Wife of man brought to US as child and deported by Trump administration: 'They can't shut me up'
Jorge Garcia lived in the US for 30 years before he was deported. His family has vowed to bring him back
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Your support makes all the difference.The wife of a man who was deported after living nearly 30 years in the US as an undocumented immigrant says she will not let her family be separated without a fight.
Cindy Garcia, a US citizen, is married to Jorge Garcia, a 39-year-old landscaper who came to the US with his family illegally at age 10. Mr Garcia was separated from his wife and children this week when Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deported him to Mexico.
Mr Garcia will not be allowed back into the US for a decade, but his wife says she will keep fighting to bring him back sooner.
"There will be no ICE coming to the door to try and deport me because I am a US citizen,” Ms Garcia told CBS. “There's nothing ICE can do to shut me up."
Mr and Ms Garcia lived in Detroit, Michigan, with their two children. Mr Garcia had no criminal record, his wife told the New York Times, and he had applied for a green card to work legally in the US.
Mr Garcia was first ordered removed by an immigration judge in 2006, according to a statement from ICE. After failing to leave voluntarily, he became subject to a final removal order in 2009. Under the Obama administration, ICE granted him several extensions while the family sorted out their residency issues.
Things were different under Donald Trump. The family met with an immigration agent this year who told them that because of the new administration, and because Mr Garcia was under an order of deportation, he would have to leave.
The family still hopes to secure a green card for Mr Garcia, but the waiting time for a visit to the US Consulate in Mexico can be up to 18 months. Processing for such cases can take years.
In the meantime, they wait.
"I understand that the president wants to protect our borders,” Ms Garcia said. “But at the same time, if my husband was brought here as a child, he has no criminal record, each individual case needs to be looked at because we try to do the right thing. It's not like we didn't. We tried.”
Nearly 700,000 childhood immigrants were granted stays on their deportation and made eligible for a work permit under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) programme started by Mr Obama. Mr Garcia was ineligible for the programme at the time because of the age limit.
Mr Trump rescinded DACA this fall, charged Congress with passing a permanent solution. Mr Garcia and his family asked for a stay on his deportation until that new solution was reached. They were denied.
Congress has yet to come to an agreement on DACA. Democrats hoped to tie the immigration policy to a government funding bill, but deliberations so far have been fruitless. The government will shut down Friday if no funding agreement is reached.
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