Two awards marked the success of the Pro Bono program of the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota (ILCM). The first came to Pro Bono Director Anne Applebaum, as the Minnesota State Bar Association honored her with the 2018 Bernard P. Becker Legal Services Emerging Leader award. This award is presented each year to honor dedicated service, outstanding achievements and a demonstrated commitment to provision of zealous and skilled legal representation by an attorney employed by a private, nonprofit agency that provides legal services to low-income and disadvantaged Minnesotans. The second award came from the Minnesota Corporate Pro Bono Council, which honored ILCM as its “Partner of the Year for 2017.

Anne joined ILCM as an AmeriCorps VISTA volunteer in 2010, leaving private practice to dedicate herself to a career in public interest law with a specific interest in immigration law. In 2011, Anne became ILCM’s pro bono coordinator, and was promoted to Pro Bono Director the next year. She has led ILCM’s pro bono programming since that time.

Anne’s leadership and innovation have built one of Minnesota’s best pro bono programs. Anne has steadily increased the number of active volunteer attorneys throughout her tenure. In 2017, 229 pro bono attorneys represented low-income clients in nearly 500 immigration cases.  Together, they reported more than 3500 donated hours, an all-time high for the organization.

“Her work reflects the highest level of client service and ensures that our pro bono trainings and representation are excellent,” says ILCM Executive Director John Keller. “The impact of her sustained hard work and dedication has been extensive, benefitting both the legal community and Minnesota’s immigrant and refugee communities.”

The Minnesota Corporate Pro Bono Council brings together pro bono leaders from businesses’ internal legal departments to increase the level of pro bono work being done by in-house counsel, paralegals and other staff.  Besides direct service to clients, they offer CLE, training and pro bono opportunities that are open to anyone in the law departments of Council member companies. Through each case and each substantive immigration matter business attorneys take on, they become aware of and engaged with immigrants from all over the world on the essential immigration issues of our times.

This year, says Council President David March, “We wanted to recognize ILCM, and in particular, Anne, for creating innovative opportunities for in-house counsel, paralegals and staff to work on a variety of immigration matters through the DACA clinic, DACA renewal trainings, etc.”

Thanks to the MSBA and the Minnesota Corporate Pro Bono Council for this recognition—and thanks most of all to the pro bono attorneys, paralegals, and support staff who partner in ILCM’s work.

 

Trafficked, abused, living in fear—and then Camila’s* life got worse. By the time she met the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota through Susan Jorgensen Flores, Camila was sitting in jail, separated from her children, and in danger of deportation.

Camila was born in Tamaulipas, Mexico, and raised by her grandmother until she was 16 years old. Then her grandmother sold her to a 29-year-old man for $2,000. He was physically and emotionally abusive from the start. They never legally married. When Camila became pregnant, he left for the United States. He left her behind with his aunt, who also abused her.

Before the baby was born, Camila escaped from the aunt and came to the United States. She rejoined her abusive partner in North Carolina. and their son was born in September 2006. A daughter was born in 2008.

The abuse continued. When she became pregnant with a third child, her partner demanded that she have an abortion, and she refused. He said he would leave, and she was happy to see him go.

By the time her second daughter was born, Camila was 21 and living in Tampa, Florida. The father of the children eventually visited them there. He was not very interested in the daughters, but took their son away and would not return him. Camila has not seen her son since then, and as far as she knows he is with his father in Mexico.

After some time, she became romantically involved with José, a construction worker. He traveled to different states for months at a time, leaving her and her daughters in Florida. When she became pregnant with his son, he became abusive and extremely jealous, and then insisted that she and the children travel with him. He was a heavy drinker, who also got involved in drugs, and remained physically and emotionally abusive throughout their relationship.

Camila and José and the children lived in Minnesota for some time, and José paid the rent, but nothing else. He also forbade Camila from working. She kept the family going with food from a food shelf and the help of a friend, Rosita*, who would often feed the children and Camila.

Desperate for a way to pay monthly expenses, Camila eventually applied for assistance for her U.S. citizen children. She did not list José as a household member and did not list his income, as he went for weeks without coming home and did not provide any money to her.

In 2014, she was charged with wrongful receipt of assistance, because José did pay the rent and sometimes stayed in the home. José hired a private attorney who got Camila into diversion, but with a guilty plea sitting in the prosecutors file that would be submitted to court if she violated any of the terms of her diversion. One of the terms of this agreement was that she must not leave the state of Minnesota.

