Carol Mayorga sat at a small table inside the Greene County Jail in Springfield, Missouri, on Wednesday morning. She appeared on screen via the jail's video visitation service, wearing a muted green jumpsuit, her eyeglasses framed by her black hair.
Mayorga, whose legal name is Ming Li Hui, has been detained in jail under U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody since late April. She'd traveled from Kennett, Missouri, her home for nearly two decades, to St. Louis for what she thought was a routine meeting to renew her employment authorization document.
The document, issued by the federal government, allows her to work legally in the U.S. and is set to expire in January 2026.
Originally from Hong Kong, Mayorga said she was used to the meetings. But when she arrived, things were anything but usual.
After a brief meeting, Mayorga said a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services staffer told her she needed to stay at the office in St. Louis. She agreed in hopes of receiving her renewal that suddenly seemed in peril.
"I started to worry — I was over there so long," Mayorga said through a black telephone receiver in the jail. "I asked one officer, 'Can I go now?' because it was so late, and he said, 'No, no, no. You will stay here.'"
Nearly seven hours passed before ICE officers entered the room, placing the 45-year-old woman, whom many residents in Kennett described as a soccer mom, in shackles at the wrists, waist and ankles.
Mayorga said before she knew it, officers placed her in the back of a van with four male ICE detainees. When the doors shut, darkness swallowed the cramped space.
Since Mayorga left her home in Kennett for her appointment, ICE officials have ping-ponged her throughout rural Missouri jails. She's expected to be deported to Hong Kong.
Her first stop was the Phelps County Jail in Rolla, where an ICE detainee recently took his own life. That stay abruptly ended in mid-May when ICE transported her to the Greene County Jail in Springfield. She said her lawyer told her the next stop is a plane to Hong Kong.
When asked for comment on Mayorga's detainment, ICE officials pointed to their inmate directory as a way to gather more information on detainees. Officials did not respond to a follow-up request for more information.
From the jail kiosk in Springfield, Mayorga spoke mostly of her children during the 30-minute call — fighting tears as she lamented missing her eldest son's recent eighth-grade graduation. She has two sons, ages 14 and 12, and a daughter, 7.
A smile appeared on her face as she gushed over her son's 4.0 grade-point average and an award one of her sons received at school.
"My middle son said, 'Mom, I miss you. … I wish you were here. It's different when you're not here,'" she said in fluent but sometimes broken English, taking off her black eyeglasses to wipe a tear away. "And say, 'If you need to go to Hong Kong, can we go with you?'"
Mayorga thought on the notion for a moment. When will she be deported to Hong Kong? Even her lawyer doesn't know.
"If I'm by myself (and) I live in the street, I think I can handle it by myself," she said. "But with my children … no."
She worried about her chances of seeing them again.
"I don't want to mix up their life," Mayorga said of her family. "They're doing so good here."
'A model citizen'
Back in Kennett, Mayorga's arrest shook the town of around 10,000 people, where she works at John's Waffle & Pancake House. The jail is more than four hours west of her home in Kennett, in the deeply Republican southeast corner of the state known as the Bootheel.
Residents of the town desperately want her back.
In interviews with the Midwest Newsroom, dozens of Kennett neighbors described her as a "hard worker" who held several jobs to support her family.
Others know her from soccer and baseball games, where her children played on local teams, or as a chatty mom who loved to catch up at the town's Walmart and at school events.
They grappled with the possibility that their favorite server, friend and fellow parent might never be home again.
"If you're looking for a model citizen — she works hard, she takes care of her kids, she makes sure they have everything they need," said Lisa Dry, a city council member who said she's known Mayorga since 2020. "I mean, to me, that's the kind of citizen we want here."
But arrests at immigration meetings have become a common story in the months following President Donald Trump's second inauguration.
In Kansas, a mother from El Salvador arrived at a green card application interview at Kansas City's USCIS office in April only to be arrested by ICE agents. The same month, a Denmark-born man living in Mississippi found himself chained much like Mayorga and detained by ICE during his citizenship hearing in Memphis, Tennessee.
Three weeks after Mayorga's arrest, more than a hundred residents gathered at John's Waffle & Pancake House on Tuesday.
A lull between hazardous storms in the region provided a picturesque sunrise over the tightly packed parking lot.
John's is typically closed on Tuesdays, but its owner, Liridona "Dona" Ramadani, opened the doors, pledging to donate all of the sales that day to Mayorga's legal fund and to support Mayorga's children.
Ramadani described Mayorga as part of her family and a diligent worker. It was Ramadani who retrieved Mayorga's purse and car left in St. Louis after her ICE detainment — a 3½-hour drive up Highway 55.
"She never missed a day — always upbeat, always smiling," Ramadani said. "She was always happy and greeting everybody — never standing around, always just working, finding something to do."
Mayorga began working at the restaurant after filling in for a day in 2021 and stayed on with Ramadani and her staff. The employees and customers said they feel a void without her there.
