posted on February 28, 2002 02:16:19 PM new
To make a long, emotional story into nothing at all, may I please simply ask this question of you and if you have a good answer, I'd like to know.
Q. Can the INS arbitrarily revoke a Naturalized Citizen's American Citizenship? Hell, do they even have a Due Process method for the INS to follow to revoke a Naturalized Citizen's American Citizenship for that matter?
Serious topic for those involved. Any serious thoughts or direct knowledge you have would help out a lot.
posted on February 28, 2002 02:46:36 PM new
Once granted citizenship is inviolate unless perhaps there was a misrepresentation in the application for naturalization that was not discovered until after citizenship was granted.
This is how plsmith is able to be here, and I looked into it pretty carefully before I agreed to marry her for citizenship purposes. I had to know the exact time periods that needed to elapse before I could divorce her without placing her citizenship at risk. Otherwise she might still be hanging around.
Te main thing is to be sure that every item is filled correctly and that if any information given is false it is impossible to determine as such.
Now it seems that they are looking very carefully for any questionable portion of the applications of many classes of people, most especially middle eastern people. No doubt there is a lot of pressure applied to investigators, enough that they will fabricate errors where none exist or take any other method they can think up to give their bosses results to report.
There's very little recourse in immigration cases.
posted on February 28, 2002 04:34:03 PM new
Well, Borillar, since Ken has already tackled the important part of your question, I'll undress the silly side.
Our marriage was much more complicated than he lets on. He first spotted me in a Ukranian marketplace and offered to buy the live chicken I'd brought to barter.
"Vy you vant chicken, Joe?" I asked warily. "You one ov those sicko capitalist svine that alvays need animal in bed?"
Already captivated by my borscht complexion and potato shape, he threw twenty dollars on the ground and choked his chicken on the spot, then swept me off to the embassy where one of his cronies forged some documents and joined us together in wedlock.
"You smell like goat," was all I said to him during the long cargo flight to this country.
After a few months chained to a wall in his cellar, he decided to turn me loose long enough to clean his filthy house. I allowed him five what he called "porkings" in the kitchen, knowing that he would pass out and then I could make my escape. Which I did.
posted on February 28, 2002 10:08:23 PM new
That you both, KRS and plsmith: KRS for some sound advice: plsmith for some sound laughter. I like your sense of humor -- matches mine, in fact.
Yep, you guessed it, KRS. It's the same guy that got snatched off the streets where he was taking pictures and absconded with to the Seattle INS Depot where he spent three weeks before the FBI cleared him of anything wrong.
But that didn't stop the local Seattle prosecutor and the INS -- here it is, months later, and they are still dragging their feet, trying hard not to let og of him. It's really freaking this guy out, because if he were somehow deported back to the homeland that he ran away from, he'd be kiled on sight! And his whole family and his father's family are all wrenched apart about this. Will Daddy be sent back to his old country and get shot? Why does the government want to kill Daddy, the worried kids ask?
I told him that since he's been married to an American gal for 15 years and has two kids by her, what he needs to do is to go down and apply for his citizenship, which should be granted fairly easily enough, concidering.
His response was that he felt that if he became an American citizen that the INS would arbitrarily revoke his citizenship and send him back. I was about to point out that the INS is not the KGB (which he saw plenty of back in his home country of Afganistan), but then I thought of the US Attorney General, the Office of Homeland Security, and the vast sweeping powers to violate citizen's rights granted to them by Ashcroft and told him I'd look into it.
I tell you, the guy has almost gone mad from the terror of being sent back to his home country, which means it is a death sentance. And the INS wantds to play games and string him along as much as possible. Now the court wants to play lots of games and is fixing him up for a psychological profile to determine that he is not a danger (as if the FBI's report wasn't good enough) and that's another $1,000 bucks on top of the $3,500 bucks he's had to dish out so far in legal costs (which he'll never recover). He's had to sell just about everything he owns to raise the funds to fight this impossible battle.
If you are right, KRS, and I believe that you are, then he ought to go slip in under the radar and get a quickie citizenship and then thumb his nose at the Seattle Prosecutor's office and the INS.
posted on February 28, 2002 11:52:27 PM new
Jeezy-peezy, Borillar, your friend is being unfairly jerked around. Have you (or he) looked through the INS Website? Here's a link to the page that describes in detail what is required for someone to become a naturalized citizen:
Also, he should not have to go bankrupt to prove his "worthiness" to live in this country! He might try the resources listed on these two sites (they're both Oregon-based) :
Although it might boomerang (as in, piss-off the Feds) I'd also look into sharing this story with a "human interest" reporter in your area. Good luck to your friend.
posted on March 1, 2002 07:38:31 AM new
Thank you for those links. plsmith! I have given them a cursory glace this A.M. and I will have to look at it more closely later this weekend, due to a funeral I have to attend today.
But just to let you know how bad this is, the thing is that the INS only has to throw in the towel to the case and nothing more. When this guy was cleared of all wrong-doing, that is, looking middle-eastern and taken pictures of the landscape, and after being wrongfully incaerated for three weeks, the court heard from his lawyer, affidavts of good moral character from frineds, family, and employer, the FBI said they did a full background check on him only to discover absoluetly nothing at all. The junior prosecution, however, reccomended to the judge that he be held some more at the INS fascillity! The judge then turned to her and asked if there was anything that she knew that she hadn't disclosed to the court and she withdrew her reccomendation. At that point, the INS should have thrown in the towel and this would all be over with.
