Deadline Poses Dilemma for Illegal Immigrants

Tens of thousands of illegal immigrants with pending green-card applications are grappling with whether to leave the United States by Saturday to keep their applications alive or face new penalties that could effectively bar many of them from ever attaining legal status.

A controversial new law--part of a broader national crackdown on illegal immigration--employs a carrot-and-stick approach that is causing widespread unease in immigrant neighborhoods nationwide.

The law tells illegal immigrants with green-card applications that they can eventually win legal residency only if they leave the country now and wait until their application is approved--a process that can take years.

Proponents say the changes add a deterrent to illegal immigration. Critics call the new rules a cruel device that divides families and denies the opportunity of legal status to longtime residents with established lives, employment and family ties here.

The law affects multitudes of illegal immigrants who are on waiting lists for green cards, usually under the sponsorship of U.S. relatives but also including many being sponsored by employers. Rough estimates indicate there are 1 million of these immigrants, and that a small percentage are seriously weighing whether to depart by Saturday.

Applicants for green cards are supposed to wait in their homelands, but federal law has allowed them to get around that requirement by paying a $1,000 fine.

That loophole is about to close; it was part of a 1994 federal law that will expire Tuesday. The net result: People like Norma Javier of Artesia are going home until their green cards are ready.

“I worked so hard here, and I don’t think it’s fair I have to leave,” said a tearful Javier, who has already purchased a ticket to return to her native Philippines and leave behind her husband, two daughters and a hard-earned $15-an-hour job that now is her family’s principal source of income.

Under the new law, illegal immigrants who do not leave by Saturday will be banned from receiving legal status for up to three years. The ban will extend to 10 years if those affected do not leave by next April.

Such a lengthy ban, analysts on both sides agree, will effectively prevent many violators from ever receiving green cards.

Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), chairman of the House immigration subcommittee, is a key supporter of the new restriction, which had received relatively little notice amid greatly increased deportations and other forced removals of illegal immigrants.

“The whole idea is not to reward illegal behavior, and to add a deterrent to illegal immigration,” Smith said. “If you’re an illegal immigrant, you’ve brought the problem on yourself.”

Judy Mark of the National Immigration Forum, a pro-immigrant advocacy group based in Washington, argues that the new rules penalize illegal immigrants who least deserve it: the ones “who are very close to legalizing their status or have a job waiting for them.”

The new law does not penalize minors who wait here for their green cards. And it allows applicants to apply for waivers of the new penalties if they can show that their absence would cause “extreme hardship” to a legal resident spouse or parent.

The pending changes are causing a near-panic in many immigrant communities, according to immigrant advocates.

While some illegal immigrants are planning to leave, activists say a mass exodus now seems unlikely--mostly because of the sheer inability of many to depart from well-established lives and return to tattered support networks in their home nations. Immigration and Naturalization Service authorities have vowed not to target people from green-card application lists, but INS officials are advising those affected to leave by Saturday and continue their applications at U.S. consulates abroad.

But many immigration experts say those who leave without first seeking legal counsel may be making a huge mistake and forfeiting future opportunities to gain legal status.

“It would be ludicrous to leave and just give away all your rights,” said Enrique Arevalo, a South Pasadena attorney who also hosts a Spanish-language radio show on immigration.

The Clinton administration favors legislation that would extend the current rule so that illegal immigrants with approved green-card petitions could continue paying fines to finish the process here.

The $1,000 fine is a major revenue source; it will generate an estimated $214 million in fees during this fiscal year--most of which is plowed into building new detention sites for illegal immigrants.

The Senate has approved the Clinton-backed extension as part of a budget bill. Numerous business groups have written to members of Congress backing an extension. But the measure has run up against strong opposition in the House, where Smith and other Republicans have blocked its passage.

Some panicked green-card applicants have already left the country. Others, like Norma Javier, have purchased tickets and begun packing but are still crossing their fingers in hopes that a solution will emerge from Washington.

“I still have hope I will be able to stay,” said Javier, 41, who said she arrived in the United States in 1991 with a tourist visa from the Philippines to be with family members, including two daughters, who are legal residents.

She has been waiting more than four years for her green-card petition--filed by her husband, Fred Alona, a legal immigrant--to be approved.

The family, including the couple’s 13-year-old daughter, Stephanie, are deeply disturbed about Javier’s impending departure. Javier, who also has a 22-year-old daughter living here, is scheduled to fly to Manila on Friday.

“Sometimes we can’t sleep at night; we are all here crying,” said Alona during an interview at the family’s $300-a-month rented apartment in a cramped converted garage.

Since arriving in California, Javier said, she worked hard to attend school and move up from a $6-an-hour dishwashing job to her current position as a diet technician in a rehabilitation center. But she will soon have to leave her work and family behind.

The costs will be felt in two nations. Javier now sends money home regularly to her mother in the Philippines. And, with her husband unemployed, Javier is also the primary provider for her family here.

Despite the family’s reservations, some legal experts say Javier’s case illustrates the kind of instance in which it is clearly advisable for a green-card applicant to leave and complete the process at a U.S. consulate abroad.

Having waited more than four years, Javier should shortly be notified that her green card is available. Javier will likely have to remain outside of the United States for no more than a year, said Carl Shusterman, Javier’s Los Angeles-based attorney.

In many cases, illegal immigrants with pending visa petitions have already opted to roll the dice and remain here, rejecting the prospect of abandoning families and jobs. By staying, though, all are risking being barred from ever receiving a future green card.

“I can’t leave my children now,” said Maria Cruz of Los Angeles, a Mexican immigrant whose two sons, Jesse, 5, and Guillermo, 3, are both U.S.-born.

For five years, Cruz has been in line for a green card via a petition filed by her husband, Martin Cruz, a legal immigrant from Mexico who works as a supervisor in a Los Angeles sewing factory. Her green card should be ready soon, but Cruz and her husband say she would have to take the two children back with her to Mexico if she were to leave.

“I just don’t see why I should leave if I’m going to get my papers in a few months anyway,” Cruz said. “That doesn’t seem right to me.”