A few months later, Camila was taken to the hospital as a result of physical abuse by José. He was charged and ultimately convicted of domestic assault.

That made Camila eligible for a U visa, a special visa reserved for undocumented immigrants who are crime victims, but who step up and cooperate with police and the criminal justice system. The county has to certify that a crime victim qualifies for a U visa. Unfortunately, even after this certification, the victim faces a very long wait. There’s a cap of 10,000 U visas per year, and there are more than 200,000 applications pending.

José was enraged by her having called the police and when he got out of jail, he took Camila and the children to Kansas, where he continued to be abusive, both emotionally and physically.

In 2016, Jose learned that there was a warrant for Camila’s arrest in Minnesota, because she violated the terms of the diversion agreement when she left the state.  The abuse worsened at that point with him constantly threatening to turn her into the police, get her deported, and take her children away.

She eventually tired of the threats and abuse and in August 2017 she signed a Delegation of Parental Authority (DOPA) form, giving custody of her three minor children to her friend Rosita, who still lived in Minnesota.

Then Camila turned herself in to the police in Kansas.  She was transported to Minnesota and ICE picked her up shortly thereafter. Under the terms of the diversion agreement, a guilty plea was immediately entered, and ICE picked her up.

The guilty plea was considered an aggravated felony by the immigration judge, who denied her bond and kept her in jail. Her two daughters were brought to Minnesota to live with Rosita, though José refused to release his son, who continues to live with him in Kansas to this day.

ILCM’s Susan Jorgensen Flores got involved when sentencing was still pending with the Public Defender’s office.  Susan heads up ILCM’s assistance to public defenders across the state. After much work and excellent cooperation between the public defender, the county, and the judge, the guilty plea was withdrawn, on the basis of an underlying substantive defect in the charge. Then the criminal case was dismissed—be gone aggravated felony!

On December 20, 2017, five days before Christmas, at a new hearing, the immigration judge set bond at $1500.  No one had the funds to pay the bond.  Camila’s friend Rosita has four children of her own and had been supporting Camila’s daughters for nearly four months by that point.  She did not have anything extra to spare.

Camila had no family in the United States other than her minor children, and had no friends other than Rosita, due to the isolation imposed on her by her abusers over the years.  She did have an advocate from CADA of Watonwan County and she did have a signed U certificate from Watonwan County. No one had money for a bond.

ILCM went looking for money to pay the bond. On December 22, the Freedom Fund organization paid the bond and Camila was reunited with her daughters for Christmas!

 

*We have changed some names in this story. As a matter of policy, we usually change the names of immigrants when telling their stories. While the stories are real, and while the individuals have agreed to let us use their stories, we choose to protect their privacy by not using their real names.

 

(updated 6/22/2020) 

• Since 2012, DACA has granted two-year deferrals from deportation to undocumented immigrants who arrived in the United States as children (DREAMers), have been here for at least five years, and have committed no serious crimes.
• 9 million people are eligible for DACA protections, and nearly 800,000 have been granted deferred status since 2012.
• The average age at the time of arrival to the U.S. was 6 years of age and average age today is 24.

DACA and the United States

• Data and survey results from DACA recipients show transformative socio-economic benefits:
  • 100% are between the ages of 15-36,
  • 100% have passed extensive background checks and have not committed any serious crimes,
  • 90% applied for a driver’s license or state ID, and 50% became organ donors,
  • 90% are employed,
  • 72% have enrolled in classes post-high school,
  • 63% got a better job; hourly rates increased from $10.29 to $17.46/hr.,
  • 57% received their first credit card.
• Research from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy shows that DACA recipients pay an estimated $2 billion each year in state and local taxes. Extending a path to citizenship for these immigrants would increase this contribution to $2.53 billion each year.

DACA and Minnesota

• As of August 2018, 5,670 Minnesotans had received DACA status, although 9,000 met the criteria to apply for the program, according to the Migration Policy Institute.
• Minnesota’s DACA recipients live in every Congressional district and come from countries ranging from Mexico to South Korea, Laos, Ivory Coast and Canada.

