Posted on 08/18/2008 4:42:36 AM PDT by Tennessee Nana
When Hilma Díaz was handcuffed one April morning at Pilgrim’s Pride, she had one thought.
“When I realized we were being arrested, the first thing I could think of was my son,” Ms. Díaz said later, holding her son Raymond in her arms. “As a mother you worry about them. Who’s going to take care of them?”
Ms. Díaz and her husband, César Mazariegos, were released the afternoon after their arrests wearing monitoring ankle bracelets so they could care for their now-9-month-old son, who is an American citizen.
The couple will leave the United States voluntarily in October, about seven years after each arrived here separately.
The departure will be tough: Mr. Mazariegos will return to his home country of Guatemala while his wife will head to her native Mexico with Raymond.
“The law doesn’t let you return to a different country without a visa. We’ll have to find a way to get back together once we’re there,” Mr. Mazariegos said.
Financial struggles are pushing the family to leave as soon as possible.
“Every day you have to pay for what you eat and pay a certain amount for rent, all the bills,” he said. “We are basically just surviving with God’s help and with the help of organizations who have been able to give us food, rent money, and some friends who have reached out to us.”
Before the raid, Mr. Mazariegos was planning to return to his country with his wife and son to take care of his aging mother. He hoped to save enough money in the United States to help them start their new lives in Guatemala.
Now they are going back empty-handed and with debts, he said.
“We go back to our countries perhaps not in the way we would have liked to,” he said. “You don’t wish anyone to go back to their countries (deported).”
Mr. Mazariegos dropped out of school before finishing the equivalent of high school, and Ms. Díaz only completed elementary school. He worked as a clothing distributor in Guatemala and Ms. Díaz cleaned houses.
They would like to return to the United States, but “we wouldn’t risk coming back illegally because we don’t want to suffer the same terror we are living right now,” Mr. Mazariegos said.
No, as a mother, I didnt flauntingly break the immigration laws...
PING
I commend them for eventually doing the right thing for a change. Good luck and maybe they'll have a nice reunion in Mexico or Guatemala.
They were arrested...
This is not their own idea...
They had been here ILLEGALLY for seven years
Boo hoo, hooo.
Ultimately, like many of the bad things that have happened to our country in the last 40 years or so, this can be laid at the feet of government. Had the government enforced our immigration laws properly at all times and not at the last minute as a half-assed attempt to placate an enraged citizenry, these people wouldn't have been put in this position.
I got that. I missed however the first lines when I cross-read the article. I took it as the couple deciding to leave the US for financial reasons etc.
Anyway Bye bye.
I’m calling Perla to complain about her headline...
As a REAL immigrant, I am offended by the ID theft...
These are not “immigrants”
They are illegal aliens...
Here's a better idea.Why don't each of you spend...say...3 months in the slammer (just to let you know that we take our immigration/residency laws seriously) and then we'll *personally* transport you to the southernmost part of Mexico.
“The law doesn’t let you return to a different country without a visa. We’ll have to find a way to get back together once we’re there,” Mr. Mazariegos said.
Let us guess,Senior Illegal....might that reunion point be somewhere in El Paso or San Diego?
It didn’t seem to bother them to leave their ‘aging mother’ in the first place.
As for the 7mo old ‘citizen’ how important was it to them he was a citizen when they were planning on using this country to make money to move to another country (Guatemala).
We need to get rid of the law that says because a baby is born on this soil it is awarded the right of citizenship. It means nothing other than the other real citizens have to fork over money to care for a baby that could’ve been born anywhere it’s family happened to be at the moment.
"Terror",Senior Illegal? TERROR???? Worthless,lousy,filthy.....
The agenda is anything that makes the U.S. look bad.
We need to change this law to be applied ONLY to children of citizens (obviously) and legal immigrants. Not for "tourists", not for illegals.
If you want to move somewhere, ya don’t start out by breaking the law then hoping to be accepted as a worthwhile citizen.
If you came here illegally you and your family should be rounded up and sent back to from where you came.
Illegal means lawbreaker and that is no way to start our relationship.
Round up ALL illegals and send them packing to from where they came.
If that causes hardships, tough.
Thirty or so years ago such laws were common in Western industrialized countries...including most of Europe,Australia,etc.Today we're about the only one left.Ireland was the last European country to do away with it and they did so *specifically* so that illegals wouldn't drop anchor babies (I saw an Irish government report on the issue). Australia did away with it some time ago.
So we're the suckers.Thank you,RATS.You *want* illegals to drop anchor babies knowing that someday you'll be able to tell them "vote for us and we'll allow all 35 members of your family in.Don't vote for us and the Nazi Republicans will kill you and *then* deport you".
Yep, life must be hard for a fugitive.
Not married. (what about those "family" values?)
Lived here for seven years as invaders.
Now they have a bastard son who will, by the time he's eighteen, be allowed to bring them back.
Anchor babies will be the death of the U.S.
“Who’s going to take care of them?”
Well, you are. Back in Mexico. Technically the child is not only an American citizen at this point, but a Mexican citizen as well. The child has no choice NOW as to what citizenship would be selected at age 21. With a US birth certificate, that child could be admitted on a priority basis as an adult, but would STILL have to choose between either Mexican or US citizenship. Dual citizenships should be outlawed altogether, once a person has reached the age of legal majority.
It's more difficult to get on an airplane than it is to get into this country illegally.
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