US allows some deported immigrants to return

MIAMI (AP) — Mexican Alejandra Juárez lived in the United States for two decades, married a veteran of the Iraq war, and had two daughters. But none of that helped her avoid deportation in 2018, during Donald Trump's presidency. After spending three years in Mérida, he has been able to return legally to Florida.

It seems incredible to Juarez to get up every morning and see the greenish walls of his room or sit with his family in the living room.

“I didn't believe it, now I absorbed it, it's true, it happened and I'm here, it's not a dream,” said Juárez, 42, who was deported after entering the country illegally in 1998. “At first it seemed to me that it was an illusion, but anything is possible. You have to be hopeful.”

Juarez is not the only case. Immigrants who were deported under Trump's zero-tolerance administration and lived in their home countries for years have been able to return to the United States in recent months thanks to President Joe Biden's more receptive policies towards foreigners.

The Democratic government has allowed a handful of activists, young students, war veterans, and parents whose cases of deportation resounded or were reported by groups or communities to return.

Even so, the return of the majority is not definitive: they arrive with a temporary humanitarian permit - sometimes only one year - which does not ensure their stay on US soil. Shortly after they have embraced their loved ones again, they are forced to fight to be able to stay.

Nor is there currently a written policy or general guidelines to allow the return of deportees. It is more about the individual analysis of some people who requested to return and a program set up by Biden to allow the return of war veterans who were deported.

After interviews with returnees, experts and activists, The Associated Press concluded that those who have returned so far are a few dozen people.

“These stories are powerful and beautiful because they are opportunities for these people to reunite with their families and come to a country they consider their home,” said Nayna Gupta, of the National Immigrant Justice Center, a group that fights to protect the human rights of immigrants.

But “what we've learned from these cases is that it takes a lot of work and a lot of support from a robust legal team to get people back home,” Gupta added.

US government spokespersons did not directly answer questions from the AP about how many deportees have returned and why. Nor did they respond why they were granted a humanitarian permit of only one year, nor did they question specific cases of migrants returned after deportation.

Juarez returned home to Davenport, just outside Orlando, in May 2021 with the help of a lawyer who saw a window of opportunity in Biden's more flexible policies.

Her case was notorious because in 2019 she appeared in the Neftlix documentary “Living Undocumented”, about immigrants living without permission in the United States. From there his daughter Estela, who is now 12 years old, was invited to shoot a video that was shown at the 2020 Democratic convention.

The Mexican arrived in the United States in 1998 escaping violence in her country. She crossed the border illegally with the help of a coyote, who told her that if she was stopped by the border patrol she would say she was a US citizen. He did so, not knowing that this lie represented a crime.

She only found out in 2013 when a policeman had her arrested at a traffic stop and saw that she had a deportation order. She was placed on a monitoring program until in 2017 when the Trump administration told her she should leave the country. In 2018, he agreed to leave, despite the intense campaign of activists and the efforts of a Democratic congressman to fix his immigration status.

In Mexico, her youngest daughter, Estela, accompanied her until the coronavirus pandemic hit, when she returned to the United States with her 20-year-old sister Pamela and her dad, Cueuhtemoc “Temo” Juárez, 45. They're all Americans, except Juarez.

Claudio Rojas is another one who was able to return to the United States.

The 56-year-old Argentine returned in August 2021 after spending two and a half years in Buenos Aires after his deportation. He was able to return because his lawyer applied for a humanitarian visa from the U.S. government and the U.S. government granted it to him.

“I never lost hope and especially because we were with the Biden administration and we saw that there was a different dialogue... We were no longer with the Trump administration and that gave me more hope,” Rojas said from his home outside Miami, where he met with his wife and was able to see his two children and two grandchildren.

The Argentinean - who first arrived in the United States in 2000 on a tourist visa that expired shortly thereafter - is known for going on a hunger strike during his detention in 2012. The strike attracted public attention and, after being released, a filmmaker made a documentary about his experience and that of others in the detention center.

He is now fighting to stay in the United States since his humanitarian visa lasts only one year. His lawyer asked for an extension a month ago.

More than 935,000 immigrants were deported in the four fiscal years between 2017 and 2020, when Trump was in power. However, during Barack Obama's previous administration, repatriations reached record levels, exceeding 1 million people in the first three years.

Being able to return to the United States after being deported is not new, although activists have asked the Biden government to create an office in Washington to review cases of people expelled claiming they deserve to return because they were unjustly deported. That office, however, does not yet exist.

From a list of 11 deportees presented by the National Immigrant Justice Center in that request to Biden, at least five returned, including Rojas.

Lynn Tramonte, director of the Ohio Immigrant Alliance, said that in addition to deportees who have returned on humanitarian leave, there are people who have returned due to a request for permanent residence they have been waiting for years in their countries.

But not everyone who could return accepts the conditions of the US government to return.

One of them is Yolanda Varona. The 55-year-old Mexican was deported more than a decade ago and could have benefited from the same humanitarian visa as Rojas and Juarez but decided not to do so.

A non-profit group called her and offered it to her at the end of 2021, but Varona said she could not return to the United States for just one year, without a work permit and leaving in Mexico the rest of the deported mothers she helps through the organization she founded in Tijuana, called Dreamer Moms.

“I want to think that I am going back to the United States. I hope that God and the universe will help me get back to my daughter but permanently, not for a year,” Varona said.

His compatriot Jesús López, on the other hand, did not hesitate for a moment. After living just over a year in Guadalajara following his deportation, the 26-year-old obtained a one-year humanitarian authorization and returned in August 2021 with the help of activists who support immigrants in Chicago and who also managed to return another man and a family of four, all Mexican.

“I thought it was a dream,” Lopez said. “It was a very nice thing to see my family again. I returned home, where I grew up.”

Lopez arrived in the United States at the age of nine with his family, on a tourist visa, but they stayed longer than authorized. In 2012, she managed to secure protection under a special program for young people who were illegally brought as children with their parents, although she was unable to renew their protection due to lack of money to apply. He was deported in 2020 because marijuana was found in the car he was riding in, an offense that does not require prison for US citizens.

In Chicago, Lopez had left his parents, brother and grandmother.

Like him, Juarez is happy to be back. Both, however, face an uncertain future.

“I am grateful to have returned, but I would have wanted it to be permanent,” Juarez explained. “Calvary continues, it doesn't end.”