The Center for American Progress reports that DACA recipients in Minnesota

• pay $57.5 million in federal taxes annually
• pay $31.2 million in state and local taxes annually
• have a spending power of $236.1 million annually
• own 300 homes
• make $1.5 million in mortgage payments each year
• pay $25.4 million in rent annually

Minnesota needs DACA and immigrants for continued economic growth:

• Research from the Center for American Progress estimates that ending the DACA program would cost Minnesota an estimated $377 million in annual GDP.
• Research from the University of Minnesota and Greater MSP concludes that Minnesota’s economy not only needs all DACA holders to remain but Minnesota also should increase immigration by 4.5 times to offset workforce shortages and to maintain our economy’s status quo growth.
• A 2015 study done by the Minneapolis Foundation and the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce shows that DACA recipients in Minnesota report their status helped them pursue higher education, gain health insurance coverage, and build careers.
• One ILCM client’s comments are representative of the transformative impact of the DACA program: “DACA has helped my life tremendously. I now have the opportunity to better myself, go to college and accomplish a career. Now I feel like I belong.”

Threats to DACA and DREAMers

• The Administration rescinded DACA on September 5, 2017. Without DACA protection, DREAMers are at risk of detention and deportation.
• Since September 5^th, 2017 no new applications have been allowed and DACA holders are much more mistrustful of renewing. An estimated 120,000 children nationwide under the age of 15 would have been eligible for DACA. Instead, they are now at risk of deportation.
• Federal court injunctions allowed some DACA holders to renew, while court battles over the administration’s action continued. On June 19, 2020, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the administration action. This should mean that DACA continues and that new applications can be made. Instead of setting up procedures to accept new applications, the administration threatened to take other action to end DACA. As of June 22, it is unclear what will happen next. In the long run, only Congress can grant long-term protections for DACA holders.

Here’s where to go for more information:

• For ILCM summary of Supreme Court decision on DACA, click here.
• For FAQ on DACA and Supreme Court decision, click here.
• La Decisión Sobre DACA de la Corte Suprema: Preguntas Frecuentes (06/18/2020)

March 1, 2018—Pakou Hang founded the Hmong American Farmers Association, building economic strength through cooperation. Solomon Paul directs Austin’s Welcome Center, offering assistance to immigrants, employers, and to the wider Austin community. Kevin and Kunrath Lam own and operate Cheng Heng restaurant in St. Paul, and support charitable organizations in Minnesota and in their native Cambodia. Refugees from around the world, now settled across Minnesota, enrich both our state’s culture and its economy.

“Every refugee has a story to tell, and every refugee has a contribution to make to Minnesota,” said John Keller, executive director of the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota. “They help build Minnesota’s economy, they are crucial colleagues and board members at ILCM and many of our partner organizations, but their personal and cultural contributions are even greater.”

Economic contributions of refugees to Minnesota can be difficult to measure. The Office of the Legislative Auditor for Minnesota has concluded that data on costs and benefits of refugees in Minnesota are not adequate to assess the economic impact of refugee resettlement. In part, that is because of “the limited extent to which refugee-specific data on costs or revenues are collected in public agencies,” and in part because it is “difficult to fully identify which Minnesota residents are currently—or once were—refugees.”

Arguments about refugee resettlement continue across the state and country. The key difference between the argument that refugees generate a net economic benefit and the argument that refugee resettlement costs too much is in the time frame.

After the first few years of resettlement, refugees work, start businesses, and contribute greatly to the economy. “The net fiscal impact of refugees was positive over the 10-year period, at $63 billion,” according to a 2017 report by the federal Department of Health and Human Services (Because the conclusions of the report were not what it wanted, the Trump administration blocked its release.)

When refugees arrive after spending years or decades waiting in camps, they do need assistance. That assistance typically does not last long. Refugees quickly repay the loans for their airfare to come here, and then proceed to rebuild their lives and contribute to the country, both economically and through their courage, patriotism, and civic participation.

While no one has a specific break-out of economic data for Minnesota refugees, a recent report from the American Immigration Council documents contributions of Minnesota immigrants to the state’s economy and tax base. One example: Minnesota immigrants paid $2.2 billion in federal taxes and $1.1 billion in state and local taxes.

“If anyone doubts the contributions of refugees to the state, I hope they will take time to meet refugees and listen to their stories,” said Keller. “Their stories may begin in flight from violence, but they end in determination and courage and building new lives as Americans. Their contributions make us stronger as a state and as a nation.”

