Bradley Bartell and Camila Muñoz had a simple, small-town love story, until immigration politics turned their lives upside down.
They met through friends, went on a first date to a local steakhouse, got married after two years, and dreamed of buying a house and starting a family. Muñoz had already been taking care of Bartell’s 12-year-old son like her own.
But everything changed when they were on their way home to Wisconsin after their honeymoon in Puerto Rico. At the airport, immigration agents pulled Muñoz aside.
“Are you an American citizen?” they asked. Muñoz said no, she wasn’t. She’s from Peru, but she and Bartell had been taking the necessary steps for her to one day become a U.S. citizen.
Like millions of other Americans, including Bartell, he had voted for President Trump’s promise to crack down on “criminal illegal immigrants.” But now, eight weeks into the mass deportation efforts, even immigrants who are waiting for approval of their legal status are being detained. This includes those married or engaged to U.S. citizens.
As USA TODAY reports, Muñoz was one of the people taken into custody, alongside others from Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.
Nora Ahmed, legal director of the ACLU of Louisiana, warned that immigrants in legal limbo need to be cautious if they plan to travel. “If you are not a citizen of the United States, and you are going through an immigration process, your first thought needs to be: How can this process be weaponized against me?” she said.
David Rozas, Muñoz’s immigration lawyer, agreed: “Anyone who isn’t a legal permanent resident or U.S. citizen is at risk – period.”
Bartell and Muñoz were confident about their situation. They wore their wedding rings and believed they were doing everything right. Muñoz had overstayed her visa but had been working legally with a W-2, paying taxes, and was going through the process of applying for a green card.
But when agents took Muñoz away, she was terrified. She quickly removed her wedding ring, afraid it might be taken. She handed it to Bartell before they pulled her out of the airport.
Bartell stood there in shock, thinking, “What the f— do I do?”
Overstaying a visa is usually considered a minor issue, not a criminal offense. Immigration lawyers say it can sometimes be forgiven if a U.S. citizen spouse is involved, but it could also result in a 10-year ban from returning to the U.S. The government has the power to detain anyone, even if their application is in progress.
Karoline Leavitt, White House press secretary, said, “If an individual is overstaying their visa, they are therefore an illegal immigrant residing in this country, and they are subject to deportation.”
But Bartell didn’t see it that way. He didn’t view Muñoz as one of the “illegals” that President Trump promised to deport. He saw her as the woman he met in Wisconsin Dells, who came here legally on a work-study visa. They went through all the paperwork to apply for her legal residency.
Muñoz had come to Wisconsin Dells in 2019 as part of a work-study program while studying human resources management in Peru. She worked at a water park, but when the pandemic hit, she couldn’t get back home and ended up overstaying her visa. She continued working locally, doing farm work and food service jobs, and then met Bartell.
They connected over dinner, and it didn’t take long for both of them to realize they were looking for something serious. They married, and their life together seemed simple and steady.
But now, immigration enforcement has become more aggressive, with ICE expanding its efforts to include more immigrants, even those who don’t fit the profile of the so-called “criminals” the administration promised to target.
Jesse Franzblau, senior policy analyst for the National Immigrant Justice Center, said, “ICE is really widening the net in a really chilling way in terms of who they are going after.”
After Muñoz was detained at the airport, it took Bartell days to find her. She wasn’t listed in the ICE system until nearly a week later, when her name showed up at a privately run detention center in Louisiana.
On a video call, Muñoz looked tired, wearing a tan uniform. She sat in a crowded dormitory with nearly 80 other women. Bartell was deeply concerned for her well-being, both emotionally and physically. “It can’t be easy being trapped in a room with 100 other people,” he said. “They don’t have anything in there. It’s just so wasteful.”
They stay in touch through expensive phone calls, but Muñoz is constantly worried about Bartell’s son and whether he’s eating well or missing her cooking. Meanwhile, the couple’s savings for a house are now being used to pay legal fees and attempt to get her released on bond.
Bartell can’t stop thinking about how his vote for Trump led to this moment.
“I knew they were cracking down,” he said. “I guess I didn’t know how it was going down.”
He thought the government would focus on people who crossed the border illegally, not someone like Muñoz, who had been vetted and followed the rules.
“They know who she is and where she came from,” he said. “They need to get the vetting done and not keep these people locked up. It doesn’t make any sense.”
