More than a year after being deported to Cuba and separated from her young daughter in Florida, Heidy Sánchez Tejeda still cannot return to the United States, despite her husband's family petition being approved in June 2025.
"It's been a year. I have given interviews to all the networks in the world. All of them. And nothing has happened!" the Cuban woman shared in the report Náufragos en La Habana, published by El Faro, a Central American media outlet specializing in investigative and in-depth journalism, which was founded in El Salvador in 1998 and was the first native internet newspaper in Latin America.
The work of El Faro found Heidy in San José de las Lajas, Mayabeque, where she currently resides. When the journalists visited her, her daughter was temporarily with her in Cuba. The girl had traveled accompanied by her paternal grandmother and was to return a few days later to the United States, where she usually lives with her father.
Heidy remains separated from her husband, Carlos Yuniel Valle, a Cuban naturalized American who resides in Florida and whom she married in January 2022.
The Cuban woman stated that she continues to try to move forward in the process that would allow her to reunite with her family permanently.
"The family reunification request is already approved. What’s going on? I went to the office. I went to the embassy. They are asking me for evidence of my relationship with Carlos," she explained.
Heidy showed El Faro a folder with photographs and documents that trace the history of the couple: from their courtship and marriage to the pregnancy, ultrasounds, and the birth of their daughter.
"They're asking me to provide evidence of the relationship again; they didn't want to see that. I'm already tired of so many interviews and documents. And nothing happens! A year has gone by, and there's no response," she lamented.
A separation that began in April 2025
The case of Heidy was widely followed by CiberCuba since April 2025.
The Cuban woman had arrived in the United States in 2019 and was under immigration supervision with an I-220B form and a deportation order. In the meantime, she had built her life in Florida, where she married Valle and had her daughter through an in vitro fertilization process.
On April 24, 2025, Heidy was deported to Cuba after being in ICE custody during an immigration appointment in Tampa. Her husband and daughter remained in the United States.
The little girl was about a year and a half old at that time and was still being breastfed by her mother, according to the testimonies published at that moment and the new account provided by Heidy.
In her conversation with El Faro, the Cuban woman recalled the moment when the agents informed her that she would be deported.
"Then they told me: 'You are in the custody of ICE. The girl is American, she will leave, but you will stay; you are being deported to Cuba.' That's how it was," he recounted.
According to her testimony, the separation occurred immediately, and she wasn't even able to meet with her husband afterward.
"It feels horrible. At that moment, my world came crashing down, my soul felt like it left my body. Having to separate from the little girl, who was a year and a half old," he recalled.
The approval that opened a door of hope
In June 2025, what seemed to be good news for the family arrived: the family petition submitted by Carlos for his wife was approved.
That approval was merely the first step in a much longer process and did not mean that Heidy could return to the United States immediately.
The Cuban herself explained days later that she still did not have a visa and needed to continue the consular process, attend an interview, and process the necessary immigration waivers.
"I am not in the United States yet, I am in Cuba waiting for this to progress," Heidy said in June 2025.
More than a year later, the fundamental situation has not changed: she remains in Cuba while her husband and daughter reside permanently in Florida.
"Why can't mom go to Tampa?"
The new report also shows how the family tries to maintain the bond between mother and daughter despite the distance.
Heidy explained that when the little one is in the United States, she stays in touch by phone for practically all of her daily routine, from when she wakes up and what she eats to the moment she goes to sleep.
"I have to sing to her to help her sleep at night and tell her a story," he said.
During the meeting with El Faro, Heidy asked her daughter why she couldn't go to Tampa. The little girl replied, "Because she doesn't have the papers."
According to the mother, the prolonged separation has also had emotional consequences on the girl and the family has sought specialized help.
“She has trauma. She always asks people, ‘When are you leaving? Why are you leaving?’ even if she just met them. We’re all talking to a specialist,” said Heidy, who claims that the little girl shows fear when people leave.
The Cuban also described the impact that returning involuntarily to a country she had left years earlier in search of building a different life has had on her.
"I am not here. My mind and my heart are there," he summarized.
While awaiting a migration solution, her goal remains the same after deportation: to return with her husband and daughter to Florida.
"The only thing that matters to me is family reunification with my husband and my little girl," she stated.
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