05/17/2026
"At night, silence fell over the Louisiana immigration detention facility where 85-year-old Marie-Thérèse Ross was held. Then the wailing began.
'Children crying, and even babies,' said Ross, the French widow of a U.S. military veteran, whose arrest last month as part of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown made international headlines.
Ross spoke to The Associated Press on Monday about her 16 days in federal immigration custody after being arrested on April 1 in Alabama following an alleged visa overstay, and the late-in-life love story that brought her to the United States. She has been released and returned to France.
The experience in detention, she said, changed her, and her view of politics.
She was held in a dormitory-style room with 58 other women, mostly mothers. 'Some of them didn’t know where their children were,' she said. 'I think it’s terrible for a woman not to know where her children are.'
Her arrest in Alabama unfolded so quickly that she barely understood what was happening. Five men, who identified themselves as immigration officers, banged on her door and windows at 8 a.m. before handcuffing her and placing her in a vehicle, she said. She was still wearing her bathrobe, slippers and pajamas.
She was transferred two days later to a facility in Basile, Louisiana. Later that month, she was freed. She is now recovering in a suburb of Nantes in western France with her family. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot had publicly called for her release, saying that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement methods are “not in line” with French standards.
At the detention facility in Louisiana, Ross described strict rules, constant shouting from guards and condescending treatment.
'The prison was clean, the food was OK, but it was the way they spoke to us,' she told the AP. 'The guards could not speak without yelling.'
She described the place as noisy. 'Everybody was talking loudly so everybody could hear what they were saying, but when silence came, you could hear children crying and even babies crying,' she said. 'There’s babies in this jail.'...
Ross said she continues to think about the women she met in custody, most of them from South America. Many were mothers separated from their children.
Her experience changed the way she sees the United States and its immigration policies, Ross said. Her husband was a Trump supporter and they used to watch Fox News together. But she was shocked to learn firsthand how immigrants are treated inside immigration facilities.
She used to view the U.S. as a 'country of freedom, where people are not arrested based on how they look, and where those who are detained are treated fairly and with respect.' But the women she met did not deserve to be detained, she said. 'Their only fault was to be South American.'
As she recovers in France, Ross still thinks about them: 'When I left this jail in Louisiana, I told them that if I ever had the chance to speak about them, I would do it, to help them.'"
To read the full piece about Ross' experience in ICE detention on NBC News, visit https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/85-year-old-french-widow-caught-trumps-immigration-crackdown-describes-rcna344911
---
The nightmare is over for Marie-Thérèse. For tens of thousands of others still inside the system, it continues. Here's how to speak out against such abuses.
--> Call your Senators and Representatives at (202) 224-3121. Demand oversight of ICE detention conditions, including the detention of elderly and medically vulnerable people in facilities with documented records of abuse -- and accountability for the 16 deaths in federal immigration custody so far this year.
--> To help immigrants who have been arrested or detained, you can support the critical work of the National Immigrant Justice Center at https://immigrantjustice.org/ways-to-help/
----
For books for children and teens about the importance of standing up for truth, decency, and justice, even in dark times, visit our blog post, "Dissent Is Patriotic: 50 Books About Women Who Fought for Change," at https://www.amightygirl.com/blog?p=14364
For books for tweens and teens about girls living under real-life authoritarian regimes throughout history that will help them appreciate how precious democracy truly is, visit our blog post "The Fragility of Freedom: Mighty Girl Books About Life Under Authoritarianism" at https://www.amightygirl.com/blog?p=32426
For children's books that encourage empathy and understanding of Mighty Girl immigrants of the past and present, visit our blog post, "A New Land, A New Life: 25 Mighty Girl Books About the Immigrant Experience" at https://www.amightygirl.com/blog?p=12855
To stay connected with A Mighty Girl, you can sign-up for A Mighty Girl's free email newsletter at https://www.amightygirl.com/forms/newsletter
