Deported Raleigh resident returns to the U.S. and is currently detained in Texas

WUNC News | By Eli Chen, 

Aaron Sánchez-Guerra

Published August 8, 2026 at 11:34 AM EDT

José Eliezer Martinez-Andino, a young Honduran man and Raleigh resident who was deported last spring, has now returned to the U.S.

Martinez-Andino boarded a plane at Ramón Villeda Morales International Airport in San Pedro Sula, Honduras on Wednesday. However, his destination was not Raleigh-Durham International – according to his lawyers, he boarded a flight to Harlingen, Texas.

“We have spoken to José since he arrived on August 5, and he is very glad to be back on U.S. soil where he can have the opportunity to seek legal relief again,” said Allison Chan, an immigration attorney representing Martinez-Andino.

Chan, an attorney at Margaret W. Wong & Associates law firm in Raleigh, did not comment further on whose custody her client is under or how soon he could be released.

Martinez-Andino had been living in Raleigh with close relatives since the summer of 2025 and is also the father of a three-year-old who was born in the U.S. The 20-year-old was detained in March this year while traveling on a cross-country trip to Seattle.

He was detained by immigration enforcement officials in multiple facilities in Montana and Arizona, where he said he was pressured to sign voluntary departure forms. He was flown out to Honduras in mid-April and since then had been residing in his hometown of Tela in the coastal state of Atlantida.

Martinez-Andino also possessed Special Juvenile Immigrant Status (SIJS), which is a legal status granted to young people under the age of 21 who have been neglected, abused and/or abandoned by a parent. He had crossed the border into Texas as an unaccompanied minor at the age of 14 and in 2023, a judge granted him SIJS and deferred action while he was living with a cousin in San Antonio.

U.S. District Court Judge Beryl Howell ordered the Department of Homeland Security in June for Martinez-Andino to be returned to the U.S. and for his legal status to be restored.

In a June interview with WUNC, attorney Allison Chan said she expected her client’s return to be “an uphill battle.”

Martinez-Andino is just one of many young people with SIJS who have been deported since President Trump’s immigration crackdown began last year. According to a letter from the Department of Homeland Security to Nevada Senator Catherine Cortez Masto’s office earlier this year, ICE detained 265 and deported 132 young people with SIJS in 2025.

https://www.wunc.org/race-class-communities/2026-08-08/jose-eliezer-martinez-andino-deported-return-raleigh-dhs-ice