Court Opens Amnesty to More Welfare Recipients

Immigrant activists Tuesday hailed a federal judge’s decision to increase the number of welfare recipients eligible for amnesty, saying that as many as 25,000 illegal immigrants in the Los Angeles area may now apply for temporary residence in this country.

On Monday, U.S. District Judge Edward J. Garcia in Sacramento ruled that Immigration and Naturalization Service regulations prohibiting welfare recipients and others who received public assistance from applying for amnesty were unconstitutional. He expanded a ruling he made last year--allowing eligibility for welfare recipients whose applications were rejected by the INS--to those aliens who were discouraged by word of mouth from applying.

‘Significant Decision’

The judge ordered INS officials to accept amnesty applications, beginning Aug. 10, for the rest of this year from eligible aliens.

“It’s a significant decision that reopens the amnesty process to many undocumented who were rejected for amnesty,” attorney Vibiana Andrade of the National Center for Immigrant Rights in Los Angeles said at a news conference.

Susan Alva, a lawyer with the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles, added, “Even those who received SSI (Supplemental Security Income) were rejected for amnesty.”

Under the landmark Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, illegal aliens who lived in the United States prior to Jan. 1, 1982, were eligible for amnesty and legal residency. About 3 million aliens nationwide signed up for amnesty during the application period that ended May 4, 1988.

Among those declared ineligible for amnesty were welfare recipients, who the INS said could not apply because they were receiving public funds to live illegally in this country.

The agency retreated from that position after it was sued by immigrant activists, who argued that the INS had unjustly denied amnesty for as many as 50,000 aliens in the western United States.

Typical of the plight facing these aliens, activists said, was that of Emarita Rodriguez, a 33-year-old mother of two from Honduras who has been prevented from being legally employed because she has not applied for amnesty.

“I didn’t even bother to apply because many told me I couldn’t qualify because I was on welfare,” she said in Spanish at the news conference. “I want amnesty so I can get a job. Who wants to come to this country to be unemployed? I didn’t.”

Andrade said eligible aliens should call a special hot line for information on how to apply under Monday’s ruling. The daytime telephone number is (800) 346-2536.

Contacted later, Bill King, head of INS’ legalization program in the West, said the agency will comply with the judge’s ruling. But he added that the deadline for the amnesty program’s second phase, Nov. 3, 1990, will not be extended to accommodate applications from welfare recipients.

Meanwhile, INS officials held their own news conference in Los Angeles to unveil a series of public service announcements featuring actor Edward James Olmos that urge amnesty applicants to complete the program’s second phase.

Olmos, who was nominated for an Oscar for his portrayal of Garfield High School calculus teacher Jaime Escalante in the film, “Stand and Deliver,” said he was leery of becoming an INS spokesman, but was persuaded because of the nearly 1 million aliens who applied for amnesty under the program’s initial phase in the West.

“It would be a sin if any of them slipped through the cracks,” the actor said.

So far, about 380,800 aliens in the West have completed the second phase requirements--knowledge of English and U.S. history, King said.