As a US immigrant, I recently experienced what it’s like to have someone you care about be deported from the United States. A friend from college and I were to meet up for drinks in West Hollywood over the weekend and have a girls night out. During the week, however, she sent me a text message saying this weekend was canceled as she was deported back to Mexico the day before. I was devistated, but also quite shocked as I didn’t know she was undocumented in the US. I just assumed that she was legally here considering how visible she was during college and didn’t even think that she is part of a hidden class of people living in this country who have to constantly fear about being deported.
When we were both in college, we both looked like your typical overachieving students. She and I were both student leaders and involved with campus life with her in student government and Me in my LGBTA organization. We had talks about various things during our college years such as gay rights, the war in Iraq, clashing of cultures, and funny enough, immigration reform. Go figure we both end up learning we are opposite sides of the immigration reform debate that has been talked about, yet not acted upon. Even from Democrats in safe districts.
When she finally had a chance to explain her situation to me after settling herself in Mexico, I found out just how complicated immigration laws are for current undocumented people. To be held for over 8 hours in a detention center after being stalked by Immigration and Customs Enforcement for weeks to try to arrest you and then shipped back across the boarder with nothing more than what you were arrested in is quite enraging to me. I guess after undocumented people are thrown out of the country it becomes that out of sight, out of mind mentality. I doubt that was the original intention of deportation when thought about in the abstract on paper, but I’m sure no one thought the experience in real life would be so… criminal.
And in the end, with all the difference she has made to countless people, including myself, she was still thrown out due to bureaucratic technicalities. She wasn’t a criminal; she worked, paid her taxes, volunteered in the community, was politically involved as much as I am still and that didn’t matter in the end. Both of us were born somewhere else and then our parents made the decision for us to move to the United States to have a better life and in the end we both contributed positively but she ended up being shown the door in spite of it all. Even though our parents made the decision back then to come to the United States, we both made the decision to contribute and to become involved which is more than people who were born here and can vote but choose not to care. And yet we still do, no matter what has happened. Even though we have hundreds of miles, a border patrol checkpoint, and crazy immigration laws between us, some things never change. She’s still the same friend who still wonders why I drink so much coffee or why I am such a workaholic. A lot can change thanks to laws and procedures, but not friendships.
Last 5 posts by Michael C
- Time flies when trying to change the world... - August 12th, 2010
- Rapid Response Alert - Meg Whitman in LA - 8/12/10 - August 11th, 2010
- Phonebank Day for Assemblymember John Laird - June 18th, 2010
- Stonewall Young Democrats awarded the 2010 Outstanding Chapter by California Young Democrats! - April 19th, 2010
- SYD Membership renewal for April 12, 2010 Endorsements - March 17th, 2010