As a courtroom interpreter for the Texas immigration system, it was Meenu Batra’s job to ensure migrants understood the proceedings of immigration court—the good and the bad.
In March, Batra was exposed to the other side of the immigration system when she was detained and then arrested by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) after decades spent living and working in the U.S. DHS called Batra an “illegal alien” and said she was arrested during a “targeted enforcement operation.”
Batra, a mother of four U.S. citizens who transitioned to interpreting in other courtrooms after years spent in immigration court, was held for more than six weeks—a harrowing experience from which she’s still recovering.
When Batra was arrested at Valley International Airport in Harlingen, Texas, she said she felt like she was falling “into a black hole.” “Fear” and “numbness” poured through her body as an officer asked her to step outside of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) line and later handcuffed her outside the airport.
Batra’s attorney, Deepak Ahluwalia, said he believed she was targeted at the airport based on the flight’s manifesto. He cited a Reuters review of internal Immigration and Customs Enforcement data that found TSA shared over 31,000 traveler records with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, leading to over 800 arrests.
The process of being arrested, processed, and detained was “humiliating,” Batra said. “You just become smaller and smaller with each moment. Even way before I was in a cell, you start feeling imprisoned already.”
Batra said her experience in detention has given her even more insight into the experience migrants face in the American court system. As a fluent English speaker who understood immigration laws from years spent working as a courtroom interpreter, Batra said she saw herself as a person of “privilege” in the detention center, with a responsibility to help other detainees understand their rights and advocate for themselves. Some detainees had been behind bars for years, she said.
Now she hopes her experience will help highlight the ordinary people detained by DHS—and “how we are denying the basic human rights to people who have been and who are part of this society and this country. I’m just hoping that this brings some attention to those who don’t have a voice,” she said.
In the days after she was detained, Batra called her adult daughter—a challenging reversal of her usual role as a single mom who prided herself on providing support and stability for her children—who quickly hired an immigration lawyer to fight for her mother’s release. The legal team filed a petition on March 26 for habeas corpus, a form of relief whose use has skyrocketed in immigration cases since Trump took office again.
Federal Judge Rolando Olvera granted Batra’s request for a temporary restraining order on April 30, ordering DHS to release her and not detain her again “until they have provided her with notice of the reasons for re-detention and an opportunity to respond.” The judge wrote that Batra “was arrested and detained for no discernible reason, with no identified change in circumstance bearing on the likelihood of removal.”
The temporary restraining order preventing Batra from being detained is set to expire on May 27. Ahluwalia, her attorney, said he expects the habeas petition will be ruled in their favor, keeping Batra out of detention.
But the ramifications of her detention are long-lasting. Batra said her daughter has struggled to sleep through the night in the days since her mother returned home. She jumps when a car passes on the street out of fear that “somebody is coming to get mom,” Batra said.
“It’s a new reality we’re living in,” Batra said. Living close to the border, DHS vehicles and officers are a frequent sight, and a potent reminder of Batra’s ordeal and her still uncertain future.
Despite this, Batra said she has kept her faith in America’s ideals. The country “is based on people who want to work hard, and that is a fundamental human right—that we can dream and make attempts to live a better life for ourselves,” she said. “I believe we must stand up for those ideals, to protect those and to make sure that they are there for other generations that are coming.”
CNN (5/26/26) By Zoe Sottile