Emily Galicia’s mother stood out among the thousands of friends and family members gathered on a grass lawn at UC San Diego’s 2026 graduation ceremony.

Her red felt hat was easy to spot as she weaved through the crowd, scanning the smiling graduates filing off the stage for her daughter, a bouquet of white roses and a teddy bear clutched in her arm. 

But earlier in her senior year, Galicia had worried her mom wouldn’t be there to celebrate her graduation at all.

In October, her mom hadn’t returned home after a scheduled appointment with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Instead, she had been detained and held in ICE custody, leaving Galicia, 22, and her older sister, 26, on their own for about a month. 

“I never thought it would happen,” Galicia said. 

President Donald Trump’s administration is on a mission to carry out the largest deportation in U.S. history. It has sparked political debates and pointed discussions about public safety and American identity, but the impact on the children of undocumented parents is much less abstract.

Immigration advocates say the administration has targeted immigrant families who have been in the U.S. for decades, some of whom have been checking in regularly with federal officials — despite claims from officials that they are focusing on deporting the “worst of the worst.” 

This week, the Supreme Court delivered one of the most significant blows to the administration’s immigration agenda so far — a decision with profound consequences for immigrant families. The justices ruled 6-3 against allowing the administration to eliminate birthright citizenship for babies born on American soil to some parents without citizenship. 

But other policy changes remain in place that could affect thousands of immigrant parents and their kids locally. According to an estimate from the nonprofit American Immigration Council, about 56,500 children under 18 lived with an undocumented parent in San Diego County in 2023.

While Galicia’s mom was eventually released from detention, the arrest altered her youngest daughter’s last year in college: Galicia moved her classes online to be able to take her mom to immigration and medical appointments, she spent less time with friends in her senior year of college, and she lived the constant anxiety that immigration agents were watching her family. 

“If it was a choice between graduating and helping my mom, I would choose to help my mom,” Galicia said. 

For families and communities across the U.S., graduation season is a time for celebration and optimism for the future. For immigrant families in particular, a child’s graduation can mean the realization of dreams generations in the making, through sacrifices and hard work. 

That was true for Galicia and her family earlier this month on the UCSD campus. 

Her graduation cap was decorated in pink, with lace and cloth roses adorning the top, along with the words, “Lo logré, Mama,” written in pearl beads. 

“I made it, Mom.”

The biggest lesson

Galicia knew the sacrifices her mom, who used to come home from long days of work with swollen feet and tired eyes, made for her and sister.

After the sisters’ dad died from a heart attack, Galicia’s mom considered moving her daughters back to her home country of Mexico, where the rest of her family remained. 

She decided instead that they should grow up and go to school in their own home country, the U.S.

“I always tell them: The three of us are in this together, and together we always pull through,” Galicia’s mom said in Spanish. 

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inewsource is not naming Galicia’s mother because she has a pending immigration case and her family fears retaliation from the government. She has been detained by ICE twice, the first time during the first Trump administration.

The oldest daughter Serenity, then 17, had to figure out how to pay rent, post bail for her mom and take care of her younger sister. When ICE detained her mom again almost 10 years later, Serenity said she felt no more prepared as she was when she was a teenager.

“I think most of those days it was just me sitting on my desk and crying at the same time while doing what I needed to do for work,” she said. 

According to ICE, the agency made about 10,500 arrests in San Diego and Imperial counties in the first 14 months of Trump’s second term. About 1,500 of those arrests happened near schools, hospitals, houses of worship and other places after the administration loosened guidelines around enforcement in such “sensitive locations.”  

Most of those arrested, like Galicia’s mother, have no criminal record, according to an inewsource analysis of ICE arrests in the region from Trump’s inauguration through October 2025.

Galicia graduated June 13 with a degree in economics and a minor in ethnic studies. She said she wants to use her degree to help working-class immigrant families like hers and support her mom. 

Outside of the graduation ceremony, the three posed for photos in front of a green hedge, laughing and crying as they embraced the graduating Galicia in the middle. 

Despite the recent challenges, Galicia holds onto the biggest lesson her mom bestowed: Have hope for the future.

“People can take everything away from you, and you can essentially go down to rock bottom, but there’s always a way to keep going forward,” Galicia said.

Despite San Diego’s abundant marine life, the region’s commercial fishing industry is in decline. 

In 2020, the Scripps Institution of Oceanography started an apprentice program to help reverse the trend — but the program has had mixed results, reports Deborah Brennan at our partner CalMatters.  

Globalization is partly to blame for the busted economics of San Diego’s fishing industry. Higher wages and stricter regulations in the U.S. mean that fish caught in other countries are often cheaper. A 2016 report found that just 10 percent of seafood consumed in San Diego is caught locally. 

Wages have plummeted for U.S. fishing captains and their crews in the last decade. A deckhand in San Diego can expect to earn between $15,000 and $50,000 per year. 

The apprentice program doesn’t just teach people to fish, but to navigate, repair engines and even business skills. It hasn’t been without success — despite a Covid hiatus. Of 11 graduates, 6 are still fishing. But some of the captains who said the program was necessary have also been reluctant to mentor apprentices. 

Peter Brownell used to be research director for San Diego’s Center for Policy Initiatives. He studied, incidentally, poverty. Wanting to transition away from a desk job, he entered the program and is now scratching out an existence on the water. 

“If you’re entirely reliant on commercial fishing for all your economic needs, that’s a hard puzzle to put all the pieces together to make that work consistently year after year,” he said. 

Read the full story here. 

