Mom just waits as immigration mood swings
Mom just waits as immigration mood swings
By Eric Zorn
Copyright © 2006, Chicago Tribune
Published November 21, 2006
Who'd have thought, back in the summer when TV trucks were bumper to bumper on West Division Street waiting for all hell to break loose at any moment, that Thanksgiving week would come and Elvira Arellano would still be holed up in a storefront church defying a deportation order?
Not me. I predicted an imminent moment of drama to rival the seizure of little Elian Gonzalez six years ago in Miami--drawn guns, gas masks, shouts, screams, tears. The full CNN.
Not Walter "Slim" Coleman, the pastor of the Adalberto Memorial United Methodist Church, which since Aug. 15 has been harboring Arellano, 31, and her 7-year-old son, Saul, who was born in this country and so is a U.S. citizen.
"I was sure that [Immigrations and Customs Enforcement officers] were going to come after her in the first five or six days," Coleman said.
Not Carlina Tapia-Ruano, Chicago-based president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association.
Immigration enforcement officials "had been heavily criticized all year, all over the country, for failing to enforce our laws and contributing to the large number of undocumented residents," Tapia-Ruano said. "And here they had a clear case of a woman daring them to come and get her."
Even Sun-Times contrarian Neil Steinberg, who challenged my forecast in print and predicted the feds would wait up to two months before acting, bet that the church would deliver Arellano to authorities "before the leaves change."
The clearest crystal ball belonged to those on the other side of the immigration issue from Coleman, Tapia-Ruano and others who believe we should clear a path to citizenship for otherwise law-abiding workers who are in this country illegally.
David Gorak, executive director of the Midwest Coalition to Reform Immigration, said he was very skeptical when an Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman promised that the agency was going to "take action at the time and place of our choosing."
Gorak said, "They knew it would have been like throwing gasoline onto a fire if they went after her. She's wasn't going anywhere, and they had more serious cases to deal with."
"This administration is weak, it lacks resolve," said Rick Biesada, co-founder of the Chicago Minuteman Project. His organization is dedicated to border enforcement, and he said he is disappointed but not at all surprised that Arellano remains an untouched cause celebre. "It probably came down to a political decision," he said.
On that, the opposing sides are in agreement:
"I'm guessing Washington thought it would be a bad idea to storm a church that close to an election," Coleman said.
"Holding off [on arresting Arellano] looks like a political move," Tapia-Ruano added. Immigration officials "haven't stopped tearing apart other families by deporting undocumented parents," she said. "But those families haven't held press conferences and imprisoned themselves in a church."
Immigration and Customs spokeswoman Gail Montenegro would say little about the case other than that Arellano is still considered an immigration fugitive. But she added that there are more than half a million others in the U.S., and agents "generally focus their efforts on those who present the greatest threat to public safety."
The inference: Arellano, whose only crimes are related to efforts to live and work here, is not high on the list of people to evict from the country by force. Her case is unlikely ever to become a government priority.
Motives aside, is that politically wise? Well, this month's election returns and exit polling suggest that immigration isn't nearly the wedge issue that the throw-'em-out-and-put-gators-in-the-moat crowd hoped: Many hardliners lost their races, and 57 percent of respondents to an AP exit poll said illegal immigrants should be offered a chance to apply for legal status.
Some see Elvira Arellano's plight as an ideal symbol for the necessity for the new Democratic Congress to reform our immigration laws. Others see her defiance as an ideal symbol for the necessity of enforcing our immigration laws. Either way, or both ways, she's ideal--too ideal to be going anywhere soon.
You may consider that a prediction, but I rather wish you wouldn't.
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Comments: chicagotribune.com/zorn
By Eric Zorn
Copyright © 2006, Chicago Tribune
Published November 21, 2006
Who'd have thought, back in the summer when TV trucks were bumper to bumper on West Division Street waiting for all hell to break loose at any moment, that Thanksgiving week would come and Elvira Arellano would still be holed up in a storefront church defying a deportation order?
Not me. I predicted an imminent moment of drama to rival the seizure of little Elian Gonzalez six years ago in Miami--drawn guns, gas masks, shouts, screams, tears. The full CNN.
Not Walter "Slim" Coleman, the pastor of the Adalberto Memorial United Methodist Church, which since Aug. 15 has been harboring Arellano, 31, and her 7-year-old son, Saul, who was born in this country and so is a U.S. citizen.
"I was sure that [Immigrations and Customs Enforcement officers] were going to come after her in the first five or six days," Coleman said.
Not Carlina Tapia-Ruano, Chicago-based president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association.
Immigration enforcement officials "had been heavily criticized all year, all over the country, for failing to enforce our laws and contributing to the large number of undocumented residents," Tapia-Ruano said. "And here they had a clear case of a woman daring them to come and get her."
Even Sun-Times contrarian Neil Steinberg, who challenged my forecast in print and predicted the feds would wait up to two months before acting, bet that the church would deliver Arellano to authorities "before the leaves change."
The clearest crystal ball belonged to those on the other side of the immigration issue from Coleman, Tapia-Ruano and others who believe we should clear a path to citizenship for otherwise law-abiding workers who are in this country illegally.
David Gorak, executive director of the Midwest Coalition to Reform Immigration, said he was very skeptical when an Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman promised that the agency was going to "take action at the time and place of our choosing."
Gorak said, "They knew it would have been like throwing gasoline onto a fire if they went after her. She's wasn't going anywhere, and they had more serious cases to deal with."
"This administration is weak, it lacks resolve," said Rick Biesada, co-founder of the Chicago Minuteman Project. His organization is dedicated to border enforcement, and he said he is disappointed but not at all surprised that Arellano remains an untouched cause celebre. "It probably came down to a political decision," he said.
On that, the opposing sides are in agreement:
"I'm guessing Washington thought it would be a bad idea to storm a church that close to an election," Coleman said.
"Holding off [on arresting Arellano] looks like a political move," Tapia-Ruano added. Immigration officials "haven't stopped tearing apart other families by deporting undocumented parents," she said. "But those families haven't held press conferences and imprisoned themselves in a church."
Immigration and Customs spokeswoman Gail Montenegro would say little about the case other than that Arellano is still considered an immigration fugitive. But she added that there are more than half a million others in the U.S., and agents "generally focus their efforts on those who present the greatest threat to public safety."
The inference: Arellano, whose only crimes are related to efforts to live and work here, is not high on the list of people to evict from the country by force. Her case is unlikely ever to become a government priority.
Motives aside, is that politically wise? Well, this month's election returns and exit polling suggest that immigration isn't nearly the wedge issue that the throw-'em-out-and-put-gators-in-the-moat crowd hoped: Many hardliners lost their races, and 57 percent of respondents to an AP exit poll said illegal immigrants should be offered a chance to apply for legal status.
Some see Elvira Arellano's plight as an ideal symbol for the necessity for the new Democratic Congress to reform our immigration laws. Others see her defiance as an ideal symbol for the necessity of enforcing our immigration laws. Either way, or both ways, she's ideal--too ideal to be going anywhere soon.
You may consider that a prediction, but I rather wish you wouldn't.
----------
Comments: chicagotribune.com/zorn
posted by Carlos T Mock @ 9:06 AM
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