Leidys Barrabi, a 25-year-old Cuban entrepreneur living in Miami, publicly revealed that she received a deportation order after four years of building her life in the United States, where she established a beauty salon from scratch and raised her daughter.
In an emotional video posted on June 27 on TikTok, Barrabi narrated the impact of the news in her own words: "I was in the process of building a successful salon in Miami, of creating a stable life for my daughter and my family, when I received this news. Now I don't know what will happen tomorrow, I don't know what the next chapter of my story will be."
Despite the setback, the young mother refused to give up and sent a message of determination: "Even though I don’t have all the answers today, I still believe that God is in control of my life, and I will continue to fight harder than ever because there is something greater than my fears: the desire to move forward and to build the best future for my daughter and my family."
Barrabi also acknowledged the emotional weight of living under such a threat: "Only emigrants who have gone through something similar know how difficult it is to live with this uncertainty."
The entrepreneur's post on Instagram surpassed 757,000 views, 49,000 likes, and 3,200 comments in less than 24 hours, receiving an avalanche of supportive and solidarity messages from the Cuban and Latin community.
From a legal standpoint, the order received by Barrabi is not necessarily final. He has the right to appeal to the Board of Immigration Appeals within 30 days, although the Department of Justice proposed in February 2026 to shorten that timeframe to 10 days.
It is essential that, in addition to appealing, you request a motion to suspend deportation, as the appeal alone does not automatically halt the process.
The case of Barrabi is set against a sustained tightening of immigration policies under the Trump administration: Miami recorded 12,599 arrests of immigrants from March 2025 to April 2026, accounting for 10% of the national total, and arrests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) of Cubans increased by 463% during that period.
More than 42,000 Cubans have active deportation orders in the United States, and in the first five months of 2026, 612 Cubans were deported in 18 operations from the country.
Similar cases have proliferated in recent months. Cuban mother Heydi Sánchez Tejeda was deported from Tampa in April 2025 during a routine appointment with ICE; Diana Fonseca opted for voluntary departure in May 2026 before her immigration hearing; and another Cuban mother voluntarily returned to Cuba after four years in the country out of fear of an ICE summons.
Barrabi asked her followers to join her in prayer for herself and for all emigrants in similar situations, expressing her wish to turn her content into a new way to support her family: "I would like to reach a thousand followers and turn this content into another way to support my family."
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