Immigration

My partner Nuria had a meeting with USCIS (U.S. Customs & Immigration) in Norfolk, Va, yesterday. I drove her to the USCIS office. There was a line at the door because they only admit one person, or a couple, at a time. We waited outside for about 30 minutes (it was cold) and finally they admitted us. Nuria was called to an office almost immediately, while I waited in a room with the hardest chair seats I have ever sat upon. 

The meeting lasted about 40 minutes. Nuria had been hoping that at the end of the meeting, the interviewer would say, "Welcome to America. We will mail you your green card." The words she least wanted to hear were, "We'll mail you our decision." But those words were exactly what she was told.

The interviewer went into great detail, questioning Nuria about an incident that happened in 2010. At that time, Nuria was living in Roanoke, Va, and one day she received a letter asking her to come to the courthouse on a certain date for jury duty. So Nuria followed the instructions and went to the courthouse. She waited a long time while other potential jurors were interviewed. Finally it was Nuria's turn to be interviewed. 

The trial involved a person who robbed a BB&T bank in Roanoke, Va. At that time, Nuria worked for BB&T bank, though at a different branch. Nuria knew the woman who was robbed. That caused the judge to excuse her from participating in the trial.

Later, she received a $30 check in the mail and a thank you letter from the Court. The USCIS interviewer asked Nuria if she considered the $30 a "payment." Nuria told her "No," and that she considered it a reimbursement of expensives (gasoline, missed pay, etc.) that Nuria may have incurred as a result of going to court for jury duty. But the USCIS lady was very intrigued over this incident and asked Nuria many questions. At the end of the interview, she told Nuria that USCIS would mail their decision to Nuria.

Nuria is a fine person. She is a blood donor and a plasma donor. She participates in community activities such as picking up litter from the streets. She has filled out hundreds of pages of forms and questionaires about herself and her life history for the USCIS. And yet while putting Nuria under a microscope, this country appears to allow entry of millions of illegal aliens about whom we know little or nothing—including their whereabouts after they've entered. I'm sure that most of them are decent people who deserve some kind of refuge, but there seems to be a double standard at play.

It reminds me of the Mariel boatlift in which over 125,000 Cubans entered Florida in 1980. Many of them were convicts, as Fidel Castro emptied his prisons and mixed those people among the other Cuban refugees. Except what is happening on our southern border is so much larger and longer lasting than the boatlift. And Nuria, a small, elderly lady who loves America, is scrutinized by Immigration as if she were a Mafia member. It's an upside-down world sometimes.