Nayra Guzmán was arrested 15 days after her daughter’s tough delivery. Earlier than Trump took workplace, postpartum immigrants had been not often detained by ICE.
By Mel Leonor Barclay and Shefali Luthra for The nineteenth
Nayra Guzmán knew there was one thing mistaken along with her daughter inside hours of her delivery — a protracted and complex supply that included a analysis of preeclampsia and resulted in a Cesarean part. Within the haze of restoration, the first-time mother observed her daughter was struggling to breathe. When the infant began turning blue, Guzmán watched as medical doctors whisked her away to the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).
Within the days that adopted, the 22-year-old’s sole focus was her daughter’s restoration, at the same time as their dwelling, the higher Chicago space, turned the newest goal of President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda in a marketing campaign titled Operation Halfway Blitz.
“We weren’t worried about the immigration raids,” stated Guzmán, an immigrant from Mexico who has a pending petition for asylum and a pending software for a visa for victims of crime. “Our worry was, ‘How are we going to get this baby home and out of the hospital?’ That was our number one priority, that she would be safe and healthy, and everything else had fallen to the background.”
That modified on the morning of Monday, October 20. Simply 15 days after her daughter’s delivery, as Guzmán, her mother and youthful brother loaded into their automotive for his or her each day drive to the NICU, they had been surrounded by immigration enforcement brokers and whisked away to detention.
Since Trump took workplace in January, the administration has deserted Division of Homeland Safety insurance policies limiting the arrest and detention of immigrants who’ve not too long ago given delivery, are pregnant or are nursing. In consequence, the administration has taken into custody immigrants like Guzmán, who’re medically susceptible and whose detention threatens not solely their very own well being but in addition that of their new child kids — usually U.S. residents — by depriving them of early bonding helpful to a child’s lifelong wellbeing.
Nayra Guzmán holds paperwork stating that she was detained by immigration officers and launched on November 24, 2025, in Cicero, Illinois. This picture has been edited to guard her privateness.
The administration’s sudden growth of immigration arrests in Chicago meant Guzmán was within the authorities’s custody for about 34 hours. She was stored in a holding facility that was supposed to accommodate individuals for less than a small fraction of that point — one which has come below intense scrutiny amid allegations of overcrowding, unsanitary situations and restricted medical care. Though she was nonetheless attempting to provide breast milk for her daughter, Guzmán had restricted entry to meals and water on the Broadview Processing Middle and was by no means supplied a breast pump. She stated she was by no means assessed by a medical skilled whereas within the authorities’s custody. Guzmán was left to handle the ache of her C-section restoration in addition to her Kind 1 diabetes with the provides she had in her backpack on the time of her arrest.
ICE didn’t reply to a request for touch upon Guzmán’s detention or the final situations at Broadview for immigrants who’ve not too long ago given delivery.
Medical professionals say the situations of many detention services — crowded, soiled and with inconsistent entry to well being care, meals and water — are a menace to most individuals’s well being. They pose significantly acute issues for people who find themselves nonetheless navigating the bodily and psychological weight of postpartum restoration like Guzmán.
Nayra Guzmán reveals her steady glucose monitor on her arm on November 24, 2025, in Cicero, Illinois. She was detained whereas recovering from a C-section and managing Kind 1 diabetes.
Now, because the administration expands its immigration enforcement marketing campaign, exporting its Chicago technique to Charlotte and New Orleans, Guzmán’s case presents a uncommon window into detention for pregnant and postpartum immigrants. Guzmán can also be among the many rising variety of immigrants who’re being detained regardless of having no prison document, even because the administration insists its immigration enforcement agenda targets criminals and individuals who pose a security menace to the nation.
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The household had completed breakfast and was loading into the automotive with some urgency. Guzmán’s daughter was nonetheless within the NICU, unable to eat or breathe independently. The medical doctors had deliberate a gathering to assessment the infant’s prognosis and care plans — and Guzmán additionally wished to be there for her daughter’s midday feeding.
As Guzmán went to buckle her seatbelt, she regarded out the window and observed they had been surrounded. By the look of the white SUVs, Guzmán stated, the household knew instantly that they had been being detained by immigration brokers.
