Army sergeant's wife deported to Honduras amid immigration enforcement

The wife of an active-duty U.S. Army sergeant was deported to Honduras on Monday, according to her family and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Cristy Maryori Villafranca-Trejo is at least the seventh spouse or parent of an active-duty service member removed under the current administration's immigration enforcement push.

Villafranca-Trejo's husband, Army Sgt. Hedar Leonel Turcios Juarez, said she was detained on July 11 outside a Walmart near Fort Bliss, Texas, where he is stationed. Since her detention, he has been balancing military duties with caring for their 6-year-old daughter, including taking her to first grade in the mornings. He said he has already postponed a planned assignment at another base.

"I don't know if I will be able to continue with this," Turcios Juarez said of his Army career. "I have to make a plan to make sure I can still fulfill my military responsibilities — but also take care of my family."

DHS confirmed the deportation, stating Villafranca-Trejo had "received due process." She entered the U.S. in 2016 at age 18 and has no known criminal record. An immigration judge issued a final removal order in 2017 after she failed to appear at a hearing. Her husband said she never received notice of that hearing and only learned of the order when the couple applied for her green card after marrying in 2022.

Turcios Juarez, originally from Honduras, became a U.S. citizen in 2024 after enlisting two years earlier. Villafranca-Trejo's motion to reopen her case was denied in May, and an appeal before the Board of Immigration Appeals was still pending. She had also been waiting about a year for a decision on her application for military parole-in-place, a program allowing immediate family of troops to stay in the country while applying for a green card.

"We were following the rules — we did everything we could on our side to fix this problem," Turcios Juarez said.

Dan Gividen, who served as ICE deputy chief counsel from 2016 to 2019, said that under previous practice, immediate family members of troops with final removal orders were typically allowed to adjust status. "If you've got an active-duty military member that's married to someone now, and that's going to give her the opportunity to get a green card, you wouldn't detain them, much less execute the removal order," he said.

U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, a Democrat representing El Paso, opened a congressional inquiry into the case and visited Villafranca-Trejo at the Camp East Montana detention facility earlier this month. "My heart breaks for her, her children and the soldier who must feel so betrayed by the country he is sacrificing for," Escobar said in a statement. "There are far too many families like theirs who are being targeted instead of supported."

Turcios Juarez said he is unsure how he will care for his daughter without his wife and has not yet told her what happened. He said he still wants to serve. "I love what I do, I want to keep doing this," he said. "I just don't know how I am going to keep doing this."