The father of a Texas teenager couldn't attend her graduation last week because he was deported years ago, but video of their tearful reunion afterward on a border bridge to Mexico has gone viral, NBC News reported.
Sarai Ruiz's mother was at her graduation at Hector J. Garcia Early College High School in Laredo, but seeing other families together for her classmates, she told NBC News, "it really did hit home for me. I knew that my dad couldn't be there."
The 18-year-old lives with both her parents across the border in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, and that night, her father was waiting on the bridge to embrace her. Video of the moment has been seen on Facebook more than 2.8 million times.
"I gave him a hug and I just started to cry a lot," Ruiz said. "It's like I fulfilled the dreams of both my mom and dad to find better opportunities that they didn't have."
