ANGELINA DOHRE
Photo Editor
What happens when your parents are suddenly forced to leave the country? This is what I found myself asking as I sat in the kitchen, staring at my breakfast in shock after hearing the news. About a year ago, my parents sat my brother and me down, fed us pancakes and told us that they would have to leave the country in the coming months.
My parents were born and raised in Germany and decided to move to the States in 1992 after getting married. During the first couple of years they traveled on the B1 Visa and had to leave the States every six months to be able to stay another six months.
After two years of this, they were told by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services they needed a different type of visa or green card if they wanted to officially stay in the States. They hired an immigration attorney in Pittsburgh and she gave them information on how to apply for the E1 Treaty Trader Visa. This type of visa is for self-employed immigrants who do half of their business with their home country, which was Germany in this case.
The E1 Treaty Trader Visa had to be renewed every five years. It was denied to them in 2015, however, because the trades with Germany were no longer over 50 percent of their total business. Production had begun to circulate through my dad’s brother, who also lives in the States, and had him trade to Germany instead.
After receiving the news in Jan. 2016, my parents immediately hired an attorney to help us find another way to stay in the States. The attorney was able to get them permission to stay for six months with the B1 Visitor Visa, and another six months after that expired.
During this time, my parents talked to countless immigration attorneys, went to the immigration office in Buffalo to seek help, wrote letters to the governor, senator and state representative of the county and state of New York and even wrote one to President Trump.
Everyone had the same answer: my parents didn’t qualify for the green card or citizenship, even though at the time they had lived most of their adult lives in the States, had invested in countless cars, two houses and most importantly had two children who were born in the country and lived here all of their lives.
So far, my parents came back to visit for the summer in 2017 to be there for my brother’s graduation and left with him in August. I saw the three of them again over this past winter break, which was wonderful, but things are so different now.
Nothing has been the same since the day they broke the news about leaving. The house was emptied of most furniture and belongings that my parents had to sell. One of our dogs and cat, Drew and Kitty, had to be put down because they were too old for my parents to take with them or have them put up for adoption. Our other dog Billy had to be left behind and now stays with a family friend.
The fact that international families like mine are being separated for doing nothing wrong while illegal immigrants are “accidentally” granted U.S. citizenship means something needs to change about the immigration policies in this country.
My parents are good people. A couple of speeding tickets was their only wrongdoing in all 26 years of living here. They never took work away from anyone as my dad owned his own company. They spent and invested all their money into the States. They always applied for their visas legally and spent a lot of money on attorney fees and visa fees. They have two children who are U.S. citizens.
So why are they on the other side of the world right now?