Monday, September 18, 2006

Seeing the other side on immigrants

I wish everyone who says immigrants "should just do the paperwork and apply legally", could read this account. DP

By Laurel Walker

JournalSentinel.com: In the great immigration debate, Brookfield resident Mary Smith says she, like many of her fellow Americans, has had little sympathy for illegal aliens.

"What's the big deal?" she'd asked herself. "Become legal. Just do the paperwork."

Now, experiencing the legal immigration process from inside, she sees it differently.

What should have been the easiest way for a foreign-born citizen to legally migrate to this country - as the spouse of an American-born citizen -has become a nightmare.

It's kept a young family - Smith's American-born daughter, Rhiannon Lange, 25, her husband from the Dominican Republic, Jeyson Seneli, 23, and the couple's 4-month-old baby, Jeyson Taylor Seneli - apart too long.

The wait is excruciating.

Lange, who grew up in Milwaukee and Waukesha counties and graduated from Oconomowoc High School and the University of Utah, met her future husband while both were on missions for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the western Dominican Republic.
Be sure to read the rest of this story! This is only a small part of it.

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