Sanctuary for Immigrant Mom

By ALAIN GAILLARD

“Please Do Not Deport My Mommy,” said a sign held by the unflappable 10-year-old son of a Guatemalan immigrant mother at a march outside the Trump International Hotel in New York on Thursday.

“Love your neighbor as you love yourself,” added the boy, Daniel Hernandez to the absent President Donald Trump at a march organized by a coalition of immigration activists and religious leaders who showed solidarity with Aura Hernandez, who has taken sanctuary in the Universalist Society church since March 18 with her United-States born 15-month-old daughter, Camila, to avoid deportation to Guatemala.

“I want to raise my voice because my children, who are the future, cannot do so because they have rights,” Hernandez said after the march, standing at the church podium. “I am no longer quiet; I am going to keep raising my voice so my children can have a future.”

In 2005, Hernandez crossed the United States–Mexico border into Texas. She was soon arrested by border patrol agents. She was released after three days and had a court date written in English that she could not comprehend because she did not speak a word of English. She also claimed that she had been sexually abused during her three days in detention.

Hernandez would later learn in 2013 that she had an active deportation order for failing to appear at a 2005 court date in Texas after being arrested for driving the wrong way on a one-way street.

With the help of a lawyer, she filed for a visa for victims because she claimed to have been sexually assaulted, but the visa was denied because too many years had passed.

According to Rev. Juan Carlos Ruiz,  Hernandez was fleeing domestic violence in her native country and she thinks her life would be in danger in she goes back to Guatemala. He said that the  Coalition plans to bring her case before The New York Attorney General, Eric T. Schneiderman, so Hernandez can return to her normal life.

Churches in the United States have a history of providing sanctuary to undocumented immigrants; they can be effective in protecting immigrants from deportation since agents of the Immigration of Customs and Enforcement (ICE) pursue a policy of not entering churches to seize immigrants except in extreme cases, fearing a strong political backlash if they do.

Immigrant rights activist Ravi Ragbir, who also faces deportation, praised the march and advocated for more such demonstrations saying, “What we did today is to go outside to seek those who want help, to say we are there for you, and you are welcome.”

Photo by Alain Gaillard