Guzmán remembers the brokers asking the place they had been born and what paperwork they may present. The household, who arrived within the nation three years in the past, confirmed the brokers their work permits and defined their pending asylum software. The household additionally defined that they had been on their technique to the NICU, and an agent approached Guzmán to ask how lengthy it had been for the reason that delivery. With that data, they didn’t handcuff her as she was being detained.
Guzmán requested if she might please name the hospital to allow them to know she wouldn’t be coming in that day. Guzmán remembers an agent saying she’d have to speak about that with a choose, who would resolve whether or not she could be launched or return to Mexico. The brokers defined that after processing, she’d probably be going to a longer-term detention facility in Kentucky.
Nayra Guzmán’s brother and mom make breakfast of their kitchen on November 24, 2025, in Cicero, Illinois. The household had been getting ready to drive to the NICU after they had been detained.
“In that moment, I just felt fear,” Guzmán stated. “I thought, ‘The government is going to take custody of my daughter. I’m going to be in detention and I won’t be able to do anything for my daughter.’ If my daughter isn’t recovering with me there, I thought, then much less so if I’m arrested.”
As much as that time, Guzmán stated the ache and problem of her personal restoration had been overshadowed by her daughter’s. When she was along with her, all of it light away. As she was being detained, it got here into focus.
Guzmán’s C-section incision was throbbing on the experience to Broadview. The agent behind the wheel was driving quick over potholes, she stated, regardless of pleas from her brother that Guzmán was in a fragile state following her surgical procedure, which concerned slicing by means of seven layers of tissue.
“How is it possible that I’m going all the way to Kentucky, in this state, six hours away? My scar is burning. I’m supposed to be resting,” she thought.
As soon as she arrived at Broadview, Guzmán stated, she was taken to a room and examined by two immigration brokers. They requested Guzmán to clarify how her insulin pump and monitor labored and what drugs she had in her backpack. One agent requested Guzmán to take off her stomach binder, a stretchy garment that helps the stomach after surgical procedure. She declined, explaining that with out it, she’d have a tough time managing the ache.
“I overheard another agent say, ‘Leave it. They’ll take it at the detention center,’” Guzmán recalled.
Finally, she was transferred to a holding cell for girls alongside her mother. They got water and a sandwich at round 3 p.m., Guzmán stated, her first meal since they had been detained round 10 a.m.
The one locations for relaxation contained in the holding cell had been small benches. Guzmán spent the evening on one with no blanket or something however what she had on her physique.
“It was really uncomfortable. I was wearing two layers of leggings, two layers of socks, my sweatshirt, and I was still freezing,” Guzmán stated. “Once I was laying down, I couldn’t really move because of the pain. And then I started to feel cramping in my uterus.”
C-section restoration usually entails six to eight weeks of relaxation, mild motion, wound care and ache administration. At a minimal, sufferers solely 15 days out from a C-section require a mattress, entry to a breast pump, clear water and a sanitary restroom to alter menstrual pads, stated Dr. Beth Cronin, an OB-GYN in Rhode Island and chair of the American School of Obstetricians and Gynecology’s Committee of Advancing Fairness in Obstetric and Gynecologic Well being Care. They want entry to a bathe, and so they want additional meals — particularly if they’re breastfeeding.
“Those are medical necessities. You would never take anybody else who just had major surgery and give them a bench,” Cronin stated upon studying about Guzmán’s case. The chance of an infection is heightened for sufferers with Kind 1 diabetes, she added.
Guzmán’s detention was made harder by the truth that she was held in a brief ICE processing facility missing the providers of longer-term detention facilities.
Nayra Guzmán at dwelling on November 24, 2025, in Cicero, Illinois. She was recovering from a C-section whereas navigating her daughter’s NICU care and the aftermath of her detention.
In a class-action go well with filed October 30, 9 days after Guzmán’s launch, individuals who had been detained at Broadview described overcrowded and soiled cells; restricted meals and water; no entry to showers, cleaning soap or menstrual provides; insufficient medical care; and freezing situations at evening. A number of individuals with diabetes stated they got solely a sandwich at each meal, although bread may cause blood sugar spikes. Days later, a choose stated he discovered the accounts “highly credible,” and described the situations as “unnecessarily cruel.”
In one other case, filed by a nursing girl detained October 30 and launched a day later, authorities officers conceded that they weren’t conscious of any lodging at Broadview — similar to a lactation room or breast pump — that may permit detained immigrants to precise breast milk.
