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In California, self-deportations are up by 173 percent since 2024. 

When the family arrived in the United States, they were granted humanitarian parole, which allowed them to live and work legally while their asylum case was pending. Giovanni said he was required to check in weekly through an app and send a geolocated photo.

He never missed a check-in until late September, when he went on vacation and failed to send a photo. Days later, he was summoned to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services field office in San Francisco.

“They asked me, ‘Why didn’t you send the photo?’” Giovanni said in Spanish. He told them his phone was damaged. “Then they said, ‘You’re under arrest.’”

Giovanni described his first four days in detention as the worst of his life. He said there was one toilet in the cell and he slept on the floor. He was later transferred to the California City Detention Center outside Bakersfield, where he was issued an orange jumpsuit — a designation for mid-level threats — despite having no criminal record.

“I am a calm person. I don’t look for problems with anyone,” he said. “I didn’t understand why they put me in orange.”

Giovanni said he grew anxious and repeatedly asked why he was being held, but never received an answer. He spoke with his wife daily by phone. “Every day I was destroyed by calls in which my wife cried,” he said. “I have never been able to cry, even when important people in my life died. But in those days, I cried every day.”

Weeks passed before Giovanni was given a hearing date three months away. He was denied bond and told he would remain in detention. He said other detainees told him the only way out was to request voluntary departure, also known as self-deportation.

“I told my wife, ‘I can’t take it anymore. I want to ask to self-deport,’” Giovanni said.

Immigration law experts say his case is increasingly common. Hiroshi Motomura, co-director of UCLA’s Center for Immigration Law and Policy, said many immigrants persuaded to self-deport actually have a legal right to remain in the country.

“Long detentions, dubious charges and the lack of a government-appointed attorney all appear to be a strategy to get immigrants to leave voluntarily,” Motomura said.

In August, more than 6,000 deportation cases nationwide ended with voluntary departures, the highest monthly total recorded in 25 years of data tracked by Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse.

Nicole Gorney, supervising attorney at VIDAS legal services in the North Bay and Giovanni’s lawyer, said her client was told he was arrested because his immigration proceedings were ongoing.

“That’s not a legal reason to detain someone,” Gorney said. “It’s been happening a lot. People go in for what should be a routine check-in and then never come out.”

Gorney filed a habeas petition demanding the government provide a legal reason for Giovanni’s detention. She said such petitions were rare before October but have become more common under the Trump administration. In January, lawyers filed four habeas petitions in California. By October, they filed more than 200.

On Giovanni’s 20th day in detention, immigration agents called out his bed number. He said he did not know whether he would be transferred, released or deported. Instead, he was freed.

“It feels like a miracle,” Giovanni said, sitting in his living room with his wife.

When signing his release forms, he asked again why he had been arrested. He said an ICE agent told him: “It’s your punishment for not sending a photo. Next time be more careful and do things the way you should.”