Confusion Marks INS Residency Deadline

They began gathering early Wednesday at the Pico-Union office of El Rescate, a social service group in the heart of Southern California’s Central American immigrant community.

Everybody had the same question, repeated by Ana Delgado of Long Beach: “Do we have to apply now under the new law?”

Thousands of Salvadoran and Guatemalan immigrants must file papers with immigration courts by Friday or lose their chance to stay permanently in the United States.

The deadline was written into the Nicaraguan and Central American Relief Act, passed by Congress last year to settle the uncertain future of immigrants from the long-embattled region.

The trouble is, few are really sure whom it applies to.

The law granted outright amnesty to Nicaraguan and Cuban immigrants, including those here illegally. Republican lawmakers backed a more generous treatment for those who fled nations headed by left-wing rulers.

But the statute mandated that Salvadorans and Guatemalans--who left U.S.-backed regimes--go through a more arduous process. They can only avert deportation by showing their expulsion would cause extreme hardship. All Salvadorans and Guatemalans seeking legal status under the new law must have been residing in the United States by 1990.

Confusion over the law is rampant.

Baffled Central American immigrants are besieging El Rescate and other service groups, as well as contacting private attorneys and the Immigration and Naturalization Service. Crowds are expected to build until Friday.

“There is a lot of apprehension out there,” said Robert Foss, an attorney at El Rescate, stationed at the front desk.

Friday’s deadline pertains only to those with outstanding deportation orders. The number is anybody’s guess, but most estimate that the deadline applies to only about one-tenth of the more than 200,000 Salvadorans and Guatemalans in the Los Angeles area who may ultimately qualify for permanent legal resident status under the new law.

Anyone with final orders of deportation must file a one-page petition with the immigration courts by Friday to reopen their case and become eligible under the new law.

But many Central American immigrants don’t know if they have been ordered deported or not. Often, the deportation documents were sent to wrong addresses. Sometimes the orders were issued in absentia.

Officials with the Immigration and Naturalization Service and the immigration courts say they have no idea how many final orders of deportation are pending.

“I’m not sure where my case is at right now, but I want to be sure that I don’t miss this opportunity,” said Sonia Fogeobach, a 40-year-old mother of six who brought her 7-year-old son, Jose, and her 16-year-old daughter, Narda.

Fogeobach was among the multitudes of Central Americans who slipped into the United States over the U.S.-Mexico border during the 1980s. It was a time when civil wars ravaged both El Salvador and Guatemala. Thousands ended up in deportation proceedings, though many were later spared expulsion through temporary legal reprieves.

A large number of those at El Rescate Wednesday were women. Invariably, they worried most about the fate of their children. Many have families split by immigration, with a mix of offspring born in the United States--and therefore U.S. citizens--and others born abroad.

In Fogeobach’s case, her three youngest children were born here and her three eldest remain Salvadoran nationals, making the family’s prospects uncertain.

“My children’s future is here,” said Fogeobach. “There is nothing for them back in El Salvador now.”

She and many others live in a legal limbo. They are no longer illegal immigrants. Most have been living with temporary legal status since 1990, when a landmark court settlement allowed hundreds of thousands of Salvadorans and Guatemalans to remain until their cases were finally decided.

Most have annually renewed work permits with the INS. Now, however, the day of reckoning is coming closer.

Eventually, all will have to make their cases before federal political asylum officers. The INS is expected to issue long-awaited guidelines within the month.

Most have no plans to return to Central America, regardless of the outcome. Their roots here, they say, are too deep.

“Even if I get deported, I will come back to this country,” said 22-year-old Astul Valle, a U.S. resident since the age of 14.

Nonetheless, many are anxious to return to Central America to visit loved ones. Most have not left the United States in recent years, fearing such travel could jeopardize their immigration status.

Felipe Velasquez has not seen his four children since he left El Salvador in 1982. All have since grown to adulthood. His parents have become elderly.

“A lifetime has passed,” said Velasquez, who just arrived from Salt Lake City to seek information.

Echoing the thoughts of many, Araceli Roque, 23, a Salvadoran mother of two U.S.-born children, said: “We live with uncertainty. Our status here is uncertain, and, if they send us back, we face an uncertain future.”