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 another baby.

Eight weeks into the pregnancy, her husband was detained while delivering a DoorDash order. He was deported back to Venezuela a short time later.

“All my pregnancy, I cried every single day,” Oscarina, who lives in Kansas City an

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