Jose Serrano is an active-duty U.S. Army sergeant who has served in the Army for 27 years, including several in Afghanistan. He said ICE lost control after his wife, Deisy Rivera Ortega, who was born in El Salvador, was detained by ICE in Texas on April 14. Ortega was making an appointment at the El Paso immigration office when he was arrested.Ortega came to the United States in 2016 and received legal protection in 2019, CBS News reported. Ortega cannot be deported to El Salvador due to legal protections, but the government told Serrano, 51, that his wife could be deported to Mexico. “I really don’t understand why, because she was abiding by T immigration rules from day one,” Serrano said, adding that his wife had a valid work permit at the time of her arrest.“I love the Army. The Army has helped me for almost 28 years. It’s not the Army, sir. It’s ICE,” Serrano said in an interview with CBS. “ICE is now out of control and taking away the rights we have as soldiers.”Serrano was born in Puerto Rico and the two married in 2022. Last year, he also filed on behalf of his wife for parole, a special program that provides deportation protections to military spouses or parents without legal status in the United States, but the case remains pending. The wife’s military identification card lists her as the spouse of an active-duty Army soldier. U.S. service members cannot travel to Mexico. If Ortega is deported to a Mexico she doesn’t know, Serrano will have to leave his military career or leave his wife. He suffered from traumatic brain injury, post-traumatic stress disorder and depression, and his mental health deteriorated after his wife was arrested because he had not been sleeping.
Homeland Security says Ortega is an illegal immigrant
The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement to CBS News that Ortega was ordered deported in 2019 after receiving full due process. The department called her a “criminal illegal alien” and said she had been convicted of illegally entering the United States.