 

Refugees stories can be found in many places, including:

• Solomon Paul Welcomes Immigrants to Austin
• Eh Mwee: Building Bridges in Five Languages
• Ojoye Akane: Connecting Families, Faith, and Homes
• Edwige Mubonzi: Mobile Doctor
• Pakou Hang: Activist organizes Hmong-American farmers “at the nexus of history”

 

 

 

 

 

Press Release: February 15, 2018 – “We are angered and deeply disappointed by the Senate’s failure to pass legislation protecting Dreamers today,” said John Keller, executive director of the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota (ILCM) this afternoon. “Make no mistake: this is not primarily about the Senate but rather about Trump’s continuing attacks on Dreamers and all immigrants. He precipitated the current crisis by ending DACA.

“Today Trump threatened to veto bills that offered protection to Dreamers, going back on the promises he made just a few months ago to pass a bill of love, take the heat, and sign any bill that Congress sent to him. The Senate, too, failed all Americans when it backed down in the face of his threats and failed to pass and send forward any bill protecting Dreamers.”

The Senate this afternoon failed to reach the minimum of 60 favorable votes for cloture on any of three immigration bills. The only bill that received 60 votes – were 60 senators voting decisively against the White House’s dramatic reductions in legal immigration. Now—after a bare three days of consideration—Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell says that the Senate will stop even considering any legislation to protect Dreamers.

“McConnell may stop, but we will not stop,” Keller said. “Dreamers and allies will never give up. Nearly ninety percent of Americans want permanent protection for Dreamers – we will all use all of our legal, policy and person-to-person skills to secure a just and lasting protection and future for Minnesota’s 7,000 DACA holders and 15,000 DREAMers.”

In Minnesota alone, Trump’s order devastates more than 7,000 young people – all of whom have or are on track to have a high school diploma, all of whom have had background checks and clean records, all of whom arrived in this country at age 15 or younger.

The state of Minnesota needs Dreamers. We currently are experiencing historic waves of older workers leaving the workforce. According to a December 2017 report from the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development, “immigration has been and will continue to be a vital source of the workforce that employers need to succeed in the state…. Immigrants have become critical to Minnesota’s economy, providing a rapid stream of new workers in the face of an aging native-born workforce.”

Minnesotans with DACA pay $15 million in state and local taxes. According to the Center for American Progress, ending DACA would cost Minnesota more than $367 million in annual GDP losses. Nationally, the loss of DACA would cost the country $460 billion over the next decade. Even the conservative CATO institute supports continuing DACA and warns of a loss of almost $350 billion over the next decade if DACA is ended.

The economic toll of ending DACA is huge, but the human suffering is even greater. Minnesota’s Dreamers grew up here, went to school here, cheered the Twins and Vikings, shoveled snow in Minnesota winters and fished on Minnesota lakes in the summers. Those who have been here the longest have bought homes, married, begun to raise their own children here. This is their home: they have no other.

Side by side with Dreamers, we will continue to fight for their future—a future right here, with a path to citizenship. That is the path and the future that the vast majority of all Americans of all political parties want for Dreamers. They will not give up. We will not give up. Dreamers are here to stay.

 

 

“In high school, I always saw the recruiters come into our school. I was always excited about joining, about serving.”

Back then, Samuel* couldn’t enlist. He felt that the United States was his country. He had lived here since he was nine years old. But he had no legal status.  He didn’t even have a work permit.

“There was no way I could even approach them without telling my story,” he recalls, “and I was afraid of being turned in [to immigration authorities.]”

Then came DACA—Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals—in 2012. Samuel filled out the forms, paid the $495 fee, waited, and finally got his DACA status and work permit and social security number.

He headed for the U.S. Marines recruitment office.

“I wanted to join the military,” he says. “I wanted to serve the country, to prove I was loyal to the country, that I didn’t have no other home but this home that I knew.”

The recruiters processed his paperwork, his social security number. Then they hit a snag. The paperwork came back—declined because of a limit on his social security number, they told him. There was a limitation noted, one that said “work authorization only.”

Sorry. No enlistment. Not until you can get that off your social security number.

So now Samuel waits again. He graduated from high school, has a responsible job and his own home. But he can’t enlist in the military to prove his loyalty to the country he knows as home.

One of his brothers is a U.S. citizen. That brother “put in a request for us to have a brother-to-brother case, legal status.”

The family reunification visa that Samuel is waiting for is part of the program Trump vilifies as “chain migration,” saying it gives immigrants an easy way to bring in distant relatives.

Samuel thinks of the visa as brother-to-brother, which doesn’t feel like a distant relative at all. His visa process is not easy or quick.

“The waiting period is ridiculous,” Samuel says. “They’re working on cases back in 1999 now. So I still got five more years to go.” Samuel thinks the program should be reformed, so that people do not have to wait 20 or 25 years to get a visa.

