A spate of federal immigration enforcement raids from Los Angeles to New York has sparked demonstrations and rallies around the country, leading to mass arrests and National Guard deployment.

The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement crackdown has heightened concerns of foreign-born residents, especially undocumented immigrants and their families, about how they should prepare for worst-case scenarios of being detained or deported. 

Planning ahead for such emergency scenarios must include a strategy for who will handle their finances and how, experts say. 

“When people are detained or deported without having legally designated somebody to manage their assets, they might lose access to their accounts or their property,” said Sarah Pacilio, a director at the Appleseed Network, a nonprofit network of justice centers in the U.S. and Mexico. 

Managing financial matters from abroad can be challenging due to limited access to bank accounts or service providers, she said. 

Having a plan is crucial. The Appleseed Network has published a detailed “Deportation Preparation Manual for Immigrant Families,” which is available for free on its website. There are also financial planners who offer their services for free to families in need, through groups including the Financial Planning Association and the Foundation for Financial Planning.  

“Right now, there’s a lot of fear, there’s a lot of trauma,” said certified financial planner Louis Barajas, CEO of International Private Wealth Advisors.

“I want to give people information so they can at least take some power back,” said Barajas, whose firm is based in Orange County, California, and who does pro bono work with Santa Ana’s predominantly Latino community.

To protect assets — including homes, bank accounts and retirement savings — financial and legal experts recommend taking these key steps:   

Store these records and documents in a safe deposit box at a bank or a fireproof, waterproof box or safe. Digitize the documents, too, with password-protected cloud storage or encrypted flash drives. 

Taking this step can help ensure you have key details about accounts and assets wherever you are, and that physical documents are in one safe location for a trusted family member to access.

Have legal documents in place, especially a financial power of attorney, or POA. Designating a POA also creates a back-up plan, Barajas said, so that “someone they trust can manage their finances if they are out of the country.” 

A POA can also give the person you designate the authority to sign checks from your bank account, make decisions about your child’s schooling and health care, or use your money to buy or sell major items such as a car, according to the Appleseed Network.

Work with a legal expert to draft a pre-need guardianship document. Naming a guardian for your child in a legal document will allow an adult of your choice to step in if you are no longer able to care for the child, say, if you are deported and your child remains in the U.S., said Barajas, who is also a member of the CNBC Financial Advisor Council.

Consider buying a term life insurance policy, which can provide benefits to your loved ones if you die. Already have one? Carefully review your beneficiaries. 

Create an estate plan. Consider setting up a trust to transfer assets such as real estate, non-retirement savings and life insurance proceeds, Barajas said.

“A lot of single mothers who have been deported do have insurance,” he said. “Because they’re they’re single mothers, they have named their minor children as beneficiaries on their life insurance policies — and that’s a major mistake.”

Insurers won’t give proceeds directly to minors, he said. 

“That’s why I’d like them to get an estate plan done so they can name a trust as a beneficiary,” he said. “So if something were to happen to them, someone can manage that money for their children.”

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Senate Republicans’ proposal to overhaul student loan repayment could trigger a surge in defaults, one expert said.

The Senate GOP reconciliation bill’s higher education provisions “would cause widespread harm to American families,” Sameer Gadkaree, the president of The Institute for College Access & Success, said in a statement. The proposals do so by “making student debt much harder to repay” and “unleashing an avalanche of student loan defaults,” he wrote.

The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions introduced bill text on June 10 that would change how millions of new borrowers pay down their debt. The proposal made only minor tweaks to the repayment terms in the legislation House Republicans advanced in May.

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With control of Congress, Republicans can pass their legislation using “budget reconciliation,” which needs only a simple majority in the Senate.

Gadkaree and other consumer advocates have expressed concerns about how the new terms would imperil many borrowers’ ability to meet their monthly bills — and to ever get out of their debt.

