Free Republic

LOS FRESNOS, Texas — Leonardo Baez and Nora Avila-Guel’s bakery in the Texas community of Los Fresnos is a daily stop for many residents to share gossip over coffee and pick up cakes and pastries for birthdays, office parties or themselves. When Homeland Security Investigations agents showed up at Abby’s Bakery in February and arrested the owners and eight employees, residents of Los Fresnos were shocked. Abby’s Bakery doesn’t employ violent criminals and Baez and Avila-Guel are not the people who border czar Tom Homan calls the “worst of the worst” and says are the priority for mass deportations. “I...

When a couple from Colombia who was planning their wedding showed up for a check-in with U.S. immigration authorities, one was given his next appointment date. The other was detained and deported. Jhojan doesn’t know why Felipe was detained at the Feb. 5 appointment with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. But Jhojan was so worried after Felipe’s deportation that he didn’t show up for his next check-in a month later. Jhojan insisted The Associated Press withhold the couple’s last names, fearing retribution. He is among many people who now fear that once-routine immigration check-ins will be used...