Council Considers Junk Fee Ordinance

The San Diego City Council heard details of a proposed “junk fee” ordinance that would cap extra fees for renters and require landlords to disclose fees before a lease is signed.

The proposal, introduced by Councilmembers Sean Elo-Rivera and Henry Foster, would cap fees at no more than five percent of the price of rent. It would also prohibit things like charges for basic building operating expenses, such as pest control. 

“What I’ve heard is a general consensus around the transparency components and agreement that people should know what they’re going to be asked to pay,” said Elo-Rivera during a hearing on the fee Tuesday. “They should know that at the beginning of their search and before they sign a lease, not after.” 

The Council only heard details on the new proposal. It did not vote on the ordinance.

AI-Powered Humanoid Robots Take Over the Web

It’s always strange when a story you write starts spreading. This week, I’ve been watching it happen with a story we published about a local charter network that spent $500,000 on two ChatGPT-powered humanoid robots. 

I wasn’t shocked the story struck a nerve. It had a built-in, WTF factor that seemed guaranteed to draw eyeballs. But more importantly, it comes at a moment when people across the world are grappling with what it means to live alongside technology. It’s playing out in skirmishes over edtech, battles over data centers, and now the question of humanoid robots in the classroom.

The story has moved from the new media food chain. First came news aggregators like the New York Post, then aggregation scavengers you’ve never heard of, and now even AI aggregators, which create something akin to news hot dogs — if hot dogs used an excessive amount of subheads and bullet points.

Underneath that hollow feeding frenzy, though, are real, local news organizations. The reporters and editors report on the communities you love, because they love them too. If you haven’t already, you should consider supporting this one.

Rabbitholed

University Heights’ neon street sign — with its iconic trolley car logo — is set to go dark. 

Locals were warned recently that city workers plan to turn off the 30-year-old sign due to wear and tear. Burned-out neon had already left some portions of the sign nonfunctioning.

Members of the University Heights Community Association say the city’s to blame. They allege city officials have drained funds from the neighborhood’s Maintenance Assessment District, which would normally pay for repairs. Now, they’re pressuring the city to pony up for fixes.

But behind the faulty neon is the fascinating, 130-year-plus origin of the sign’s trolley logo. It commemorates a time before the city was carved up by freeways — and instead had a thriving network of streetcars extending from Ocean Beach to La Jolla and Chula Vista. Many of those cars were repaired at a warehouse located at the site of Trolley Barn Park, hence the name – and the sign.

The streetcar network had plenty of ups and downs, like when John Spreckles, the richest man in San Diego at the time and owner of the network, ordered his workers to secretly dig up the tracks under the cover of night due to a dispute with city officials. Here’s an interesting story about how the actual streetcars evolved over the years. 

The system ultimately went defunct in 1949.

What’s your take? Do you wish the city still had an urban streetcar system?

In Other News

• Two San Marcos residents say their homeowners association is violating their rights to fly American flags outside their home. But legal experts say people do have the right to fly their flags even in homes subject to rules by homeowners associations. (inewsource)
• Longer meetings are coming to San Diego City Hall. As part of a new set of policies to boost public participation, city officials will allow group presentations during online meetings. (Union-Tribune)
• Speaking of City Hall, the San Diego City Council will soon create an affordable housing preservation fund backed by $8.5 million. Along with other funding sources, the fund will work to preserve affordable housing. (KPBS)
• The former news director of KPBS, Terrence Shepherd, is suing the outlet, alleging he was wrongfully terminated after recommending a reporter be fired because they’d “staged a protest scene” during a television shot. Exactly what Shepherd’s claim of a “staged protest” entails isn’t entirely clear. A spokesperson for KPBS declined to comment on the situation. (Current)

The Morning Report was written by Jakob McWhinney, Mariana Martínez Barba and Will Huntsberry. It was edited by Will Huntsberry. 

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The U.S. military identified a Minnesota Marine stationed in Southern California who went missing off San Diego last week, and confirmed his death.

Lance Cpl. Armando Ortiz Canseco was declared deceased Saturday. It is believed he was lost at sea after a training exercise.

“On behalf of the Marines and sailors of the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit, I extend our deepest condolences to the family and loved ones of Lance Cpl. Ortiz Canseco,” Col. Richard Alvarez, the commanding officer of the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit, said in a statement.

Ortiz Canseco was reported missing from the amphibious transport dock ship USS Anchorage early Thursday morning. His disappearance resulted in an extensive search and rescue operation, with efforts beginning around 1:20 a.m. Thursday.

The search spanned roughly 2,400 square miles and involved officials from the Navy, Marine Corps, Coast Guard and Air Force who used three surface ships and 12 aircraft, according to the military.

The Marine went missing during a training operation involving the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit and the Makin Island Amphibious Ready Group.

After nearly two full days of searching, the Navy transitioned to recovery operations.

“He earned the title of United States Marine and served his country with honor and commitment,” Alvarez said. “We mourn alongside his family, and we remain committed to bringing him home.”

This incident marks the second time in recent weeks that the U.S. military has searched for missing service members.

The remains of two Army soldiers who went missing while off duty from military exercises in Morocco were recovered in May, according to the Army.

Officials did not initially identify Ortiz Canseco on Thursday or disclose the circumstances surrounding his disappearance, saying his family needed to be notified first.

His death continues to be under investigation.

Ortiz Canseco enlisted in the Marine Corps in April 2023 and reported for training at Marine Corps Recruit Depot San Diego.

His individual awards include the Marine Corps Good Conduct Medal and Sea Service Deployment Ribbon.

Times staff writer Alene Tchekmedyian contributed to this report.