For deportee, a journey home and a vow to return
According to a new report from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the agency has deported nearly 400,000 people in the past year - a record number. So what happens when someone is kicked out of the U.S.? CBS News correspondent Seth Doane followed one man on a long trip home.
After 13 years in the United States, Ivis Lopez has just three hours left here.
That is because he's being forced to leave. He's taking just legal papers, a Bible, and the clothes on his back. He's also leaving behind so much more.
Looking through pictures, Lopez said: "These are my kids."
Angelina is three and Natalia is just two -- both are U.S. citizens. They along with his American fiancée will all stay in Florida while Lopez is deported.
"Sometimes I start crying," said Lopez, "because I'm missing everything, basically."
On this night, Lopez is one of about 80 Hondurans to be sent home.
U.S. deports nearly 400K in a year - a record
Randall Henderson with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, runs this sprawling detention facility in Pearsall, Texas, where illegal immigrants are processed before they're deported -- as many as 120 at a time.
On this day, detainees from 64 countries fill the cells.
"We have approximately 38 percent of the detainees [who] have known criminal backgrounds," said Henderson. "Sixty-two percent of the detainees are here for immigration violations."
Ivis Lopez has both. He was convicted of drug possession charges and was deported once before.
"Why keep coming back?" Doane asked Lopez.
"For my kids," he said.
Lopez and the other Hondurans board what's called "ICE Air" -- a virtual airline run by the U.S. government that flies anywhere in the world. One-hundred-sixty-thousand people were deported by these private charters last year, at the cost of about $750,000 each. That's around $120 million.
"I really don't know what to do once I get there," said Lopez on the plane, "so I even got a headache just to think about everything. Like, 'What am I going to do?'"
Landing in Honduras, those once in shackles walk free. But Ivis Lopez hardly feels liberated.
He heads to visit his blind grandmother -- the only family he has here. But it's clear Lopez's mind is already on another reunion.
"I'm going to spend some time with my grandmother," he said. "And then just go back."
"Back to the U.S.?" asked Doane.
"Yeah."
That would be his third trip back to America -- one of the 11 million undocumented migrants in the U.S. who are part of an endless cycle of immigration and deportation.
