Oscarina gave birth to her son without her husband after he was deported from Missouri months earlier. Advocates, activists and attorneys say many undocumented mothers are foregoing medical care out of fear of being detained and deported.

Oscarina spent the first week of her son’s life moving between his bassinet in the neonatal intensive care unit and her small apartment to care for her 6-year-old daughter.

She is sore. She is tired. And she is alone.

Oscarina and her husband escaped violence in Venezuela and moved 2,000 miles north to Missouri in 2023, seeking more stable housing and a better future for their daughter. Neither have permanent legal status in the United States, and when she learned she had a second child on the way, Oscarina wondered how they could afford to raise anoth

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