One of the big local stories concerns two local sisters, aged 17 and 18. The immigrated with their father from Soviet Ukraine in 1991. Their father is applying for citizenship and is currently awaiting processing. When the oldest daughter went to DMV to get a driver’s license she was asked for immigration papers. When the father tried to obtain papers the US Department of Immigration realized that the girls were here illegally and sent agents to their house to arrest them. That was on January 14. The girls were taken to a Los Angeles facility and locked up.
Since the Soviet Union no longer exists, the Department of Immigration attempted to deport the girls to Armenia, the country that used to be the former Soviet Ukraine. Armenia refused the girls because they were not citizens there. So the girls sat locked up in LA. Eventually the State Department pressured Armenia into giving the girls temporary visas, and to accept them. The girls were about to be sent to a country they have not been to since they were 3 or 4 years old, with no relatives there, and no understanding of the language.
Somehow the father found an attorney, who obtained a restraining order preventing the deportation. But the girls still sit locked up in LA because they are deemed a flight risk and following Homeland Security guidelines the Department of Immigration is attempting to deport all illegal aliens it finds.
Once the father obtains citizenship he can petition for the girls to stay, but that may be months away. Once the girls are deported they will be marked as deportees and not permitted to return.
Imagine being 17 years old and taken by armed police, taken to a jail 400 miles from your family, and told you are to be sent to a place that you don’t know, never to return.
So this is what has been the leading local news story for the past week, two Armenian Girls. Different people trying to get the girls to stay here, government officials keeping them locked up and trying to deport them. Editorials about compassion. Our congressmen ignoring everything.
So this is our Department of Homeland Security working with the Department of Immigration working to keep our country safe. So far I have seen very few stories of terrorist being arrested or charged with anything. Most of the arrests under the Patriot Act have been for bribery or other crimes that law enforcement officials cannot prosecute under existing laws. Where are all the terrorists?
OK, another political rant. Fill in more paragraphs here for me, I’ve typed enough.
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