Immigrants who are arrested for being here illegally sometimes lose their children as a result. The New York Times profiles the case of Encarnación Bail Romero who was arrested as part of a raid of a poultry processing plant in Butterfield, Missouri.
Because she had false identification, she was sentenced to prison.
And because she was in prison, she was deemed an unfit parent for her infant child — guilty of “abandonment.”
At the time of the raid, the child, Carlos, was six months old. He went to live with aunts, but they soon decided they couldn’t care for him.

The aide visited her in jail to say that an American couple was interested in adopting her son. The couple had land and a beautiful house, Ms. Bail recalled being told, and had become very fond of Carlos.
“My parents were poor, and they never gave me to anyone,” Ms. Bail recalled. “I was not going to give my son to anyone either.”

There are disputes over whether Bail tried hard enough, or had proper representation (she had a public defender for a while but he was pulled from the case after he pleaded guilty to domestic violence charges, though he was no doubt an outstanding attorney).
A lawyer for adopting couple argues that Bail has had plenty of chance to get her child back. “We afforded her more due process than most people get who speak English,” Joseph L.Hensley said. (Anyone want to unpack that sentence for me?)
The first priority in a situation like this should be the child. It would have been infinitely better for him if the woman and child had both been deported. In effect, we’ve created a situation where the punishment for working at a poultry plant illegally, and having a false ID, is losing your child. That’s cruel to the mother, and, more important, to the child.