Ban lifted for green card visa applicants with HIV

A stamp in Heidemarie Kremer’s passport reveals her health status as HIV-positive.

Because of the disease, Kremer — a native of Germany — has been barred from becoming a legal resident of the United States. She and her two children are fighting possible deportation, and their plans for the future are on hold.

But that soon may change.

This month, the federal government cleared the way for HIV-positive foreigners to visit the country and apply for green card visas, lifting a bar that has been in place for more than two decades.

Kremer, 46, a trained physician and HIV researcher who lives in Miami, said she was relieved that her case might be resolved when she returned to court in February. But she said she also felt a sense of responsibility.

“This is not the end of the story,” she said. “What about all the lives that the HIV travel and immigration ban ruined?”

Immigration lawyers in California and around the nation said the ban had caused families to be separated; foreigners to avoid being tested or to go without medication; and highly skilled workers to return to their home countries.

Since the announcement, Los Angeles immigration lawyer J Craig Fong and other lawyers said they had received a flurry of calls and e-mails from HIV-positive foreigners who now had renewed hope. The new rules, including the elimination of HIV testing for green-card visa applicants, take effect Jan. 4.

“To finally be in a position where I can tell people that they can come to the United States to visit their family or that they can get a green card visa and stay here with their partner is just incredible,” said Victoria Neilson, legal director for Immigration Equality, a national organization that advocated for lifting the ban.

But Mark Krikorian, executive director for the Center for Immigration Studies, said the decision to remove HIV as a bar was based on politics, not science. “It was clearly a politically motivated move,” Krikorian said, adding that the decision could have real consequences — more HIV cases and more costs. “It is extra healthcare spending that we wouldn’t have otherwise.”

An analysis by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed that in the first year, an estimated 4,275 people infected with HIV could come into the U.S. at a cost of about $25,000 each.

The ban on infected foreigners began in 1987, when federal health officials added HIV to the list of communicable diseases that prevented people from entering the country. In 1993, Congress made it law.

“At the time, much less was known about HIV,” Neilson said. “People were really scared that HIV status was a death sentence.”

People could apply for waivers, but for most applicants that required proof that the foreigner had a family member in the U.S. legally. Because same-sex partners don’t qualify as family members under the law, the requirement was difficult for many to meet.

Last year, Congress changed the law, and this month, the CDC removed HIV from the list of diseases restricting foreigners’ entry.

Kremer was infected as a medical student in Germany. In 2001, she received a visa to come to the U.S. on an educational exchange program and later qualified for a visa for highly skilled workers. Her original waiver — granted by a sympathetic consular officer in Berlin — was automatically renewed.

But when Kremer applied last year for a green card visa, she was denied based on her HIV status, and she and her family were placed in removal proceedings. “I was fuming,” she said. “My whole future was built up to stay in the United States.”

Knowing the change in policy was coming, her lawyers pushed to get her case postponed until after the new year. Kremer, whose treatment is paid for by the German government, said she was thankful to have both medical coverage and immigration lawyers.

“I am concerned about other people who have been affected who aren’t fortunate enough to have attorneys who know how to navigate the system and keep people from being deported,” she said.

Another HIV-positive visa holder, who lives in Southern California, has also had access to an immigration lawyer but hasn’t been able to apply for legal residency.

Dave, who did not want his full name or occupation used because his HIV status is unknown to his employer, arrived from Canada a decade ago as a visitor. He soon found a job and was able to get an H1B visa for high-skilled workers. Now, he earns six figures and manages million-dollar projects.

Dave’s employer offered to sponsor him for a green card visa, but Dave couldn’t move forward because he knew how it would end — with a denial. His visa expires next year, and he had started looking for new job opportunities.

“Everything had a finite end to it,” he said. “You were working within certain boundaries. Now those boundaries have been removed.”

[Source: LA Times]

Living the Dream [source:Teen Ink]

While the majority of students are worrying about getting into their dream schools and being able to afford them, others worry about a bigger issue. Students brought to this country illegally, who must leave a blank space on applications that ask for their Social Security number, know they will not be accepted regardless of their outstanding grades and extracurricular involvement. However, there may be some hope in the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act (DREAM Act).

Of the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants residing in the United States (70 percent from Mexico), 2.7 million are children. These young people benefit from the U.S. school system, but only up through high school. Their education often stops there due to a 1996 federal law that prohibits states from offering in-state tuition rates to illegal immigrants unless the state also offers in-state tuition rates to all U.S. citizens.

The DREAM Act is a massive amnesty program for the millions of illegal immigrants (age 12 to 35) who entered the United States before they are 16. Those who apply for this amnesty can receive conditional, temporary resident status, which can be converted, once earned, to a nonconditional green card visa (permanent U.S. residency) after six years. These immigrants can then use their newly acquired status to seek green cards for their parents. In this way, it can also provide amnesty for the millions of illegal aliens who brought their children to the United States.

“I don’t necessarily live in fear of being deported,” says Juan, a high school junior who was born in Mexico. “For the most part, I live a normal life. Except, now everyone is getting their driver’s license, and I can’t.”

Juan came to the U.S. with his mother and older brother in 2000 when he was eight. He is just one of millions of students in the nation hoping for the DREAM Act to be passed. While he does not claim to have experienced any overt prejudice in high school, Juan still faces racial stereotypes.

“It bothers me when people joke around and ask me for my green card,” Juan explains. “I laugh, but deep down I know they are offending me for something I have no control over. I was born in Mexico, but my life is here.”

His older brother, who graduated a few years ago, now attends a community college and plans to transfer to a university. Juan hopes to take a similar path. “I have no doubt that I can go to college,” Juan says. “I know it’s going to be hard, but as long as I stay in this country, I have a chance.”

The DREAM Act was reintroduced in both chambers of Congress last March by Senators Dick Durbin and Richard Lugar.

“I can only hope that the DREAM Act will pass,” Juan says. “All I want is a good life and a promising future, just like everyone else.”

[source: Teen Ink]