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#1
08-08-2007, 10:29 AM
Member
Joined in Aug 2007
32 posts
Hello all, *wary smile* I've been lurking around the corners in these parts for about a week now, and figure that it might be time to put my toes in the discussion waters.

My story - sounds a bit more strange to my own ears than most of the ones I've read through here. My mother is status native american (indian) born in Canada, and was able to enter, live, work, and be legal in the USA thanks to the Jay Treaty. My biological father was just plain Canadian, which leaves me with *no* native legal status. I was fourteen when my mother and I moved to Mississippi. I was issued a SS# in order to enroll in High School, with 'not eligible for employment' stamped on it, which I was given to believe was due to my age and labour laws.

We were never issued visas. We were never told about the need for them, not at the border, not at the SS office, zip. As far as we understood it, everything was A-ok. I graduated highschool in 2002 with, while not top grades, decent ones, and a fistful of scholarships to my local community college thanks to my creative writing skills and ACT scores. I went to University for a year and a half in Canada to study one of the top three creative writing programs in North America, to learn that as I'd been gone for four years, I wasn't considered a Canadian resident anymore.

In 2004, my mother's partner's parents fell ill. I packed up and borded a plane to take care of my mother, her in-laws, and the family farm. The immigration officer at the airport asked me how long I would be staying in the country, as my ID was a strange mix of Canadian student and American. I told him about my ill family, the need to take care of them, and burst into tears.

Again, no mention of the need for a visa.

A year later I discovered that I had skipped all the legal routes somehow, and I'm trying to wade through red tape to discover what I need to do next in order to stay. No one, not at immigration, not the lawyer I spoke with, no-one, can tell me what I have to do. I've spent three years unable to work due to fear of being kicked out. Three years not contributing to my parents household beyond farmwork, housework, and nurse to my granparents because I have no legal standing.

As far as I can tell, the DREAM Act is my only hope to start contributing to my family. To regain any semblance of independance. So. . . Let's get on those phones shall we? I've called Senator Cochran twice a day this week, and dial the number for my parents to add both *their* voices as well. Am working on talking my old highschool friends into doing the same. The more voices the merrier right?

Right.
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