President Trump’s inconsistent and often irrational immigration policy has targeted another Utah mother who is now faced with deportation after 14 years in America.
Maria Santiago Garcia left Guatemala 14 years ago after suffering “severe abuse and violence.” America was her refuge, as it has been to so many throughout its short history.
Since leaving Guatemala, Garcia Santiago has had four children, who were born here and are American citizens. They are 11, 9, 5 and 3. They know no other home, and Garcia Santiago is their caretaker. She makes and sells tamales to support her family.
Garcia Santiago entered the country illegally in 2004, was ordered removed in 2006, and was given a six-month stay of removal in 2014. That is 10 years wherein Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers ignored her alleged illegality or deemed her a non-risk. It is unclear why they are targeting her now, perhaps because she was convicted of a misdemeanor “for obtaining or assisting in obtaining an identifying document of another.” But that was in 2015. Why didn’t ICE deport her then?
How long will we bait and switch an entire population of vulnerable immigrants according to the fickle whims of our motley leadership?
Our immigration system is broken. The United States Attorney for the District of Utah John Huber joined a White House press conference in July that announced legislation intended to put more violent criminals behind bars. At the time, we noted that such piecemeal fixes to immigration won’t help the broken system; it needs an overhaul.
Santiago Garcia’s case shows us why. She’s not a violent criminal – she’s a mother of four American citizen children, intent on raising them to fulfill their dreams, which include becoming a doctor and a teacher.
Yes, she committed a non-violent crime. But so do many American citizens, and we don’t exile them. In fact, colonial America was developed with the help of boatloads of convicts deported from Great Britain in a futile attempt to rid themselves of such humanity.
We cannot allow mothers and fathers who are good citizens to bear the brunt of our broken immigration system. We cannot expect them to play by rules of a game that has no rules, or, at least, rules that we have not enforced for generations.
Santiago Garcia is not the type of woman we should be using resources to deport. She’s not a predator. She’s not a violent offender. She’s part of the “vulnerable community” Huber claimed to be helping in July. Where is his voice now?