[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 25 (Friday, February 15, 2013)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E162]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           BARBARA J. WRIGHT

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. MARK POCAN

                              of wisconsin

                    in the house of representatives

                       Friday, February 15, 2013

  Mr. POCAN. Mr. Speaker, I submit the following letter.

  Barbara Wright, Workers Rights Center, 10th Anniversary Celebration

       My name is Barbara J. Wright, and I am a resident of 
     Madison, Wisconsin. I have been married twice in my life, 
     both times to husbands who were born in other countries. I 
     have two children from my first marriage. Cesar Gabriel 
     Moran, 39, is a firmware engineer in St. Paul Minnesota and 
     Nickolas James Moran is a jazz musician here in Madison.
       On July 27th, 1972, I married Cesar Edmundo Moran in 
     Magdalena del Mar, Lima Peru. I was 19 years old and he was 
     18. We were married for 25 years. He had been studying in 
     Platteville, Wisconsin at the University of Platteville. When 
     we left the country to travel to Peru (we hitch-hiked 
     there!), he lost his student visa. After we married in Peru, 
     I returned to the US and filed for him to get a permanent 
     resident visa (a green card). He had to stay in Peru until it 
     arrived. I sent the form to the INS along with $25 dollars, 
     both of our birth certificates, our marriage license, and a 
     letter from the police to say we had committed no crimes. In 
     a month he was able to pick up his permission to travel and 
     his green card at the American Embassy in Lima and return to 
     the US, so we could both go to college.
       My marriage to Cesar ended in 1998 although it was a few 
     years till we were legally divorced. In 2004, I married 
     Youssef Amraoui, from Morocco. We were married in Las Vegas, 
     Nevada on June 6th, 2004. This time getting Youssef permanent 
     residence status took more than 5 years. Between the legal 
     fees to file all of the petitions and to pay the immigration 
     lawyer, Irene Wren at Wren and Gateways Law Group, it cost 
     almost $12,000. Luckily, Youssef had filed for a waiver by 
     himself with no lawyer, so that he did not have to leave the 
     country while he waited for his case to be determined. 
     Imagine getting married and having your new husband have to 
     go back to his country and wait five years to see each other 
     again.
       Because the INS was now under the wing of Homeland 
     Security, there were many additional steps which meant 
     additional delays. When I asked Irene why things were taking 
     so long she said that there was a huge backlog of cases, 
     between 4 and 6 years of cases. She said Homeland Security 
     insisted that each case be reviewed by the FBI and since it 
     was not a criminal case, it gathered dust in someone's inbox 
     for a long time.
       One time, Homeland Security called and demanded that 
     Youssef come to Milwaukee alone to be ``interviewed''. We 
     were waiting for a formal interview in Milwaukee that is now 
     a part of the process, but this was not it. The man who 
     called tried to intimidate me when I said that Youssef was 
     not coming alone. I said that either I or the immigration 
     attorney would go with him (I was petrified of his being 
     taken into custody or forcibly removed or never hearing from 
     him again). This man tried to convince me that Youssef could 
     be a ``sleeper agent'', and they needed to interview him. 
     Because I owned a restaurant and could not leave, I sent the 
     attorney with him. Youssef said they kept him in a room that 
     had shackles but did not shackle him. Irene said this was a 
     scare tactic because Moroccans and other Muslims were all 
     suspects because of the attack on 9/11. They just wanted to 
     see if he would come or he would run. That was a horrible 
     day.
       It seemed like every time we would reach the end of the 
     process there would be more forms to fill out, more fees to 
     pay, and more of an indefinite wait. At one point in the 
     process, the fees were doubled. We paid the majority of our 
     discretionary income to this process. Youssef's parents were 
     old, and he lived in fear that they would die before he was 
     able to go and see them. You have to have permission to leave 
     the country once the papers are filed. If you leave without 
     permission, you cannot come back.
       I know many people here who are undocumented. The press has 
     been talking a lot about a ``path to citizenship''. I think 
     very few of the people saying this have any idea what is 
     really involved. Because of the high fees of immigration 
     attorneys, the many steps of the process and the time 
     involved, many will have a hard time coming up with the money 
     for this process.

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