Grieving Mother Holds One Last Wish for Son--

washingtonpost.com ^ | February 9, 2006 | Karin Brulliard

[quentin]

A weeping Kim-Hoan Thi Nguyen kissed her 7-year-old son goodbye at the Ho Chi Minh airport and told him it would be a long time before they would be together again. Little Binh Le boarded the plane and flew off to the States, where his mother hoped he would flourish. It was 1991.

She next saw Le when he visited Vietnam at 12. He cooked her french fries.

He visited again when he was 18 and a recent graduate of Edison High School in Fairfax County. They had a party.

Their next reunion came in December 2004. At his funeral, at Arlington National Cemetery.

Le, a Marine corporal and a Vietnamese citizen, was killed at age 20 while defending his desert base in Iraq. The month after his death, he was awarded U.S. citizenship in a ceremony at which speakers lauded his valor.

Nguyen, who has lived with a friend in Springfield since the funeral, wants to stay. Wracked with guilt that she sent her only child off to a life that was cut short, she wants only to lay flowers on his grave each Sunday. Yet, although parents of immigrants killed in combat are eligible for permanent residency, Nguyen's applications have been denied. (snip)

U.S. Rep. James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.) found their case so compelling that he filed a private bill in Congress last February that would grant permanent residency to Nguyen, Tran, their new spouses and Tran's daughter. But it has been stuck in committee since March. (snip)

[Moran] said he is still pushing the bill, but added: "Any bill that has even a whiff of an immigration-related provision faces a very tough road here in the House." (more ...)

[quentin]

Do you have a bill number on this?

I don't, but will check.

[HamiltonJay]

Unless this woman or those with her have ties to terrorists give her her citizenship... her son paid for it honorably with his life, and she sacrificed greatly I am sure to let her 7 year old son come here to make that life.

Mr. Congressmen, GET IT DONE!

[quentin]

The bill is HR 993. Here's a link: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/D?d109:6:./temp/~bdXMHa::

[armymarinemom]

Thanks. This link doesn't work. On page source you are putting nothing between the "". The link in your first post has the same error. It takes you right back to your original post.

[A.A. Cunningham]

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:H.R.993.IH:

[quentin]

Thanks to you both, and my apologies. I used an automatic link generator and didn't check to see if it worked. My face is red!

[leadpenny]

bump