 

* We have changed Samuel’s name in this story. As a matter of policy, we usually change the names of immigrants when telling their stories. While the stories are real, and while the individuals have agreed to let us use their stories, we choose to protect their privacy by not using their real names.

 

“I fear for my life right now,” Samuel* says. “We are in limbo, all the DACA applicants … People’s lives are at stake.”

Samuel started in the United States when he was 9 years old, brought across the border while he slept. He’s one of the young people called Dreamers, who came to the United States as children, without legal permission to stay.

“I was 16 years old when I started working,” he says. “I was still going to school. My summer times were spent in the fields, picking up potatoes, and doing lawn mowing. In the winter, I removed snow. I was always trying to get money somehow.”

Samuel worked all the way through high school, and volunteered as a tutor at the same time. He graduated with honors, “as a role model student for the accomplishments I already had.”

Despite those honors, he had no security. He was undocumented. That was something he could not change.

Then came DACA—Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals—in 2012. He seized the chance.

“When they told me about the process it took to be approved for DACA, they said I had to prove I wasn’t a burden to the country. I was actually a role model. I had tons of proof. I had tons of letters—from even Republican candidates that sent me a letter when I graduated.

“I wanted to live in this country and I didn’t know anything outside of this country. I don’t know how to live in Mexico, I don’t know how things work down there.”

The DACA permit came, and with legal permission to work, Samuel “got a really good-paying job being an interpreter, translator, and contact specialist for a collection agency…. I finally bought my first car, which was another milestone in my life.”

Now he could work on another long-time dream: a home of his own.

“When I was 14, I looked at what the requirements were to have a house. Work for at least two years, credit had to be at a peak, best of the best. At a young age, I went to talk to a banker and asked how I could work on my credit score, so one day I could purchase a house. They suggested that I start a prepaid credit card.

“I put all my savings on the credit card. … That credit helped me to get a job, get a car, and ultimately I built it strong enough to get a house.”

Now Samuel fears that he may lose everything he has worked for, his American dream.

“If I were to lose my work permit, I lose my driver’s license,” he explains. “If I lose my work, I can’t pay my mortgage. I go back to zero. Back to where I started. Nobody wants to go back to where they started.”

The Trump administration has rescinded DACA, effective March 5, 2018. Congress has waffled and dithered and failed to pass any relief for Dreamers like Samuel.

When Samuel visited Congressman Tom Emmer’s office last year, he told his story, and asked Emmer to support legal status for Dreamers.

“If you guys don’t do something about this,” he told Emmer, “I’m going to end up on the streets. Not even here, but on the streets of Mexico, which is worse. You are basically giving me a death sentence, that’s how bad it is.”

 

* We have changed Samuel’s name in this story. As a matter of policy, we usually change the names of immigrants when telling their stories. While the stories are real, and while the individuals have agreed to let us use their stories, we choose to protect their privacy by not using their real names.

Does the hot-button issue of 2018 really split the country? Or just the Republican Party?

Press release, January 26, 2018—The one-page list of demands released by the White House late yesterday represents their continuing attempt to hold Dreamers hostage to their all-out attack on immigrants and immigration.

“This plan offers nothing new,” said John Keller, executive director of the Immigration Law Center of Minnesota (ILCM). “The anti-immigrant hardliners are exploiting the crisis they created, offering a limited path to citizenship for Dreamers at the expense of all other immigrants. Their hypocrisy is overwhelming. One example: the section eliminating most family visas is titled ‘Preserving the Nuclear Family.'”

The White House memo calls for slashing legal immigration to the lowest level since the 1920s, by eliminating most family visas and ending the diversity visa lottery. The plan guts asylum protections, sending Central American men, women, and children back to the violence they fled. It calls for increasing enforcement and streamlining deportation, while wasting $25 billion on a border wall. In exchange, the plan offers a 10-12 year path to citizenship for Dreamers, hedged around with eligibility requirements and provisions for revocation of status on several largely undefined grounds.

“The hard-liners created this crisis by ending DACA,” said Keller. “Now they are holding Dreamers hostage to get Congress to pass their racist and anti-immigrant agenda.”

Some 86 percent of all Americans want legal protection for Dreamers. It’s time to stop the hardliners in the White House and in Congress from holding Dreamers hostage. Congress must act now to protect Dreamers and end the crisis that the White House created by ending DACA.