Thread: Deportation of Illegal Workers Leaves Families in Quandary

http://www.latimes.com/business/careers ... ss-careers

Deportation of Illegal Workers Leaves Families in Quandary
By Sam Quinones
Times Staff Writer

April 22, 2006

Paola Ordaz is feeling lost in America.

Her husband, Alfredo Garcia, was arrested Wednesday with 28 co-workers during a raid at a Riverside-area factory run by IFCO Systems North America, where he made wooden pallets.

He and his brother, Alejandro Garcia, both illegal immigrants, were immediately deported to Mexico as a result of a federal investigation into IFCO's hiring. They were among 1,187 workers taken into custody this week in a nationwide crackdown on the Dutch-based company, the largest manufacturer of wooden pallets in the United States.

His wife said he's now in Tijuana and has called her twice but is afraid to cross the border illegally again for fear of landing in prison.

Ordaz, 29, is left to care for three U.S.-born children under age 6, with no job, no money — not even enough for bus fare to rejoin her husband in Tijuana.

The $650 rent for their apartment is due May 1.

"I'm hoping to find a job now so I can support my children," said Ordaz, who quit school at age 10 to become a tomato picker. She has her husband's car but has never learned to drive it, and because of that hasn't explored much of the area west of Riverside where she's lived for the last seven years.

She's not entirely alone. Her sister-in-law, Maria Jarquin, wife of Alejandro Garcia, lives nearby. But she too is stranded. She must now support her 6-year-old daughter and 3-year-old son — both U.S. citizens — at least until she can leave for Mexico when the school year ends.

Until Wednesday, the immigration debate was mostly background noise for the women, who had comfortably inhabited the world of illegal immigrant housewives raising children in the United States. Neither they nor their husbands had ever faced deportation before.

Their husbands had spent several years as tomato pickers in northwest Mexico before coming to the U.S. to work. At the factory, they made $350 a week.

"We're all working, doing the hardest jobs," said Jarquin.

But immigration authorities said families like these made the choice to break the law.

"Families make the decision to come here and live illegally," said Virginia Kice, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Just because they had children here "doesn't convey that status on their parents," she added. "Those children are free to return with their parents to a home country."

She said everyone arrested has the right to request a formal hearing, although doing so might make it more difficult later to return to the United States.

At IFCO's Riverside-area facility, company officials declined to comment on the investigation, saying only that they had hired temporary workers from an employment agency to replace the deported immigrants.

Federal investigators allege that IFCO not only hired illegal immigrants but reimbursed them for buying illegal documents and coached them in avoiding detection. Ordaz said she knew nothing of this. Her life revolved around her apartment and her children, she said.

The Garcia brothers, according to their wives, had become reliable workers at the plant.

Alfredo had worked there eight years, after arriving illegally from their hometown of Ejutla, Oaxaca, Ordaz said. Over the years, he was joined at the job by Alejandro, another brother, a sister, a cousin and an uncle; all were deported after Wednesday's raid, she said.

Now, Ordaz said, her husband and the others are hoping to earn money in Tijuana to take a bus back to Oaxaca.

Friday afternoon, Ordaz wasn't sure whether she'd stay in this country or go back home.

"You come here to have a better life, but here they don't want us," she said. "We need to ask the Mexican government to give us jobs so we don't have to leave our country to survive."

*
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Times staff writer J. Michael Kennedy contributed to this report.

So sorry.......BYE_BYE!!!

They start off with wrong , by committing a crime entering the country illegally,,,, and they seem shocked that it ends up badly???

It's as if they don't understand "illegal, is illegal, is illegal!!!

Yeah you should have asked the Mexican government to give you jobs in the first place - not come over here with the whole tribe and start having anchor babies. ..

i am very happy to see some action finally being taken. Now it needs to spread.

BTW those anchor babies will come back 15 yrs hence when they are 18 or over adding to our burdens. Does citizenship lapse?

Did that article ever come out and say that both of those women are illegals.

He illegal, go to the Mexican Consulate. Let them take care of you because you are their citizen living abroad.

You made your bed, now lie in it.

But immigration authorities said families like these made the choice to break the law.

Waaahhhhh! Waaaaaaaaaaah! Families get split up every day when a parent runs afoul of the law and ends up going to prison.

You don't hear these victims whining (well, some do .. but not to THIS degree) Some people realize they got themselves into the situation they're in by their own volition and don't run around spreading sob stories about how difficult things are cuz they broke the law!

Why did this article state the salary of these illegals? To get sympathy? They make very close to what I make and I bust my rear just as hard as any illegal immigrant. I'm sick of Bush and his cronies using that damn phrase "jobs Americans won't do".

This is yet another ploy to heat up ICE protests etc.........So they can say well we tried but "the people" don't want us to.....

"You come here to have a better life, but here they don't want us," she said. "We need to ask the Mexican government to give us jobs so we don't have to leave our country to survive."

Originally Posted by Brian503a

Ordaz, 29, is left to care for three U.S.-born children under age 6, with no job, no money — not even enough for bus fare to rejoin her husband in Tijuana.

Typical LA Slimes sob story. They are Globalists to the max.

The above is so stupid, all she has to do is turn herself in, and the INS will bus her and the kids back FOR FREE!
It shows the backflips the Slimes does to gain sympathy. Hopefully this will make other illegals think twice about having kids on our dime, since they don't seem to be as heavy an anchor as before.

If Congess would end the anchor baby scam, then they would have no weight at all!