“She’s like the glue that keeps us all together,” said her brother. “Every happy event we have, we can’t imagine ourselves without her”
A DACA recipient and nursing aide who volunteered to help save lives in New York during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic has been detained for months and is at threat of deportation despite holding current protections valid through 2027, Spectrum News 1 reports.
Yenniffer England, a 32-year-old nursing professional who has called the U.S. her home since she was just four, was on her way to dinner with her brother and daughter this past February when she was targeted and pulled over by a Texas Department of Public Safety state trooper. “The Mexican national had an expired driver’s license and was taken to jail after the traffic stop,” Spectrum News 1 reported. But Texas State Rep. Armando Martinez said “England has constantly done everything required of DACA recipients, and that minor traffic and legal infractions are not reason enough for an arrest,” KRGV reports.
England, a mother of two U.S. citizens, is now separated from her family and could be deported to a country she hasn’t known as home for nearly three decades over a traffic violation that has resulted in a simple citation for other Americans. Her supporters gathered outside a privately-operated detention center in Raymondville, Texas, last week to rally for her release.
“She’s like the glue that keeps us all together,” her brother, Fransisco De La Rosa, said outside the MTC-operated El Valle Detention Center. “Every happy event we have, we can’t imagine ourselves without her.”
England deserves to be with her family, and the promise that the federal government made to DACA recipients – that they would be protected if they submitted their information, paid their fees, and followed the rules – should have ensured that. But the Trump administration has broken that promise, detaining or deporting hundreds of Dreamers since January 2025. DACA recipient Maria de Jesus Estrada Juárez was detained and deported this past February in “flagrant violation” of her protections. The mom won her return home the following month. Last month, the federal government agreed to let deported DACA recipient José Contreras Díaz return back home to his family – only to detain him for a second time. He was finally freed late last week.
But neither have the peace of mind they deserve. Estrada Juárez is “appealing the denial of her green card application” and worried “about what the next appointment might bring,” Mother Jones reported. Meanwhile, the administration has made clear it intends to keep targeting Contreras Díaz. “The end result will be the same — he will not be able to remain in the U.S,” said an unnamed Department of Homeland Security spokesperson.
As we noted last week, the administration has been subjecting DACA to death by a thousand cuts, including by issuing an immigration court ruling that makes it easier to kick out young immigrants like Yenniffer, Maria, and José, as well as slow-walking DACA renewals so that these breadwinners not only become vulnerable to family separation, but also lose their ability to legally work to support their loved ones even if mass deportation agents haven’t detained them.
Like Yenniffer, Ariel – whose real name is being withheld to protect her from government retaliation – is another essential healthcare worker at risk of losing everything she’s worked to achieve. She’s among DACA recipients who risk falling out of status due to lengthy renewal delays, Mission Local reports. The San Francisco nurse filed her paperwork more than four months ahead of her April deadline. But even that wasn’t enough time.
“When her DACA status expired on April 15, Kaiser gave her 30 days of unpaid leave,” Mission Local reported. “Now, as the May 15 end of the unpaid leave approaches, it appears that she will lose her job and the promotion she had been training for.” Despite calling the U.S. her home for more than three decades, putting herself through medical school, and spending months training to co-lead her unit, Ariel is now exploring whether to leave America entirely.
Not only would she be forced to uproot her life, the patients who depend on her care and expertise will feel the impact too, her colleagues and advocates said.
“Perioperative nursing shortages are already impacting access to care,” Elizabeth Lancaster, vascular surgeon at Kaiser, wrote in one letter of support. “The absence of this single, highly trained clinician has real consequences for surgical capacity and patient care continuity.” Sydney Simpson, a fellow nurse at Kaiser and union representative, plainly stated that “patients are going to suffer.”
While Simpson expressed frustration with Kaiser’s internal policies making it difficult for Ariel to keep working while her status is in limbo, it’s federal delays that are the root cause of this dilemma affecting healthcare workers and patients. But instead of prioritizing resolution of this issue so that Dreamers can continue caring for patients, the administration is demanding more money for mass deportation and $1 billion in taxpayer funds to help fund a ballroom instead.
Back in Texas, Yenniffer’s recent court hearing did not result in her release from El Valle Detention Center, as her advocates had been hoping. Her continued detention meant that she spent Mother’s Day separated from her U.S. citizen children. So did many other mothers. “According to the Migration Policy Institute (MPI), detention levels have surged to historic highs, with roughly 61,000 individuals in custody in late 2025, and approximately 40% of them were women,” as Dr. Maia Niguel Hoskin wrote in February. While it’s unclear exactly how many mothers make up that percentage, the federal government’s reopening of a notorious migrant family jail in Dilley, Texas, has resulted in the detention of more than 5,600 parents and children, Human Rights First said last month.
LUPE said that Yenniffer’s next court date is set for May 19 and that her supporters will not stop until the mother is free. “The fight to bring her home continues,” the organization wrote.
