http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent ... 55487.html

While tens of thousands of illegal Mexicans rape, rob and pillage our country daily WITHOUT REPRISAL, the idiots in immigration want to zero in on this lady and deport her. What is wrong with this picture?

City official plans hunger strike to keep wife in U.S.
Agency cites violations in deportation case
12:22 AM CDT on Tuesday, August 2, 2005
By GRETEL C. KOVACH / The Dallas Morning News

It was an unlikely romance: A millionaire real estate developer falls madly in love with a Chinese masseuse on the verge of being deported.


MICHAEL AINSWORTH/DMN
Yanhong Hu, who wed millionaire developer Ralph Isenberg in 2004, must return to China by Aug. 15. Mr. Isenberg said he's prepared to die for his family, including daughter Niraya.

Ralph Isenberg risked everything for her. His marriage of 30 years disintegrated. His best friend stopped talking to him. His adult son and daughter shunned him.

Now he says he's prepared to die for Yanhong Hu.

Mr. Isenberg, a member of Dallas' City Plan Commission, said he is planning to begin a hunger strike this week after trying everything to keep his new wife in the country.

Since they met about three years ago, he persuaded high-placed government and business leaders – including U.S. Reps. Pete Sessions and Eddie Bernice Johnson and the entire Dallas City Council – to write letters of support for her residency application.

But Monday, immigration officials said they would not allow Yanhong Hu, who now goes by Nicole Isenberg, to stay in the country past Aug. 15. The couple had sought a six-month extension after the birth of their daughter on July 1.

"Three-fourths of my family perished in Nazi Germany. ... I never imagined in my wildest dreams that I would have to fight to keep my family together on U.S. soil," Mr. Isenberg said, choking back tears.

Doctors told the Isenbergs that the newborn, Niraya, is too young to travel to China.

Mrs. Isenberg's daughter from a previous marriage, whom Mr. Isenberg adopted, is about to start high school and may have to stay behind with the newborn in the care of their nanny as Mr. Isenberg splits his time between China and Dallas.

Immigration officials said they have been more than generous with Mrs. Isenberg, who pleaded no contest to a 2001 prostitution charge in Dallas, was incarcerated for 52 days for immigration violations and ordered deported in absentia when she missed an immigration hearing.

A statement from the Isenbergs sent to government and business leaders around the country says the misdemeanor prostitution charge, which preceded their 2004 marriage, was unfounded.

'Egregious' case

Paul Hunker III, chief counsel for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Dallas, said Mrs. Isenberg needs four waivers for immigration law violations before the State Department can approve her application for permanent residency.

"This is really one of the most egregious cases I've seen in my 12 years as a government attorney," he said.

Mr. Sessions had lobbied for a six-month delay in her departure, citing concern for the health of the baby.

Wealth or political influence cannot be a factor in the enforcement of immigration law, but the birth of a U.S. citizen is strongly taken into consideration, Mr. Hunker said.

"Originally, the Aug. 15 date was set with the birth of their child in mind, because of a request made by their attorney," Mr. Hunker said. "If we didn't care about the child, we would have picked [Mrs. Isenberg] up and deported her."

Dallas immigration lawyer Richard Fernandez, who is not involved in the case, said American immigration authorities will often allow the parents or spouses of citizens to apply for permanent residency in the U.S. if there are no negative factors.

"Adjustment of status is a privilege, and it's in the discretion of Citizenship and Immigration Services," Mr. Fernandez said. "Generally if you're open with them, they're amenable to helping you out, especially if there is a little baby involved."

No guarantees

A last-minute reprieve seems unlikely for the Isenbergs, and Mr. Isenberg said he sometimes finds his wife pacing the house in the middle of the night with Niraya in her arms, weeping.

"Right now the baby is too young. I cannot take the baby," Mrs. Isenberg said. "And I can't leave a newborn baby here."

If Mrs. Isenberg leaves, there is no guarantee she can return, and she faces a five-year ban for being deported in absentia. The Isenbergs are willing to go to China to sort things out but want some assurance that she can return quickly.

Dallas Justice of the Peace Thomas Jones married the Isenbergs and is their baby's godfather.

"I would venture that immigration is on point legally, but there comes a time when we need to be more humane," Judge Jones said. "This is not about the mother, this is not about the father, this is about the baby – a U.S. citizen, native-born U.S. citizen."

Mayor Laura Miller, who appointed Mr. Isenberg to the City Plan Commission, said she is sad for the Isenbergs, whom she described as a "really happy, loving, terrific family."

"It's very unfortunate. I wish that she could stay here and be a family," Ms. Miller said Monday when the Isenbergs' attempts for an extension collapsed.

For Mr. Isenberg, whose home is decorated with statues of Abraham Lincoln and Lady Liberty, his troubles with immigration are perplexing.

"This is just devastating to a family. I don't know what we're going to do," said Mr. Isenberg, 53. "Do I stay with my children or do I stay with my wife?"

Mrs. Isenberg, 40, originally came to the U.S. in 1999 on a business visa. Chinese authorities had forced her to use an IUD that was making her sick, she said.

"I wanted a better life. I feel more safe here," she said.

Mrs. Isenberg had an advanced engineering degree but arrived in this country unable to speak English. She worked as a waitress during 13-hour shifts for $20 a day, she said.

She didn't understand that a massage license in California was no good in Texas and was led by desperation and naiveté to a job in a Dallas bathhouse, the Isenbergs said.

But some of Mr. Isenberg's closest friends and business partners were skeptical. They feared that she was a con artist.

Dave Roberts said he had cautioned his longtime business partner and friend to move slowly with Nicole but now has no doubts about their relationship.

"She's delightful, and I don't think there's any question that she loves Ralph," he said. "This is the happiest I've ever seen him."

Stories of romance

Eventually, as Mrs. Isenberg became a regular at parties and functions, mingling with the likes of Rudy Giuliani, those with a romantic streak began to lend their support. If Mr. Isenberg ever had any suspicions about his future wife, they disappeared when she allowed him to adopt her 14-year-old daughter.

Now, people remark on the gleam in his eye. They say he looks younger, and they listen to his giddy stories about the lovebirds' Titanic moment on the prow of a New York City night cruise past the Statue of Liberty.

They were both married, unhappily, when they met, Mr. Isenberg said. He was deeply lonely and, by his own account, had spent about a million dollars on the company of women. So while some may say that Mr. Isenberg rescued his future wife from the unsavory life of a bathhouse worker, it is Mrs. Isenberg who really rescued him, he said.

"I had sold my soul to the devil. I had lost all self-respect. Everyone in the business community, City Hall, they knew I was running around on my wife. I was basically a joke," he said.

"That all ended when I met Nicole."

They wed March 13, 2004, in their living room, using attorneys as ring bearers.

In his fight for his family's future, Mr. Isenberg has assembled several 4-inch-thick binders of immigration documents. While Mozart drifted downstairs from his adopted daughter's piano lesson, Mr. Isenberg flipped through the pages, recounting what he sees as flaws in the government's proceedings.

For instance, Mrs. Isenberg said she never received notice of the immigration hearing that led to her deportation in absentia. The notice was sent to her previous attorney in California, though she had filed change of address forms after her move to Texas.

"To be forced from this country because I have a Chinese wife, and the government made a clerical error, it's not conceivable. It's not American," Mr. Isenberg said.

He intends to rent an RV and drive around the state lobbying officials to help him keep his family together. First stop: Crawford, Texas.

"What am I without my wife?" Mr. Isenberg asked. "If I have to die for my family, OK. I've got millions in life insurance, millions in assets. They'd be taken care of."

E-mail gkovach@dallasnews.com