ICE released Jossman in June. He\u2019s awaiting a hearing before an immigration judge who will rule on his asylum application in January.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s still trying to stay invisible, leaving his rented room only to work and attend Pastor Dianne Garc\u00eda\u2019s church. <\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260709-Undocumented-Families-JAJ-11-full.jpg\")
Jossman checks the mail at his apartment. He was arrested by state troopers in April while trying to send money to family in Venezuela. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n
![\"Jossman](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260709-Undocumented-Families-JAJ-08-fullA.jpg\")
Jossman shows his work tools outside his San Antonio apartment. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n
![\"Jossman](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260709-Undocumented-Families-JAJ-16-full.jpg\")
Jossman was released from detention and mostly stays in his rented room, leaving only to work and attend church. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n
Many other undocumented immigrants have done the same, becoming guarded and anxious: the sight of a police car pushes them to the edge. Some lost access to much needed financial aid, and now depend on a volunteer network for routine activities like running errands or going to the hospital. <\/p>\n
Lisa Diana, a 57-year-old volunteer, said she buys groceries for a family so afraid of ICE that they don\u2019t even let her in the house. For months she\u2019s been leaving the bags at their door, sending them a translated WhatsApp message and walking away. She\u2019s never seen their faces. <\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone here in the community is terrified. Everyone,\u201d said J., a 39-year-old Venezuelan woman who also attends Garc\u00eda\u2019s church. \u201cTry to do things right, although doing things right doesn\u2019t guarantee you anything \u2026 don\u2019t run a red light, don\u2019t go running around in the street, don\u2019t be out late at night. Go to work and then go straight home.\u201d<\/p>\n
At a news conference in San Antonio on Tuesday, U.S. Democratic Reps. Joaquin Castro of San Antonio and Greg Casar of Austin and state Rep. Trey Martinez Fisher<\/a> urged the Bexar County sheriff\u2019s office and other law enforcement agencies to end their partnerships with ICE to help enforce immigration laws because it\u2019s causing fear among residents.<\/p>\n \u201cSome students in San Antonio stop showing up at school. Folks are afraid to show up to their places of worship or even go to work,\u201d Castro said. \u201cBusinesses have lost employees. Some businesses have told me that either they\u2019ve shut down or they\u2019re on the verge of shutting down and going broke.\u201d<\/p>\n The July 7 fatal shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo<\/a>, a 52-year-old Mexican who had been in the country for over three decades, by ICE agents only intensified the fear.<\/a> <\/p>\n \u201cIt hit me deep in my soul,\u201d Jossman said, thinking of his own arrest. \u201cIf they had wanted to shoot me, they could have. And then all they would have had to say was, \u2018He tried to pull out a gun,\u2019 or something like that, and that would have been the end of it. It\u2019s our word against theirs. We\u2019re immigrants and they\u2019re the law here.\u201d <\/p>\n He said he misses the Texas he used to know, where neighbors helped him and he befriended people from all over the world. <\/p>\n Persistent fear \u201ccan become a habit, shaping our daily choices, relationships, rituals and behaviors,\u201d said Venus Gin\u00e9s, a former teacher of health literacy at Baylor College of Medicine and founder and CEO of Dia de la Mujer Latina, a company that promotes health in the Latino community. \u201cThe mind may begin to anticipate danger, influencing how people make decisions, whom they trust, and whether they seek care.\u201d<\/p>\n Yailyn, a 32-year-old Venezuelan whose husband spent eight months in a detention center, had to support their three daughters and pay for lawyers with her job at a restaurant.<\/p>\n \u201cI developed an abscess on my head. It kept getting bigger and bigger, and then another one came up, so I went to the doctor,\u201d who explained it was from stress, she said. \u201cIt would get itchy every time I get stressed, when the rent is due, when the bills come in, when everything comes in\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n For Garc\u00eda, the 46-year-old pastor, managing her anger is the hardest thing. She runs what she calls an \u201cimmigrant church\u201d \u2014 a shelter where neighbors go when they need a helping hand, and for most their only social lifeline, which she said has helped more than 150 ICE detainees so far. <\/p>\n \u201cMostly I feel angry at people who don\u2019t care and who don\u2019t even know that this is going on,\u201d Garc\u00eda said. \u201cMy biggest worry is that we\u2019ll be having a service and ICE will come here and take everyone away.\u201d <\/p>\n Like being in a horror film <\/p>\n Even before ICE hit San Antonio, Jennifer\u2019s life was never easy.