think tank that favors restrictive immigration policies.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe shouldn\u2019t have let it get out of hand the way we did,\u201d Krikorian says of the previous administration\u2019s immigration policies. \u201cSome businesses are going to have difficulties. Some communities are going to face difficulties.\u201d<\/p>\n
Federal agents\u2019 raids began reaching deeper into everyday life across the Rio Grande Valley in June, just as the area\u2019s 1.4 million residents began their summer ritual of enduring the suffocating heat.<\/p>\n
This working-class stretch of Texas solidly backed Trump<\/a> in the 2024 election, despite campaign promises to ruthlessly pursue mass deportations. People here, who once moved regularly from the U.S. to Mexico to visit relatives or get cheap dental care, say they didn\u2019t realize his deportation campaign would focus on their neighbors.<\/p>\n Immigrants are staying shut inside their mobiles homes and shacks that make up the \u201ccolonias,\u201d zoning-free neighborhoods that sometimes don\u2019t have access to running water or electricity, says Sandra de la Cruz-Yarrison, who runs the Holy Family Services, Inc. clinic in Weslaco, Texas.<\/p>\n \u201cPeople are not going to risk it,\u201d de la Cruz-Yarrison says. \u201cPeople are being stripped from their families.\u201d<\/p>\n Yet people here are among the most medically needy in the country.<\/p>\n As much as a third of the population<\/a> doesn\u2019t have health insurance to cover those ailments. And a quarter of people live in poverty, more than double the national average.<\/p>\n Now, many in this region are on a path to develop worse health outcomes as they skip doctor appointments out of fear, says Dr. Stanley Fisch, a pediatrician who helped open Driscoll Children\u2019s Hospital in the region last year.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve always had, unfortunately, people who have gone with untreated diabetes for a long time and now it\u2019s compounded with these other issues at the moment,\u201d Fisch says. \u201cThis is a very dangerous situation for people. The population is suffering accordingly.\u201d<\/p>\n Trepidations about going to clinics are spreading<\/p>\n Elvia was the unlucky \u2014 and unsuspecting \u2014 patient who sat down for the finger prick the clinic offers everyone during its monthly educational meeting for community members. As blood oozed out of her finger, the monitor registered a 194 glucose level, indicating she is prediabetic.<\/p>\n She balked at the idea of writing down her address for regular care at Holy Family Services\u2019 clinic. Nor did she want to enroll in Medicaid, the federal and state funded program that provides health care coverage to the poorest Americans. Although she is a legal resident, some people living in her house do not have legal status.<\/p>\n Fewer people have come to Holy Family Services\u2019 clinic with coverage in recent months, says billing coordinator Elizabeth Reta. Over decades, the clinic\u2019s midwifery staff has helped birth thousands of babies in bathtubs or on cozy beds in birthing houses situated throughout the campus. But now, Reta says, some parents are too scared to sign those children up for health insurance because they do not want to share too much information with the government.<\/p>\n \u201cEven people I personally know that used to have Medicaid for their children that were born here \u2014 that are legally here, but the parents are not \u2014 they stopped requesting Medicaid,\u201d Reta says.<\/p>\n Their worry is well-founded.<\/p>\n An Associated Press investigation last week revealed<\/a> that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have gained access to personal health data \u2014 including addresses \u2014 of the nation\u2019s 79 million Medicaid and Children\u2019s Health Insurance Program enrollees. The disclosure will allow ICE officials to receive \u201cidentity and location information of aliens,\u201d documents obtained by the AP say.<\/p>\n