Grandfather with cancer deported from US to China during last family vacation

A Chinese man with stage 4 cancer and his wife were detained on Monday, May 21 after the Carnival cruise they were on docked at a port in Florida.

The Daily News reported that Joseph McDevitt and his wife Zhengjia had invited her parents, Huan Wang and Yuanjun Cui, on a cruise with the couple’s two small children during what was supposed to be a six-month stay in the USA.

The Chines couple, both of whom are 59-year-old executives for China Mobile from Shenyang, originally planned to return to their country on June 19. Cui has terminal stomach cancer and had been receiving treatment in China.

Cui is dying of stage 4 cancer. Because of his illness he had his stomach removed and went through several rounds of chemotherapy, the McDevitts invited him and his wife to stay with them in the country so they could get to know their young grandchildren.

But once the family returned from the Bahamas, the trip turned into a nightmare. Border Patrol officials detained the family within minutes of getting off the ship. They were separated and being held, without even having the chance to say goodbye.

The couple’s son-in-law, who is a pilot for the Army National Guard in Missouri, told that the entire family, including his wife Zhengjia, a naturalized U.S. citizen, and their American-born children, ages 3 and 4 years old, were also detained for about an hour.

The couple had a 10-year visitor visa issued by the U.S. Embassy in Shenyang, China, according to the family's lawyer, Susan Pai. The visa does not expire until 2027.

According to Pai, Cui’s wife said the CBP threatened her and her husband with jail time and not being able to see their daughter again in order to force her to sign a document that she had no understanding of.

Pai said the unexpected deportation resulted in Cui and wife Huan Wang getting stranded at Beijing’s airport with no food or money. Pai explained that Cui gets dehydrated really easily due to his poor health condition.