<\/p>\n At 25 she had left her home in Honduras, fled the gangs, watched her daughters faint under the desert sun during the journey north and crossed the Rio Grande straight into the Border Patrol \u2014 which quickly returned them to Mexico nine times before they made it to San Antonio in 2022.<\/p>\n She said the father of her children became addicted to methamphetamines during the difficult one-year journey trying to enter the U.S., and would beat her. One night in San Antonio he got high and knocked their daughter unconscious. Jennifer called the police. He was arrested and deported. <\/p>\n Jennifer kept going, renting apartments when she was able to get cleaning jobs, living in shelters when they didn\u2019t. <\/p>\n After Trump\u2019s return to the White House, Jennifer said she felt like a character in a horror movie.<\/p>\n \u201cThere was a time when there was nobody at all in the streets. There was so much fear. Most of the people I knew didn\u2019t have jobs or anything to eat,\u201d she said. \u201cImagine: we couldn\u2019t go out because they were hunting us.\u201d<\/p>\n She said it hurts to see new empty seats at Garc\u00eda\u2019s church during Sunday services. <\/p>\n When ICE arrested her friend Yailyn\u2019s husband on his way to work during a traffic stop outside Austin, \u201cShe was traumatized. She couldn\u2019t even see a police car without crying and shaking,\u201d Jennifer said. \u201cShe would say to me, \u2018Jennifer, why do you go out? Aren\u2019t you scared?\u2019 <\/p>\n \u201cIt scares me \u2014 of course it scares me. But I know that, first of all, there is a God. And second, I have to work.\u201d<\/p>\n But other than working, she doesn\u2019t go out much. And since ICE began raiding the streets, jobs became harder to find. Jennifer\u2019s only able to work a couple days a week \u2014 enough to pay rent, not enough to afford anything else. So the family stays in.<\/p>\n Jennifer\u2019s 3-year-old son, born in Texas, is the only one in the family with a U.S. passport. Her 5- and 7-year-old daughters were born in Honduras like herself.<\/p>\n The lack of legal status had already left them without food stamps until Jennifer asked Garc\u00eda for help. The pastor was able to intervene and fix the problem. <\/p>\n Once all three children caught a bad fever and a nasty cough. At the hospital, she said doctors didn\u2019t want to treat her daughters because they didn\u2019t have papers. She had to call in the pastor again. <\/p>\n It took some convincing, she said, but eventually the doctors agreed to treat the children. <\/p>\n During her children\u2019s summer vacation, the four of them spent most time at home, watching TV or playing on their phones, with the blinds down. <\/p>\n She said sometimes when she\u2019s driving with her kids in the car, her oldest daughter tells her: \u201cMommy, drive carefully or the police will catch us.\u201d<\/p>\n Summer dresses and ankle monitors <\/p>\n It\u2019s been a while since J. has worn her summer dresses. <\/p>\n She\u2019s been camouflaging her ankle monitor with jeans since she was released along with her 3-year-old son from the Dilley detention center for families in January<\/a>. <\/p>\n She cannot take it off even to sleep, so she tosses and turns in bed, trying to find a position where she feels it as little as possible. During the day, she monitors the battery to make sure it never runs out \u2014 which would trigger an alert that could put her behind bars again. <\/p>\n \u201cWhen they released me it put me into a depression for a week. I felt like a criminal, like \u2018We\u2019re putting this on you so you behave,\u2019 \u201d said the 39-year-old Venezuelan, who arrived with her baby at the U.S. border and surrendered to the Border Patrol in Eagle Pass in 2023. They released her but required her to attend ICE check-ins while authorities reviewed her case. <\/p>\n She said she attended all her check-ins, worked hard cleaning houses and, in less than a year, had rented an apartment, bought herself a car, and established a good credit score. <\/p>\n ICE arrested her and her son in November during her annual check in. Until then, she didn\u2019t think the mass deportation campaign would target her \u2014 she felt she had done everything right under the law. <\/p>\n \u201cIn fact, when I was detained, everyone at church was saying, \u2018If they detained J., they\u2019re going to take all of us,\u2019 \u201d she said. \u201cPut yourself in God\u2019s hands, because ICE is out on the streets and you never know when it might be your turn.\u201d <\/p>\n The first week at Dilley she just cried. She couldn\u2019t sleep because the light was always on, and her son didn\u2019t eat for two days, she said. <\/p>\n \u201cThose two months felt to me like everything I had worked for over almost three years had come crashing down,\u201d she said. \u201cI kept thinking, \u2018My baby is so little, and he\u2019s already being detained.\u2019 I thank God he was still little because there were some older children there crying because they wanted to leave. That broke my heart.\u201d<\/p>\n ICE released her in January with a parole that allowed her to apply for a marriage-based green card without leaving the country. In February, she married her partner of two years, who is a U.S. citizen.<\/p>\n She said she didn\u2019t lose her home \u201cbecause, thank God, I had always paid (rent) ahead.