For Rene Monroy and his dad, Daniel, business is strong. There is a lot of demand for their concrete foundations across Southwest Florida.
“Manasota Key, Boca Grande, all along the coastline. We do big houses, big mansions all the time,” said Monroy.
Despite the steady calls from big contractors, this feels like the worst of times.
The federal government has ordered Daniel Monroy to be deported by the end of March. His son Rene worries about how his family will cope, especially his 17-year-old sister Jenny.
“That's going to be the hardest part. Seeing my sister, be without her dad, you know, graduate high school,” said Rene.
Daniel entered the US illegally thru the Mexican border when he was 16 years old.
“I feel like my dad had no choice than to come over here. You know, there was no opportunity for him over there,” said Rene referring to his dad fleeing Mexico.
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Daniel says he left his Mexican village in desperation. His father had died while working in the US and his mother struggled to feed her five children on her own.
“There’s no food. No money. There’s nothing. That’s what makes us leave home,” said Ren, referring to the conditions in his village as a child.
After working in agriculture for several years, Daniel spent nearly 30 years in construction in the state of Florida. He and his son have laid thousands of foundations from Tallahassee to Port Charlotte: concrete slabs for everything from stores to condos to banks. Rene says it’s hard to understand why his dad is being forced out by immigration officials.
“I think we done a lot for this country. We pay a lot of money in taxes,” said Rene. “We do so much, for them just to take him out, like he's nothing to this country.
Daniel also brought his wife Santana and two sons thru the southern border to the US about 20 years ago. Rene was a toddler at the time. Rene has a work permit under the DACA program. The family’s hard work has paid off. They’ve bought several acres in Southwest Florida—with the dream of building a home and moving out of their trailer.
But that is all in jeopardy now. ICE told Daniel he needs to buy a plane ticket back to Mexico. An ankle monitor tracks his whereabouts now. While the current deportation order was under a previous U.S. administration, under the Trump White House, the family worries that the consequences of Daniel returning illegally would be more severe.
In Florida alone, lawmakers are spending $500 million dollars to beef up law enforcement to help carry out tougher immigration enforcement.
Ricardo Skerrett is his attorney.
“He doesn't have any option. He's going to have to leave,” said Skerett. “And I don't know what he's going to do. He's going to have his family here. And probably, he'll return illegally. And if he gets caught, he's going to be put in jail.”
This isn’t the first time Daniel was deported. In fact, he’s been deported twice and has come back. He says he doesn’t know how to leave his family alone.
Making Daniel’s case harder is his criminal record. He was convicted of battery in 2003, which he called a dispute with a family member and driving while intoxicated in 2001. But he and his family say he’s a changed man.
“I’ve made mistakes. But I haven’t made them again like driving drunk. When I made that error I gave up alcohol forever,” said Daniel.
Daniel says he returned to the U.S. because of his responsibility to take care of his family.
Skerett, his attorney, says this story is sad and common and not just among his clients.
“Most of these people come from extreme poverty, and they really come to work. And that's why we need to reform our immigration laws. Most of the people that come here do not come for asylum. They go for economic reasons. And we have to recognize that,” said Skerrett. “And that's always been my complaint: that the immigration laws in this country do not follow the market realities.”
He says the market reality is American businesses can’t find enough workers, illegal or not. And bringing in foreign workers through the lawful channels is too expensive and lengthy.
“It is so cumbersome for an employer to have to employ a foreign worker in this country, that I can blame them for hiring illegal workers, undocumented workers,” said Skerett.
Rene says all the construction sites he’s worked at rely heavily on undocumented workers.
When asked if construction business owners know that most of the folks working in the industry don’t have permission to work, he said, “Yes. Everybody knows it. Nobody has it. Even though you know, you don't say it. Everybody knows that. You know, pretty much everybody doesn't have a piece of paper to their name,” said Rene.
Rene now worries how he’ll make the family budget work in his dad’s absence. That’s also a worry for 17-year-old sister Jenny, a junior in high school, the only US citizen in the family.
“I worry a lot. My mom can't work. She can't go work and provide for me and her. Without my dad, we wouldn't have as much,” said Jenny.
The family is finding the decision of what to do next impossible: either Daniel living alone in Mexico or Santana joining her husband and leaving the family, as well.
Jenny hopes someone will reconsider her father’s case.
“He's changed as a person and he doesn’t do the things he once did before,” said Jenny sobbing. “He deserves to stay here one more time.”
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