Yesterday, as reported, the Obama administration changed the policy for immigrants who are in deportation proceedings. There will be a review of all the pending cases and the new policy places a priority on deporting serious criminals, who are considered high priority.
This should put a halt to the deportations of the non-criminal immigrants who are in proceedings. The government will use its discretion to assess these other cases. Among the factors to be considered are family relationships. The Obama administration's definition of family includes same-sex couples.
So, there's a test for the new policy today in Denver. A couple weeks ago, we wrote about a married couple, Violeta and Sujey, who are facing the prospect of being torn apart. Today, Sujey has a deporation hearing before an immigration judge in Denver.
Sujey's lawyer, Lavi Soloway, is ready to use the new policy to prevent her deportation. He sent the following statement:
I am taking Janet Napolitano's announcement of a system wide case review with me into court in an attempt to stop the "DOMA deportation" of a Sujey Pando, a Mexican immigrant who married her wife, Violeta, a U.S. citizen last year in Iowa. Sujey fled a lifetime of rape and beating in Mexico when she came to the US as a teenager. She was put in deportation proceedings after a routine traffic stop in 2008 and has been fighting every since. She and Violeta have been together as a couple for five years. I will impress upon the judge that a final decision on deportation that had been scheduled for today at 2:30 p.m. must be delayed in light of yesterday's announcement by the administration. Both U.S. Senators representing Colorado, Mark Udall and Michael Bennet, have communicated with ICE and requested feedback on the status of this case, thanks to grass roots support by the LGBT binational couple community and the immigrant rights community in Colorado.
