A hero served our country and was deported, but after twenty-three long years, he was permitted to come back to the United States. Luis, a United States army veteran, was deported to Nicaragua due to a substance-related conviction that he attributes to his depression and PTSD. Luis suffered from an unimaginable amount of trauma and hardships during his time serving our country, and his mental health began deteriorating, leading him to look to cocaine for temporary relief from his shattered emotional state. After spending time in solitary confinement and then being sent to an immigration jail with terrible conditions, he was deported. Veterans should be provided with the proper mental and physical health treatments they require after their military services, and deportation should not be the answer.
Luis is not the only veteran that was deported as countless American military veterans have been removed from the United States despite serving our country. Fortunately, the Biden administration is trying to grant these deported veterans an opportunity to come back to this country as being deported after being deployed and spending years defending the freedom of our people is not right. Luis’s story, similar to others undergoing the same situation, gives hope to other veterans that are suffering from alike circumstances.
