Cicero, Illinois —
The Sunday morning dawned clear and blue, a perfect day for a birthday celebration. The Enciso family split up in their Chicago suburb – the parents and the eldest son were stopping at a store and then getting breakfast, while the older sister took her siblings to a donut shop for her little brother’s birthday treat.
A cheerful day changed suddenly when their parents were taken into custody by immigration authorities on September 14, leaving Moises Enciso Jr., his sister Yurithsi Enciso and their younger siblings to pick up the pieces.
It’s been over a month, but for the children of Constantina Ramirez and Moises Enciso, immigrants who came to the United States from Mexico about 18 years ago, it feels like it happened yesterday.
As tensions across the country escalate between federal officers enforcing the Trump administration’s immigration hardline and demonstrators fighting the crackdown, the plight of the Enciso children offers a glimpse at the upheaval faced by those left behind.
The family’s home in Cicero, less than 10 miles outside Chicago, is eerily dark and still these days, according to the two eldest children. At the dinner table, two chairs are always empty. Gone is the music their mother played as she tidied up around the home.
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