For decades, Cuban immigrants in Florida believed they were different from other migrants.
Many arrived to open arms, benefiting from laws and policies that gave them easier access to legal residency and protection from deportation.
But under President Donald Trump’s second term, that reality has changed, fast.
Ron Filipkowski, a former federal prosecutor and Trump critic, summed up the community’s reaction in a post on X:
“I guess they thought they were special since the Cuban-American community largely supports Trump.”
According to the Cuban government, and as reported by The New York Times, more than 1,600 Cubans were deported in 2025.
That figure is double from 2024, and marks one of the highest annual Cuban deportation totals in recent history.
Some of those deported had lived in the U.S. for decades.
One case shocked the Cuban-American community. Heidy Sánchez, a 44-year-old home health aide and mother, showed up for a routine ICE check-in in Tampa in April 2025.
She brought her 17-month-old daughter, who was still breastfeeding.
Instead of being cleared to leave, she was detained on the spot. Two days later, she was deported back to Cuba.
The story spread fast on social media, partly because Sánchez was Cuban.
In Florida, where Cuban Americans have historically received special treatment, her removal felt like a wake-up call.
“We were welcomed into the country,” said Alicia Peláez, 78, who came to the U.S. alone in 1960 as part of Operation Pedro Pan.
“Now, it’s the complete opposite.”
End of Special Treatment
Trump’s policy shift has hit the Cuban community hard. Regular deportation flights to Cuba restarted in 2023 after a pandemic pause.
Even Cubans with work permits, Social Security numbers, and pending asylum cases are now facing removal.
Those caught up include people like Javier González, a 36-year-old HVAC technician and political dissident who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border with his wife in 2022.
Though he holds a work permit and is awaiting an asylum hearing in 2028, he’s now scared to go to the grocery store.
“Sometimes I tell myself, ‘Why do you have to feel as if you were a criminal when you are an upstanding person?'” he said.
“They can grab you and do whatever they want.”
Many of these immigrants came in under “conditional parole,” a status that excludes them from applying for permanent residency through the 1966 Cuban Adjustment Act.
That leaves them in legal limbo and increasingly vulnerable.
To make matters worse, Trump has halted all Cuban immigration case processing, including naturalization, residency, and asylum applications.
He’s also enacted a travel ban affecting Cuba and eliminated a family reunification program.
“It’s the most sweeping rollback of Cuban migration channels since the Cold War,” said María José Espinosa, executive director of the Center for Engagement and Advocacy in the Americas.
Detention and Protest
Many Cubans are now being detained in Florida facilities for weeks or months, including one known as “Alligator Alcatraz” in the Everglades.
In June, detainees at another facility protested by spelling out “SOS” with their bodies and writing “SOS Cuba” on their clothes.
These images shook a community that had long felt immune to immigration enforcement.
Little Havana, Ybor City, and other Cuban-American neighborhoods are now filled with fear.
As historian Michael J. Bustamante of the University of Miami noted, while most Cuban American voters still support Trump, he’s noticed “a growing amount of unease” across the community.
Family Separation and Trauma
Heidy Sánchez’s story shows how quickly lives can be upended. After arriving at the U.S. border and waiting in Mexico, she missed a court hearing due to safety concerns.
That resulted in a deportation order and nine months in detention before she was eventually released in Florida.
She studied, became a nursing assistant, married a U.S. citizen, and had a daughter through fertility treatment. They even bought a home.
Then she was taken away. Her daughter, now in Tampa with her father, changed emotionally after the separation.
“She didn’t laugh anymore, which really worried us,” Sánchez said from Havana, where she awaits a visa interview to try and return.
Many Cuban Americans believed their longstanding support for Trump would protect them from immigration crackdowns.
But today, even longtime residents are realizing that the rules have changed, and no one is exempt.