But that wasn't it.
The INS still has to appear in court a second time, only to tell the judge that since he's been cleared all alround, that they have no further need to keep a hold on him. And after waiting MONTHS for this action from the INS, a week ago, in court, the INS POST-PONED the INS position for "an indefinite period"!!
You think that the IRS is bad and out of control, the INS is a nation of laws unto itself; whose purpose is to torture and demolish the lives of anyone that in their prejudicial judgement is an enemy of the United States, even though they've been proven otherwise.
And now, Ashcroft has given new, wide sweeping powers against immigrants. Fun, huh?
posted on March 1, 2002 04:26:11 PM new
Yeah, Borillar, I'd imagine the INS operates with the same imugnity that the IRS and ATF do. Your friend isn't going to be able to hide from them, though, so it would seem wise for him to pursue naturalization a.s.a.p.
I wonder how many times scenarios similar to the one in that article have been played out across the country since 9/11? I also wonder why, in the case of those who have been in America since infancy or childhood, none of them had become U.S. citizens? (Citing the article's mention of an absence of any passports to make this supposition.) I'd also like to know what, if anything, Intel has to say about having it's workers kidnapped by the INS. Either they (Intel) are hiring people unlawfully (no work visa, for example), or they've got some "on-the-ball" employees ratting on their Muslim co-workers, because there's no way the INS finds these people without a map.
posted on March 1, 2002 07:08:14 PM new
From the article I can't understand why the INS would deport a child of aliens and not the whole family.
I would assume that since the child never gained citizenship, their parents and siblings didn't either.
But if you're here illegally, that's all the INS ever needed for detainment and deportation.
The guy in Seatle should have a strong case for citizenship due to his marriage to a U.S. citizen and his children being born here. The spouse being a U.S. citizen and the length of marriage coupled with the children makes it almost certain that he would be granted citizenship, unless we're not hearing the whole story.
posted on March 1, 2002 08:43:44 PM new
I think we're hearing the whole story. He has been in this country lawfully for 22 years and I have known him for about 20 of those years. He has not committed any crime at all. He did not go to get his naturalization because someone had told him that there really was no difference between being a citizen and a lawful immigrant. Now he knows better, of course, but they (INS) can send another away that their power-mad minds want to scheme about. That bored beaurocrats thinking themselve to be heros sending innocent people off to foreign countries to die is unfortunate for a lot of people here lawfully.
Thanks, KRS, for that article. I'll show it to him when I see him in the next few days. It's really sad!
posted on March 2, 2002 08:11:53 AM new
So how did he remain in the country 22 years without gaining citizenship ? Did he re-new his visa/resident alien permit for 22 years or is he undocumented ?
What we're seeing is the I/N laws suddenly being enforced by the Executive branch due to 9-11, after years of non-enforcement. What is happening is not illegal, it just wasn't being enforced. There are several thousand aliens here on student visas and they haven't been in school for years. They too will be deported.
But where is the Congress on this matter ? The Congress has full authority over immigration and naturalization, and the issue was even discussed in the Federalist Papers explaning why the issue should be strictly a matter for Congress.
So why doesn't Congress act ? Because presently the issue is a political bomb, even for the liberals.
Any Congressman that calls for lax enforcement or changing the existing laws will be held politically accountable for every act committed by any alien, and aliens don't vote or contribute to politicians.
There hasn't been one Congressman step forward and comment on the enforcement surge that is going on with I/N.
I've seen one I/N lawyer in the media comment, and all he said was that I/N was strictly a creature of economics and politics, and that the present political and economic climates offer little leeway towards lax enforcement.
The ACLU has accepted the reality that illegal aliens have few, if any protections against deportation.
The media isn't even covering the issue for much the same reasons why Congress remains silent.
Where are the voices of the millions of U.S. citizens that are the sons, daughters, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren of legal and illegal immigrants here in the U.S.? They too remain silent.
When the political heat is off and enforcement subsides, Congress won't change the laws, they'll just lean on the Executive branch to ease up. Those laws remain on the books waiting for the next Presidnet to use.
There are several types of permanent residency visas that don't require periodic renewal or documentation. A person need not be either a student or undocumented to remain in this country quite within the law.
posted on March 2, 2002 09:33:19 AM new
The permanent residency visa is the documentation, and is subject to periodic review as well as revocation. Even the PRVs remain in the country at the pleasure of the INS/Congress.
There are no aliens "legally" residents in the U.S. without some type of documentation.
But I understand there is yet another problem with documentation, and that is the INS's record keeping. I have heard it is horrible.
posted on March 2, 2002 09:25:39 PM new"So how did he remain in the country 22 years without gaining citizenship ?"
REAMOND, I stopped asking those kinds of personal questions many years ago - decades in fact. Because I never pry into people's personal business, I am well liked and enjoyed wherever I go. If I began to ask questions that are clearly none of my business, I'd have few friends left.
