Illegal immigrants prepare for application process

Anita Wadhwani, awadhwani@tennessean.com8:02 p.m. CST November 28, 2014


(Photo: Thinkstock.com)

A week after President Obama outlined a series of executive orders overhauling immigration policy, many Nashville-area illegal immigrants were cautiously optimistic, tracking down old documents to ready proof of the years they have been living here in anticipation of an as-yet-to-be-announced application process.

But many unknowns about the president’s new policy remain.

The Davidson County Sheriff’s office has received no information about the replacement program for “secure communities,” a controversial, cooperative agreement with immigration officials to verify the immigration status of those arrested.

Employers may be confronted with a surge in work permits to verify. Private contractors in the immigration enforcement business such as Nashville-based Corrections Corporation of America face uncertainty over future profits depending on whether the plan leads to more — or fewer — immigrants held in the detention centers they operate.


Approximately 40,000 illegal immigrants living in Tennessee will be protected from deportation under the president’s new plan, among the 4.9 million immigrants nationwide who will qualify. They won’t be able to get U.S. citizenship or a green card, but they will be able to remain in the country legally, obtain a work permit and receive a Social Security number.


Azucena Ramirez is one of them. The 21-year-old Nashville waitress has been living in the United States illegally since she was 13. She was brought by her mother, who also remains here illegally. Both Ramirez and her mother will likely qualify to live in the country legally.


Ramirez cried when she learned of the plan. She said she has lived in constant fear that she will be deported since she was a girl, a fear that has deepened since she had her own daughter two years ago.


“I remember only a few things from Mexico,” she said. “I don’t know what I would do if I had to go back. I don’t know what my daughter would do. It’s terrifying. I hope I can finally get a better job and open my own business.”


While Ramirez said she is grateful for the full-time job she has in a Mexican restaurant, Obama’s announcement has opened the door to new possibilities.


She could open her own cleaning business like her aunt, she said.

Ramirez said she wants a way to avoid some of the indignities she is sometimes confronted with waiting on tables: The inebriated customers at a birthday party who began dancing on a table and then drunkenly mocked her Spanish accent when asked to leave; the woman who scolded her for not adding salt on a mango-flavored margarita, telling her she should go back to where she came from.


“I just want to not be stressed, to know that me and my mom and my daughter are safe here,” she said.


Under Obama’s new orders, Ramirez will qualify as the parent of a U.S. citizen who has lived in the United States for at least five years and does not have a criminal record. The Deferred Action for Parental Accountability will account for the lion’s share of immigrants who will qualify under the new plan. Ramirez’ mother, who has two citizen children, will also likely qualify. The plan remains a temporary measure, with people qualifying for just three years.


They will not be allowed to access the Affordable Care Act, but may be able eligible for Medicare and Social Security. Like all working Americans and legal immigrants, they will have to pay taxes.


Other elements of Obama’s executive orders:

•Expansion of a program for childhood immigrants: A 2-year-old program known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals will expand. The program is intended to protect illegal immigrants from deportation if they arrived before the age 16 and meet certain criteria, such as graduating from high school or completing a military tour of service. The president expanded the program to end the age limit of 31 for applicants, giving anyone who arrived before the age of 16 a chance to apply. The president also expanded the renewal requirement for the program from two years to three years.
•Immigration enforcement: The new plan will also change a program known as Secure Communities that is under operation in Davidson County. Under the program, everyone arrested by local law enforcement has their fingerprints checked against federal immigration databases. If an immigration violation is found, the person is detained until immigration agents pick them up to begin deportation proceedings. Under the president’s order, the program will be renamed the Priority Enforcement Program. It will notify immigration agencies only for those convicted of a felony, who are gang members or pose “a demonstrable risk to national security.”
The new plan will impact the way the government handles illegal immigrants living far from the border as part of an effort the administration calls “deporting felons, not families.”
•Beefed up border security: The Department of Homeland Security will create the “Southern Border and Approaches Campaign Plan,” an attempt to refocus its enforcement resources toward the southwest border with Mexico.
The department started shifting resources over the summer, when a wave of unaccompanied Central American children rushed across the border. Approximately 1,200 of those children were released to sponsors in Tennessee. Obama’s plan will send more Border Patrol agents, immigration judges and U.S. attorneys to the border to speed up deportations of people caught crossing.
•High-tech visas: Currently, most foreign high-tech workers are sponsored by a company and can only change jobs after going through a lengthy and complicated process. The new plan will make it easier for them to switch jobs when they’re in the United States.

The new changes will also open the door for spouses of foreign workers to get their own jobs, and change requirements for applying to make it easier to enter the country.


Reach Anita Wadhwani at 615-259-8092 or on Twitter @AnitaWadhwani.

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