“Packing their stuff, it almost feels like they died.”

Stephanie Gonzalez became emotional Thursday talking about her parents, Gladys and Nelson — who are very much alive — but are thousands of miles away from their three daughters, son-in-law, and grandson. 

The couple, who lived in California for over 30 years, were deported in March to their native Colombia after a routine check-in with Immigration and Customs Enforcement at the end of February.

“If I’m being honest, we weren’t really nervous, despite [President Donald] Trump just having taken office. Our family was very confident at peace that the appointment would go well like it always has,” said Gonzalez.

The couple arrived in the U.S. in 1989 and attempted to declare asylum in 1992. But bad legal advice from multiple lawyers, including one who was later disbarred, resulted in multiple failed attempts to successfully obtain the necessary paperwork. They received a "voluntary departure" order but continued to appeal for 20 years.

“My parents were definitely victims of immigration fraud and just awful fraudulent lawyers who did not care about them, gave them awful advice," explained Stephanie.

During that time, Nelson and Gladys continued doing routine check-ins with ICE and neither have a criminal record. 

While the Department of Homeland Security corroborated Stephanie’s story of her parents’ legal attempts to seek asylum, Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin told Spectrum News in a statement “illegal aliens do not have a right to roam freely in our country, nor do they have a right to elude federal authorities.”

Rep. Mike Levin, D-Calif., who represents Laguna Niguel, refutes the fact the couple were eluding authorities. 

“Gladys and Nelson Gonzalez, they did everything right. The lawyers and the immigration system did them wrong, and the Trump administration should be ashamed for deporting her parents,” he told Spectrum News Thursday, sitting alongside Gonzalez, who is on Capitol Hill sharing her parents’ story and trying to plead their case to those who may be able to help.

“My parents, unfortunately, aren’t the only ones who are going through something like this. There are so many other families — families with young kids,” said Gonzalez. “Thankfully, my sisters are older, but there’s families who have young children who are being separated from their parents.”

Once Gladys and Nelson were detained by ICE, they were separated and taken to three different detention facilities before being deported. When they arrived in Colombia, they had “nothing.”

“They arrived in the same clothes that they were originally arrested in,” said Stephanie. “They didn’t have anything, and so we frantically booked them a hotel, so they had somewhere to sleep that night.”

Gladys and Nelson are now staying with family in Colombia while they figure out what comes next. 

“The hope now is to get a great lawyer — we’ve already been in contact with a couple different ones, trying to see if there’s any way that they can come back home,” said Stephanie. “The reality is that they were given a 10 year ban before they could come back to the country. We’re hoping they don’t have to be [gone] 10 years. We’re hoping that they can at some point visit… if that’s possible.”

Nelson worked as a phlebotomist for life insurance exams and drove Uber on the side to make extra money for their family, according to Stephanie. Gladys stayed at home and raised Stephanie and her sisters Jessica and Gabriella.

“My older sister had her first baby. He’s eight months old. He won’t have his grandparents — like my parents are going to miss so many special moments in their grandson’s life because they can’t come here,” said Stephanie.

Levin said he has been critical of both the Trump and Biden administration in the past, but said he’s frustrated by the Trump administration’s “lack of basic decency and humanity.”

“Here’s a husband and wife that paid taxes for 35 years, didn’t have so much as a traffic ticket, contributed positively to our economy, to our society, did everything the way you’re supposed to do it,” said Levin. “For them still to have been deported tells me that something’s fundamentally broken, and the way that this administration is prioritizing a quota — an immigration quota — where they want to deport as many people as they can, regardless of what that does, what negative impact that has on our society, on families.”

Levin’s team has been trying to work with the Department of Homeland Security and Immigrations, Customs and Enforcement to bring Nelson and Gladys home, but information about the reason for their deportation has been scarce.

“It’s fundamentally un-American, and I will fight against it every way I can for as long as it takes,” he promised.

Spectrum News reached out to the White House for comment on the Gonzalezs’ case, but has not heard back.