Deborah Sample, a business owner in town, said she knows Mayorga as a warm part of Kennett's community. She recalled Mayorga's sympathy when Sample's daughter died last year.
"Carol was very kind and compassionate to me when I was in need," she said. "She's a person in our community that is needed, and we want her home — this is up to God to help bring Carol home."
Pastor Kirsten King, whom many in the town know as "Pastor KK," dropped a donation into a small box on the bar-top at the restaurant around 11 a.m. before making her way back to the First Presbyterian Church.
Not long after Mayorga's arrest, King's congregation brought the issue to her.
"I know that when my congregation raises something to me, it's important," King said. "I had it said to me in that very first phone call. This is not the kind of person who should be treated this way."
She described her congregation as a reflection of the town — diverse but conservative. She said members grappled with Mayorga's arrest and its implications.
Cars and trucks filled the tight parking lot at John's and nearby businesses' open spots from 6 a.m. until 2 p.m. Some vehicles had "Trump 2024" bumper stickers displaying Trump's campaign slogan "Take America Back."
The rattle of silverware, sizzle of the grill and conversations among customers bounced through the restaurant as seats filled and stayed that way until close. John's cozily seats roughly 30 patrons at a time.
Servers greeted most customers with a hug and small talk before handing out devices that buzzed when a seat opened up at the diner. Some waited hours for a seat.
Conversations struck a defiant tone. Customers said that they were there to support their friend and that they wanted her back home.
For many who gathered at John's that morning, Mayorga's detainment was a step too far by the Trump administration, an administration many at the restaurant say they voted for and support.
"Ninety-five percent of the people in here support Trump — I do, too — but this is wrong," said Bud Garrison, a daily customer at John's.
Garrison and his wife, Anita, made black T-shirts with bold yellow wording that read in all caps, "Bring Carol Home" and on the sleeve say #TEAMCAROL. They described Mayorga as the wrong type of person for Trump to deport.
"We don't feel what's happened to her is right," said Anita Garrison. "She's a very upstanding citizen in our community. Her kids are into the sports, she's in the church, and she's a very upstanding citizen as far as I'm concerned. I think she deserves to be free with her kids."
Fleeing abuse in Hong Kong
Mayorga's immigration situation is a complex one, much like those of others caught in the Trump administration's new rules on immigrants without legal status.
She fled Hong Kong at age 20 after saving up enough money working as an assistant manager at a McDonald's. She legally entered the U.S. in 2004 with a nonimmigrant visa to escape abuse from her mother and a culture that did not value women, she would later tell an immigration court.
Mayorga told the court her mother favored her brothers and regretted having a daughter. The abuse eventually turned physical. She recalled her mother cutting her hair short and making her dress like a boy.
"The abuse included the mother burning her hand with a cigarette butt, withholding food, calling her 'trash, garbage,' and telling her she 'wish[ed] you'd die soon,'" a court petition read.
Fearing a return to Hong Kong, she stayed past the expiration of her visa, Raymond Bolourtchi, Mayorga's lawyer, said. In 2008, she received a deportation notice from an immigration court and, according to court records, conceded that she was in the country illegally before turning to asylum and other avenues as a way to avoid returning to Hong Kong.
Court records show she presented letters from family members warning Mayorga that her mother still thought violently about her and that she should remain in the U.S.
But an immigration judge denied all three requests and the U.S. Board of Immigration Appeals later ruled against a petition she filed seeking a review of the decision in 2014.
The appeals board asserted that due to Mayorga's age, then 34, her mother was no longer a threat to her life or freedom and that she could return to Hong Kong safely.
From there, Mayorga said she continued living and working through an employment authorization document and an order of supervision, which allowed her to remain in the country as she worked toward citizenship. She traveled to St. Louis frequently to renew her documents.
"She has had that every year, and she's paid her taxes, she's been duly employed," Bolourtchi said. "She's always provided for her family and has been really devoted to taking care of her son and her other children."
Bolourtchi said Mayorga was always compliant, checking in with agents locally on a regular basis as directed. When she was taken into custody, Bolourtchi, who refers to Mayorga by her birth name, Ming, said his heart sank.
"I've known Ming for so long and if there ever was a person … it would be the last person that would ever think that would be taken into custody," Bolourtchi said. "She could be your neighbor, or could be your sister, and she's just literally a mother of three kids, and she works, takes care of kids, goes to work and she has no violation, she has nothing that in my opinion would trigger her detention."
Bolourtchi hopes the Board of Immigration Appeals grants Mayorga a stay. The ruling would formally order the U.S. Department of Homeland Security not to deport her. If Mayorga is deported, he doesn't know when it would happen as the department doesn't usually provide dates or times for security reasons.
Mayorga's situation is one of many cases the federal government is prioritizing that Bolourtchi said wouldn't have been a focus in years prior. He said he's handling many cases just like Mayorga's.
"Ming — or Carol — is only one of many," Bolourtchi said. "We had several clients that have suffered the same fate, several clients that were in a very similar situation, and several clients where there was absolutely no need, no violations, nothing."