\u201d <\/p>\n She went back to her job at a Tex-Mex restaurant, and never left home without her parole documents.<\/p>\n In August, a judge ordered her deportation despite her pending green card application. She\u2019s trying to save money to appeal. <\/p>\n She said she\u2019s used to her ankle monitor but she still misses summer dresses. <\/p>\n Staying in Texas<\/p>\n After his release from detention, Jossman went back to the $700 bedroom with a kitchen and bathroom that he rents with his partner in a manufactured home that\u2019s been divided to house four other families, in a San Antonio working class suburb.<\/p>\n Jossman said they\u2019d like to move \u2014 the ceiling is low, and the cheap materials don\u2019t insulate against the Texas heat.<\/p>\n He went right back to work because he needed the money, but his body struggles with the physical toll of construction work after two months of living in a cell. He said he drives home after his shift and spends the rest of his day calling his 16 children, scattered between Venezuela and Colombia. One of them is sick and the medical bills are mounting. <\/p>\n Jossman has a document showing his scheduled court appearance in January, so he\u2019s the one running errands since his partner is also undocumented. He drives her to work at a sandwich factory every day at 5:30 a.m., and picks her up again after her shift.<\/p>\n He said she only leaves their home to cash her paycheck, and talks about returning to Venezuela. <\/p>\n Jossman wants to stay in Texas and open his own business. He\u2019s picturing a trailer packed with his clown props, and performing for laughing kids. <\/p>\n Maybe one day, he says \u2014 when people like him are no longer a target. <\/p>\n Uriel J. Garcia contributed to this story.<\/p>\n Disclosure: The New York Times has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in The Texas Tribune\u2019s journalism. Find a complete\u00a0list of them here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Editor\u2019s note: The migrants in this story asked to be identified only by their first names or initials…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":405454,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[145,3647,51280,7913,82,27,29,28,6748],"class_list":["post-405453","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-donald-trump","tag-immigration-and-customs-enforcement","tag-photo-build","tag-photography","tag-san-antonio","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news","tag-well-b-homepage"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405453","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=405453"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405453\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/405454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=405453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=405453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=405453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260630-Roca-De-Refugio-JAJ-24-full.jpg\")
Pastor Dianne Garc\u00eda at her San Antonio church on June 30, 2026. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260630-Roca-De-Refugio-JAJ-21-full.jpg\")
Migrants and asylum seekers gather at the church, which has become a shelter for immigrants who need a helping hand, and for most their only social lifeline. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260630-Roca-De-Refugio-JAJ-07-full.jpg\")
Pastor Dianne Garcia runs what she calls an \u201cimmigrant church\u201d which she said has helped more than 150 ICE detainees so far. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260709-Undocumented-Families-JAJ-37-full.jpg\")
Jennifer washes dishes at her apartment in San Antonio. She left her home in Honduras with her daughters to avoid gang violence, she said, and crossed the Rio Grande in 2022. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260709-Undocumented-Families-JAJ-24-full.jpg\")
Jennifer says she and her children mostly stay home because of their fear of being arrested by ICE. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260709-Undocumented-Families-JAJ-39-full.jpg\")
Artwork by one of Jennifer\u2019s children on her refrigerator at their apartment in San Antonio. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260630-Roca-De-Refugio-JAJ-11-full.jpg\")
Jennifer sits in a pew at church in San Antonio. \u201cIt scares me \u2014 of course it scares me,\u201d she said of the ICE presence in the city. \u201cBut I know that, first of all, there is a God. And second, I have to work.\u201d Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260630-Roca-De-Refugio-JAJ-10-full.jpg\")
Bibles sit in the pews inside Garc\u00eda\u2019s church. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260630-Roca-De-Refugio-JAJ-23-full.jpg\")
A migrant from Venezuela wears an ankle monitor after being detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260630-Roca-De-Refugio-JAJ-09-full.jpg\")
Matt Stafford, a volunteer at the church. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/20260709-Undocumented-Families-JAJ-04-full.jpg\")
Jossman has said he\u2019d like to move from the room he rents with his partner in the back of a manufactured home in San Antonio. Joel Angel Juarez for The Texas Tribune<\/p>\n