For 29 years, Susan Rubio Rivera has led MUJER, an organization that supports survivors of sexual and domestic violence in South Miami-Dade, a largely agricultural area south of Miami that’s home to many Latino and farmworker families. The mission has always been the same: Help survivors reach safety.
But this year, for some undocumented survivors, safety has come down to one question: Can you protect us from being deported?
“We have to say, sorry, but we can’t give you that guarantee,” Rubio Rivera says. “No one can guarantee you that anymore.”
In past years, she says, fear of immigration enforcement was more perception than reality.
“This time, it is ICE, and they’re here,” she says. For anyone with brown skin, “they’re also going to ask for our documents.”
Last year, when MUJER’s federal funding was frozen, Rubio Rivera was deciding which staff she might have to cut. A year later, she hasn’t had to laid off anyone, and MUJER has bought a property it calls the Healing Sanctuary. But getting here wasn’t simple.
About 54% of MUJER’s funding comes from federal and other public sources, Rubio Rivera tells me. In February 2025, the Justice Department’s Office on Violence Against Women pulled its grant opportunities and instructed organizations to pause application review.
Then, Rubio Rivera says, during last fall’s government shutdown, a delayed housing contract forced MUJER to pause a counselor’s position, and a grant that pays for all of its 24/7 rape crisis advocacy didn’t come through. That grant keeps advocates at MUJER ― one of the only two certified rape crisis programs in Miami-Dade County ― on call around the clock.
A private foundation filled the gap until MUJER received a three-year award on July 1.
“If all the apples in your basket were coming from the feds, you would basically be out of business,” Rubio Rivera says.
When a survivor of a recent sexual assault arrives at a hospital in South Miami-Dade, even in the middle of the night, an advocate meets her there, explains her rights and options, and walks her through the forensic exam. MUJER also offers therapy, support groups, and emergency help with food and other basic needs. Without that, Rubio Rivera says, survivors can’t focus on healing.
Sixty-eight percent of people who turn to MUJER do so because they trust it, Rubio Rivera says. “And they still trust us, but they don’t trust going out on the street.” Fewer immigrants are seeking services, so MUJER now sends Ubers for survivors afraid to drive and is exploring virtual services.
Deportation, family separation, involvement with child protective services: “All of those are huge fears that people carry that would keep them kind of silent and away from the formal service system,” says Chiara Sabina, a professor of social work at Rutgers University who researches violence against Latinas. Groups such as MUJER, she says, “help the people that are even willing to come forward and seek help. And there’s so many Latinas that don’t even get to that point.”
A 2016 study Sabina co-authored found that undocumented Latinas experienced violence at around the same rate as those with permanent legal status. But they were less likely to seek formal help from police or social services. Undocumented survivors often want to stay “underground, unfound,” she says. For someone also living with an abusive partner, “it almost feels like there’s nowhere to turn.”
Legal protections have grown less certain. In January 2025, ICE walked back guidance on how to sensitively address undocumented victims of domestic violence. The agency was previously discouraged against survivors seeking U visas, which protect crime victims who help law enforcement, or other immigration relief under the Violence Against Women Act.
In May 2026, a federal judge temporarily blocked that change nationwide, but the case is ongoing. U visa cases can take years, and even survivors with pending applications are afraid a routine traffic stop could end in detention.
“They’re also scared,” Rubio Rivera says. “What happens if I get stopped?”
MUJER is also seeing families left behind. Rubio Rivera describes a typical case: a father, the family’s breadwinner, “picked up on Krome Avenue for no other reason, just going to work in the morning. There was no criminal activity. There was no deportation order.” His wife, who may also lack legal status, is left to support their children alone.
Federal grant contracts now include a DEI clause organizations must attest to, Rubio Rivera says, which has left many nonprofits “on the edge.” She worries an organization with a Spanish name could draw scrutiny. “Our name, that’s our brand,” she says. “People know us because of MUJER. So do we now change that?”
“That’s the line all of the culturally specific organizations have to walk right now,” Sabina says. The pressure “leads to erasure, it’s erasing the community. It’s erasing the problem.”
Nearly half of homicides of Hispanic and Latina women from 2003 to 2021 were related to intimate partner violence, according to the CDC. When organizations like MUJER are short on money, Sabina says, what’s at stake is “literally lives.”
Rubio Rivera grew up a migrant kid and remembers arriving in a small Alabama town where local church members would seek out the workers and bring toothbrushes, soap and shampoo. “It was all based on love,” she says.
That’s the spirit behind the Healing Sanctuary. In an area with limited public transportation, survivors have often had to go from office to office for help. The sanctuary will house MUJER and partner organizations so survivors can get help in one place.
This summer, four organizations came together at MUJER for a back-to-school event for 1,000 children, with face painting, snow cones and cotton candy. Togetherness, Rubio Rivera says, is at the heart of MUJER’s work. “You are not alone, we’re all here.”
“With or without money, we’re here,” she says. “This is our home. We don’t just work here. We live here.”
Need help? In the U.S., call 1-800-799-SAFE (7233) for the National Domestic Violence Hotline. Visit RAINN’s National Sexual Assault Online Hotline or the National Sexual Violence Resource Center’s website.