More than 42 million Americans hold student loans, and collectively, outstanding federal education debt exceeds $1.6 trillion. More than 5 million borrowers were in default as of late April, and that total could swell to roughly 10 million borrowers within a few months, according to the Trump administration.

But under the Senate Republican proposal, there would be just two repayment plan choices for those who borrow federal student loans after July 1, 2026. (Current borrowers should maintain access to other existing repayment plans.)

As of now, borrowers who enroll in the standard repayment plan typically get their debt divided into 120 fixed payments, over 10 years. But the Republicans’ new standard plan would provide borrowers fixed payments over a period between 10 years and 25 years, depending on how much they owe.

For example, those with a balance exceeding $50,000 would be in repayment for 15 years; if you owe over $100,000, your fixed payments will last for 25 years.

Borrowers would also have an option of enrolling in an income-based repayment plan, known as the “Repayment Assistance Plan,” or RAP.

Monthly bills for borrowers on RAP would be set as a share of their income. Payments would typically range from 1% to 10% of a borrower’s income; the more they earn, the bigger their required payment. There would be a minimum payment of $10 a month for all borrowers.

While IDR plans now conclude in loan forgiveness after 20 years or 25 years, RAP wouldn’t lead to debt erasure until 30 years.

The plan would offer borrowers some new perks, including a $50 reduction in the required monthly payment per dependent.

Still, Kantrowitz said: “Many low-income borrowers will be in repayment under RAP for the full 30-year duration.”

A typical student loan borrower with a college degree could pay an extra $2,929 per year if the Senate GOP proposal of RAP is enacted, compared to the Biden administration’s now blocked SAVE plan, according to a recent analysis by the Student Borrower Protection Center.

The Center included the calculations in a June 11 letter to the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions.

“As the Committee considers this legislation, it is clear that a vote for this bill is a vote to saddle millions of borrowers across the country with more student loan debt, at the same moment that a slowing economy, a reckless trade war, and spiraling costs of living squeeze working families from every direction,” Mike Pierce, the executive director of the Center, wrote in the letter.

The second-quarter estimated tax deadline is June 16 — and on-time payments can help you avoid “falling behind” on your balance, according to the IRS.

Typically, quarterly payments apply to income without tax withholdings, such as earnings from self-employment, freelancing or gig economy work. You may also owe payments for interest, dividends, capital gains or rental income. 

The U.S. tax system is “pay-as-you-go,” meaning the IRS expects you to pay taxes as you earn income. If your taxes are not withheld from earnings, you must pay the IRS directly.  

The quarterly tax deadlines for 2025 are April 15, June 16, Sept. 15 and Jan. 15, 2026. These dates don’t line up with calendar quarters and so can easily be missed, experts said.

The second-quarter deadline in particular “often sneaks up on people,” especially higher earners or business owners with irregular income, said certified financial planner Nathan Sebesta, owner of Access Wealth Strategies in Artesia, New Mexico.

“I often see clients forget capital gains, side income, or large distributions that were not subject to withholding,” Sebesta said.

Quarterly payments are due for individuals, sole proprietors, partners and S corporation shareholders who expect to owe at least $1,000 for the current tax year, according to the IRS. The threshold is $500 for corporations. 

If you skip the June 16 deadline, you could see an interest-based penalty based on the current interest rate and how much you should have paid. That penalty compounds daily.

On-time quarterly payments can help avoid “possible underpayment penalties,” the IRS said in an early June news release. 

Employer withholdings are considered evenly paid throughout the year. By comparison, quarterly payments have set time frames and deadlines, said CFP Laurette Dearden, director of wealth management for Dearden Financial Services in Laurel, Maryland.

“This is why a penalty often occurs,” said Dearden, who is also a certified public accountant.

That threshold increases to 110% if your 2024 adjusted gross income was $150,000 or more, which you can find on line 11 of Form 1040 from your 2024 tax return.

However, the safe harbor protects you only from underpayment penalties. If you don’t pay enough, you could still owe taxes for 2025, experts say.