Study: Poverty more likely for kids of illegal immigrants

By Sara Olkon | Tribune reporter
April 15, 2009
Roxana Joachin never dreamed that her sons, Sebastian and Ricardo, would grow up without their father.

The Pilsen woman, a part-time secretary, now relies on church food baskets, public aid and help from relatives to house and clothe her boys. In 2004, her common-law husband, Roberto Lopez, was deported back to Mexico. An illegal immigrant, Lopez had been working as a carpet layer on the North Side.

Joachin and her sons, all U.S. citizens, pray for the day Lopez can return.

"I tell them, 'Papi is working out of town,' " she said as she wiped away tears.



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Little pre-K access for Latinos Growing numbers of children of illegal immigrants are being born in this country, and they are nearly twice as likely to live in poverty as the children of American-born parents, says a report released Tuesday by the Pew Hispanic Center.

In 2008, 73 percent of the children of undocumented immigrants were U.S.-born, compared with 63 percent in 2003.

The study highlights a complicating factor in the Immigration debate: Illegal immigrants' children born in the United States are American citizens, yet they struggle in poverty and uncertainty along with their parents.

"By the time they get to high school they are dropping out in much greater numbers" than the children of American-born parents, said Joshua Hoyt, executive director of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights.

Hoyt has said restrictions on illegal immigrants should be eased.

"As the Baby Boomers retire there is a need for a massive replacement of workers both to pay our Social Security and to do work that needs to be done," he said. "If we don't legalize the undocumented and put them and their children on a ladder that they climb out of poverty, the undocumented and their families will suffer today, the rest of us will suffer tomorrow."

William Gheen, president of the Americans for Legal Immigration political action committee, said he thinks illegal immigrants are causing the suffering.

"The increase in the number of babies that illegal immigrants are having illustrates what we've known for some time: They are intentionally exploiting the birthright citizen provision," Gheen said.

But Martin Andrade isn't thinking about politics when he describes his wife's forced separation from him and their three children.

A U.S. citizen living in southwest suburban Burbank, Andrade met his wife, Maria, while studying in Mexico City in 1999. After they married, Maria Andrade applied for citizenship. While they waited, she sneaked into the country illegally. They started a family and moved to South Chicago. In 2005, she received a letter from Immigration officials. The couple thought her citizenship papers had finally gone through. Instead, Maria Andrade was arrested and deported.




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