Immigration Process

Ruth Rodriguez

To my friends on FB, those I trust believe in justice, allow me to share something that has been on my mind; especially lately with all the anti immigrants rhetoric, because it is especially those of us immigrants who don't share the right skin tone, usually being the white privilege one, that end up getting the worst treatment.

The next time you hear about "those illegals", you might want to know about a little racket that our government has been carrying on, especially in countries where the majority are poor, and the living conditions border on inhumane.

Here's how the immigration process has been designed by Washington in my country of birth. When a person, heeding our Lady Liberty call "to bring me your tired....", makes the decision to start the process requesting a visa to travel to the United States, applicants must pay a fee of $400.00. That amounts to about $16,000 pesos in my country of birth. That amount is for the application only, it doesn't include all the the documents and the other expenses as well as travel from the countryside to the city where the US consulate is located. In other words, it is a very expensive endeavor, many families end up selling many of their property to gather enough "pesos" to buy dollars, another expense put on poor people.

Now, that's the first step, then you are given an appointment where the US consulate will inform you with a letter of acceptance or rejection. Almost always the first try ends with a rejection, they give no reason why the application was denied, and at bottom of the letter it advises that you may apply a year from the rejection date. Every time one submits an application its the same expenses all over again, and the agony of waiting and hoping this time its a positive response.

Its been reported of cases where people have done this for ten years, (this amounts to about $160,000pesos paid to the US government), some give up, then they are others who out of desperation may listen to some scammer, promising to arrange for legal status, charging sometime as much as thousands of dollars, only to find they have been taken by a scam. Many of the people who apply for visas are decent, law abiding citizens whose only crime is attempting to better their lives and the lives of their families, and in the end, up with little possession and financially starved.

I share this because I believe its time that people view the complexity of this situation. The next time you see an undocumented workers you might consider that that person may have paid his way ten times over. I also think its unfair for our government to have immigration policies that are fair with countries that they choose, like the idea that our Northern borders can enjoy humane immigration policies, while dehumanizing our neighbors from our southern border, this is so wrong and biased..