Thread: American dream deferred

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American dream deferred
Path to U.S.

By PAMELA MANSON , Salt Lake Tribune
June 29, 2006


It took June and John Sweeney 26 years. Seven years for Maria Prows. Seventeen and counting for Edna Smith; five plus a month or so for Zlatko Avdic.

All those years to become a citizen of the United States, and more: Mastering a bureaucratic maze, learning English as well as the history and civics of this nation and spending a considerable amount of money in the process.

Prows and the Sweeneys said it has all been worth it, and so will Smith and Avdic, as soon as they raise their hands and take the oath of citizenship this summer.

''I've lived here so long, America is my country,'' said Smith, 56, of West Jordan, Utah, a native of Indonesia.

At a time when an estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants are in the United States and Congress is stalled on competing House and Senate immigration-reform legislation, many foreign-born people are enjoying the privileges of citizenship or approaching the end of the long process to attain the official status of ''American.''

Twenty years ago, Prows went twice to the American consulate in her hometown of Mazatlan, Mexico, to get a tourist visa to the United States. Each time, hours of waiting ended with rejection.

So she traded paperwork for prayer.

''I prayed with all my heart,'' said Prows, 39, a convert to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who lives in Provo.

On her third call to the consulate, she got her visa, which led to meeting her future husband in Utah and eventually becoming a U.S. citizen.

''When I became an American, it was one of my dreams come true,'' Prows said. ''I wanted to be able to vote. I wanted to be part of the American culture.''

Becoming a U.S. citizen was once a relatively simple matter. Not anymore.

These days an immigrant first has to be allowed into the United States by qualifying under certain categories. Most then have to apply to be a legal permanent resident, or LPR, which allows them to get a work permit and puts them on the path to citizenship, generally a five-year process. Members of the military and spouses of U.S. citizens wait three years.

At both the LPR and naturalization stages, applicants undergo security checks and submit proof they meet standards of good moral character. They also must turn in the results of medical examinations performed by a certified doctor to show they have the required vaccinations and are free of conditions that are a public health concern, such as tuberculosis or HIV/AIDS.

Finally, they are tested on their knowledge of civics and their proficiency in English.

People who came into the United States illegally are usually barred from becoming an LPR or a citizen. That law has stopped millions of undocumented immigrants, many of them from Mexico, from legalizing their status and has led to calls for changes in immigration law.

Undocumented immigrants who marry U.S. citizens still have a chance of living in the country legally but first must return to their homelands and apply from there. Some might never be allowed to return.

Provo lawyer J. Christopher Keen said immigrants do not need legal assistance to apply for residency or naturalization. However, they should consult an attorney if there is a question on whether an old conviction or multiple trips outside the United States might cause a problem, he said.

Limits on the number of immigrants allowed into this country each year can frustrate even those who are eligible to come legally. Once the quota for a certain category is reached, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, or CIS, waits until the next year to resume processing those applications, which has resulted in a huge backlog in some cases.

This month, CIS is processing applications from Mexico first filed in 1992 by the unmarried sons and daughters of naturalized U.S. citizens, and applications filed in 1983 by the brothers and sisters of naturalized U.S. citizens from the Philippines.

Canadians June and John Sweeney, both 57, waited nearly two decades to emigrate south. ''I have always wanted to be an American,'' John Sweeney said.

In 2004, according to the latest Office of Immigration Statistics yearbook, immigrants admitted as LPRs totaled 946,142. Some, including the Sweeneys, had waited for a long time to settle in the United States.

June Sweeney's sister moved to Utah in 1964, married an American and became a citizen. That opened the door for her sister and brother-in-law to apply to follow her.

June and John Sweeney first applied for entry in December 1972 and tried various avenues over the years, including a CIS lottery that admits a number of immigrants whose applications are drawn at random.

They got nowhere for a long time. The fact that John Sweeney's adoptive father was born in Buffalo, N.Y., before his family moved to Canada when he was 2 years old didn't help. Nor did his Mohawk Indian ancestry.

Whenever they had a question, no matter how simple, the Sweeneys had to drive an hour to Toronto from their home in Hamilton, Ontario, and wait for hours to see someone at the U.S. consulate. The employees seemed hardened and cynical, John Sweeney said.

''We were reconciled to the fact that if it's going to happen, it would be years,'' he said.

When approval finally came in 1990, the Sweeneys quickly had to sell their home and business. Their son, Jefferson, had been called to serve a mission in California for the Mormons, but he was granted a delay so he could meet a requirement that he be in Canada when the immigration papers were processed.

Family members submitted medical exam reports that cost $1,500 for the Sweeneys and their three children, and fingerprints for security checks.

The family arrived in 1990, just in time for the Fourth of July, and became citizens in 1998. Today, John Sweeney works for an architectural casting company and June Sweeney as a secretary and dance teacher.

Prows, too, had a hard time. The first person she dealt with at the American consulate refused to approve a visa because she didn't own a home. On her third visit, a different employee waived that requirement.

Prows met her husband-to-be, Joseph H. Prows III, during a visit to Brigham Young University. The two conducted a long-distance courtship, and she came to Utah from Mexico again. It was hard to go back home after that, Prows says, but they were determined to do things right.

Once Joseph Prows asked her to marry him, he applied for a fiancee visa.

Six months later, in 1988, the application was approved, and the two had 30 days to wed. Prows' other dream, to be married in the LDS Church's Salt Lake Temple, was realized just in time. Joseph Prows is now a Mormon bishop, and the couple have five children.

Along the way, Maria Prows became a citizen.

''I was nervous in my interview, but I did well,'' she said. ''They were kind to me.''

Avdic, 40, also is close to becoming an American. He's a Bosnian refugee who had been a legal permanent resident for the minimum of five years when he took the final steps this spring in the naturalization process.

''From the beginning, it was hard,'' Avdic said. ''Later, it was (still) hard.''

His teacher, Tatjana Micic, an immigration coordinator with the International Rescue Committee in Salt Lake City, says learning a new language and a new nation's history can be intimidating. A refugee from Bosnia herself, she prepares newcomers from all over the world for their citizenship interviews.

Edna Smith arrived from Indonesia in 1989, one of the winners of the CIS lottery that allowed her to emigrate immediately as a legal permanent resident. She married five years ago and is studying to become a real estate agent.

Studying for her citizenship interview was nerve-racking, but Smith passed in May. She will officially become a citizen this summer.

Soon, she said, ''I can vote. My voice can be heard.''

Becoming a U.S. citizen was once a relatively simple matter. Not anymore.

That was probably before we had 300 million people in this country. Our natural resources and space are not unlimited.