But Bolourtchi said people are noticing. Those close to Mayorga and living in communities similar to hers are seeing more of these situations across the country.
"The outpour of support that Ming has received from her community is overwhelming," Bolourtchi said. "I can only imagine how many other communities around the country are feeling the same way when they're long neighbors, or the person that you know maybe served them their lunch or breakfast, or they played pickleball all of a sudden is taken away from their kids under this order."
A difficult dichotomy
Judy Casey sat with her husband, Kevin, in a booth at John's Waffle & Pancake House at the special event for Mayorga.
The pair, wearing the shirts created by the Garrisons, described themselves as close friends of Mayorga and said they saw her every morning at John's and throughout town. And while the pair said they support Trump's stance on deporting immigrants without legal status, they called Mayorga's detainment "radical" and said she was an "easy target" who didn't deserve deportation.
"I think it's the sorriest thing I've ever seen," said Judy Casey. "She went up there to get renewed, and they just kept her. Her family didn't get to know it — she didn't even get to say goodbye to her family or anything."
Across the table from the Caseys, Jerald Pickens said ICE officials need to "make it right" by returning Mayorga.
"I know we're trying to get all these aliens back, but it seems to me like situations like this are just getting the easy ones," Pickens said as he finished his breakfast. "She went because they called her there, and I'm sure she's not the only one. She doesn't deserve this."
Kennett sits in Dunklin County, nestled against the Arkansas border. In the 2024 presidential election, Dunklin County voters overwhelmingly cast their ballots for Trump.
Dry, the recently elected Democrat on Kennett's city council, said Mayorga's arrest has many residents putting politics aside to support one of the town's own. Still, she said, she sees many in the town struggling with the implications of the soccer mom's detainment.
"I can't speak for other people, I don't know what their thoughts are, but I do hear them ask questions," Dry said. "'Surely this is a mistake,' or 'What did she do wrong?' or 'Carol's not a criminal, why is this happening to her?'"
Dry said Mayorga's detainment has been eye-opening for residents.
"Something like this brings it home because it makes it personal."
Thousands raised for Mayorga and her children
Late Tuesday evening, Ramadani said the fundraiser for Mayorga and her children raised more than $20,000 worth of proceeds through meal sales and donations. She said that toward the end of the day, she had to turn away customers when the shop closed at 2 p.m.
A Facebook post announcing the totals showed Ramadani in a photo with Mayorga's three children wearing a special variation of the black-and-yellow T-shirt the staff and customers wore. The kids' shirts read, "Bring Mom Home." The post garnered nearly 800 likes and hundreds of shares.
From the jail kiosk in Springfield, Mayorga said she felt shocked by the outpouring of support from Kennett. Even after living there for more than 20 years, she didn't expect such a response.
"I didn't know so many people loved me," she said, fighting tears.
Mayorga's thoughts again turned to her children and her possible future in Hong Kong. Her grandmother, who she said took care of her when she fled her abusive home, died in 2006.
"I'm scared, for sure — I have nothing there," she said.
Mayorga said she expects she'll sleep on the streets of Hong Kong for a time if she's deported there, nearly on the other side of the world from the home she's made in Kennett.
The Midwest Newsroom is an investigative and enterprise journalism collaboration that includes St. Louis Public Radio, Iowa Public Radio, KCUR, Nebraska Public Media and NPR.
There are many ways you can contact us with story ideas and leads, and you can find that information here. The Midwest Newsroom is a partner of the Trust Project. We invite you to review our ethics and practices here.
Methods
To tell this story, reporter Kavahn Mansouri traveled to Kennett, Missouri, to interview people living in the town about Carol Mayorga's recent detainment by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers. He spoke to customers at John's Waffle & Pancake House about Mayorga, Kennett itself and their stances on immigration. He also conducted a video interview with Mayorga herself.
Reporter Chad Davis interviewed Mayorga's lawyer and reached out to ICE officials for comment on her detainment. Photojournalist Julia Rendleman traveled to Kennett to speak with and photograph the people and community involved with this story.
References
"U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services-Employment Authorization Document"
"A mother and son fled Colombia for a better life. He died in St. Louis on ICE's watch." (St. Louis Public Radio and The Midwest Newsroom | April 2025)
"Kansas woman went to KC for a green card interview. Now, she faces deportation." (Kansas City Star | April 2025)
"ICE Arrests Mississippi Father at His Citizenship Hearing, Threatening Deportation." (Mississippi Free Press | May 2025)
Type of Article
News: Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources.
Credits
Reported, written and produced by: Kavahn Mansouri and Chad Davis
Photography: Julia Rendleman, Brian Munoz, Kavahn Mansouri and Chad Davis
Lead Illustration: Brian Munoz / Source: Brian Munoz, Carol Mayorga via Facebook and Julia Rendleman
Digital editing: Jessica Rogen, Kris Husted, Nicole Grundmeier and Bob Cronin
Digital presentation and distribution: Brian Munoz
Copyright 2025 St. Louis Public Radio
