Salvadoran Immigrants' Fears Grow : Refugees: Program that let tens of thousands legally stay in U.S. expires Dec. 31. White House is pondering an extension, but any decision is likely to spark protests.

By PATRICK J. McDONNELL

Nov. 15, 1994 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

Already unsettled by Proposition 187, Southern California’s huge Salvadoran exile community is bracing for another possible blow: next month’s scheduled expiration of a program that has allowed tens of thousands of Salvadoran immigrants to remain in the United States legally for years.

While most experts agree that large-scale deportations are unlikely, rumors of such extreme action have sent a shudder through Salvadoran expatriate neighborhoods from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C., and mobilized activists pressuring the White House for an extension of many Salvadorans’ legal status.

On Monday, the Salvadoran government’s top-ranking official in the United States spoke in Los Angeles in an effort to quell the fears of compatriots worried both about the effects of Proposition 187 and the scheduled end of their legal immigration status Dec. 31.

“Be calm,” Ana Cristina Sol, El Salvador’s ambassador to the United States, urged her fellow citizens during a news conference at the Salvadoran consulate across from MacArthur Park in Los Angeles, heart of the Salvadoran community in the United States. “Continue sending your children to school, keep going to clinics if you need (medical) assistance.”

Salvadoran President Armando Calderon Sol (a distant relative of the ambassador) has condemned Proposition 187, which bars illegal immigrants from most public services, as has Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari.

Salvadorans, their numbers bolstered during a massive 1980s exodus as their nation was riven by civil war, may have surpassed Cubans as the second most populous Latino immigrant group, after Mexican nationals. As many as 400,000 Salvadorans reside in the Los Angeles area, according to community estimates.

In 1990, Congress initially granted all Salvadoran citizens residing in the United States a special temporary “protected” status, barring most deportations, at a time when the civil war was still raging.

Since then, a series of government actions have essentially extended that provision, shielding tens of thousands of Salvadoran immigrants from deportation. The protections outlasted the civil war, which ended in 1992.

Currently, an estimated 90,000 Salvadoran nationals across the United States are protected under “Deferred Enforced Departure,” initially granted by President Bush and later extended by the Clinton Administration.

However, that status is due to expire Dec. 31, causing great consternation among Salvadorans. Many have been here 10 years or more and have no intention of returning to a land still suffering the aftereffects of a debilitating, more than decade-long civil war that left a legacy of economic ruin, political instability and widespread crime.

“Our life is here now,” said Francisco Argueta, a Salvadoran immigrant who, along with his wife and 8-year-old son, are in the United States under deferred enforcement, having arrived seven years ago. “We have roots in this community, and we’re not going to return.”

The Clinton Administration is pondering whether to extend the program, a decision that will have considerable implications both for U.S. domestic and foreign policy.

“The matter is under review by the Department of Justice, in consultation with the White House and the State Department,” said Ana Cobian, a Justice Department spokeswoman in Washington.

Extending Salvadorans’ special status would likely trigger a torrent of criticism, particularly in the current political atmosphere hostile to illegal immigration.

“The time has come for the El Salvadorans to go home,” declared Dan Stein, executive director of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a Washington, D.C.-based group that seeks restrictions on new immigrants.

But denying the Salvadorans an extension would spark outrage among human rights advocates who have long championed the cause of Salvadoran refugees, the original beneficiaries of the sanctuary movement of the 1980s. Moreover, the Salvadoran government--a staunch U.S. ally in Central America--has formally requested that Salvadorans’ protected status be extended.

Remittances by Salvadorans to their homeland, believed to approach $1 billion annually, have helped to prop up a tottering economy. Any large-scale forced repatriation would likely have serious social and economic consequences in the struggling Central American nation.

Analysts say massive deportations are unlikely.

If their status is not extended, some Salvadorans are likely to return voluntarily. That would continue a trend that has accelerated since the civil war ended and large-scale illegal immigration of Salvadorans to the United States slowed to today’s more moderate levels. Others denied extensions will revert to illegal status, securing false papers to assist them find and maintain jobs.

But if the protected status ends, most Salvadoran immigrants will likely apply for political asylum, citing potential persecution if forced back to El Salvador and joining a U.S. asylum application backlog now approaching 500,000 cases. Most asylum applicants would be eligible for working papers while their cases make their way through the system, a process that can drag on for years.

Some Salvadorans may also seek relief under so-called “suspension of deportation” procedures, available for some illegal immigrants who have resided in the United States at least seven years. Applicants for suspension may win lawful permanent residence status if they can demonstrate good moral character and show that they would face severe hardship if forced to return.