MIAMI — Two mothers eager for a family reunion sat with their toddlers on Thursday in Miami to talk about their nightmare in hopes of finding a solution.
Their husbands were deported to Venezuela. They couldn’t afford to stay in the U.S. without them, so they opted to self-deport.
Once at Miami International Airport, the airlines did not allow them to board their flights to Venezuela. Without travel documents, they needed a safety pass.
“Oh my God! I almost wanted to die,” Yelitza Pérez, the 29-year-old mother of two girls, said.
The mothers and their children, including babies, were part of a group of Venezuelan migrants who spent a few nights sleeping at MIA.
The only way the airlines would allow them to fly to Venezuela was if they were able to get a pass or “salvoconducto” from a Venezuelan consulate or embassy, but those were closed in 2019.
“I sat with my children to cry,” a mother, who asked to be referred to as Jennifer, said.
Jennifer said she reached out to U.S. Customs and Border Protection to explain her dilemma, and a representative said they couldn’t help her.
“They couldn’t help me without a passport,” Jennifer said.
Jennifer reached out to a stranger on TikTok, who promised to help her in exchange for cash. The opportunistic fraudster stole her $520.
Miami-based nonprofit Hermanos De La Calle helped the vulnerable Venezuelans to get a place to stay and food while they remained stuck in a hopeless limbo.
Homeland Security has yet to respond to a request for information about the cases. A spokesperson for U.S. Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar said she and her team were trying to find solutions.
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