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The immigration system's tangled web
Second of TWO parts
For 13 years Antonio Minev made a life for himself in the United States. A native of Bulgaria, he came to this country legally, like many immigrants, to find more freedom.
But Minev overstayed his visitor's visa and eventually found himself on the wrong side of immigration law.
Immigration officials deported Minev and because he was in the country illegally for longer than a year. By law, he can't return for 10 years.
Now his wife is hoping to find a way to get her husband back.
By Paul Sloth
Racine
- The immigration system is a complex labyrinth of agencies and offices and forms.
Antonio and Angela Minev of Racine learned this the hard way, as they worked to gain legal status for Antonio, who had spent the past 13 years in the United States working and paying taxes.
For eight of those years, Antonio was in the country illegally.
The experts who deal with the immigration legal system every day describe it as a bureaucratic nightmare that can be nearly impossible for immigrants in this country, legally and illegally, to understand.
Benjamin Johnson, director of the Immigration Policy Center at the Washington D.C.-based American Immigration Law Foundation, said situations like the Mineves' happen all the time.
Johnson cited statistics that between 40 and 60 percent of illegal immigrants entered the United States legally. Many of this large number of people have been here for years.
Johnson said there are estimates that up to 4 million undocumented immigrants have been in the United States for 10 years or more.
"I'm not suggesting they should get a free pass, but the punishment should be proportional. Ten years (to be deported out of the country), that's huge and I think we need to have a real debate about whether that's proportional punishment," Johnson said.
Immigration law makes U.S. tax law look like a walk in the park, Johnson said.
"There's very little flexibility in it," Johnson said. "Since 1996, we've taken away most of the discretion out of the hands of immigration judges to look at things on a case-by-case basis."
In 1996, Congress passed two laws in an effort to get tough on terrorism. One law was a response to the Oklahoma City bombings. Significant parts of that law made changes in U.S. immigration law, Johnson said.
The other law, the Illegal Immigrant Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, imposed many harsh penalties on legal and illegal immigrants and limited the ability to appeal immigration cases to federal courts.
Johnson said the law was punitive and helped to create the situation the U.S. faces today. It led to a system that he and others describe as ineffective and prone to error.
"I fear that the anger, and perhaps legitimate anger and anxiety people have about the immigration system, have desensitized us to the human side of the immigration experience," Johnson said. "We have an obligation to focus our anger on the real causes of the problem of undocumented people and not cast a net so wide that it catches up many otherwise decent people."
A difficult fight
A good number of immigrants aren't always aware of their rights, said Tara Tidwell Cullen, communications and litigation coordinator for the National Immigrant Justice Center, a non-profit immigration law firm based in Chicago.
Her agency works with many immigrants in detention awaiting deportation or fighting deportation and provides legal assistance to low-income immigrants in almost any type of situation.
"It can be difficult to fight if you don't have the money. One of the biggest challenges is finding legal representation," Tidwell Cullen said. "Under immigration law, the United States government does not provide legal representation. Immigrants are responsible for finding their own and paying for it."
Many families, like the Minevs, are facing separation. There are no guarantees that a person here illegally will gain citizenship by marrying a U.S. citizen or having a child while they're here.
Part of the problem is the fact that immigration law is so complex. People are surprised to learn how complex it is, Tidwell Cullen said.
"It is very easy, if you don't understand immigration law, to make a mistake," Tidwell Cullen said. "It is very common."
Left behind
Antonio said it is difficult to think about leaving his wife and daughter, but he said he is not angry with the U.S.
"I'm angry because I left a baby and a wife. I left some part of me over there," Antonio said. "You can't leave 14 years behind you easily."
During the past five years, the Minevs worked with attorneys trying to appeal previous immigration officials' decisions. It's difficult for Angela to sort through the mountain of paperwork that has accumulated.
It's been very frustrating.
"If you're not told the right thing, you can fall through so many loopholes," Angela said. "Now everything falls on me to get him back here, if I can."
While her husband gets accustomed to life in Bulgaria again, Angela waits to learn the decision on their latest appeal. Because he was deported, Antonio can't return to the United States for 10 years.
Angela knows the likelihood of her husband returning, before the mandatory 10 years, is slim. Though it's hard to see the positive in any of this, Angela wants something good to come of her experience, whatever happens to her family.
"If I can prevent this from happening to anyone else, then what has happened has not been in vain," Angela said.
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| Deported -- He came here legally, married an American woman -- and now he's back in Bulgaria | Racine women's curling team takes second in national competition |
