by Salome Eguizabal
Elvira Arellano, the 32-year-old undocumented woman who a year ago took refuge with her U.S.-born son inside a Chicago church to avoid deportation to Mexico, was arrested Aug. 19 outside a California church and removed from the country shortly afterwards.
Arellano and her son Saul, 8, had become spokespersons against U.S. immigration policies that separate mothers and children. She was arrested outside Our Lady Queen of Angels church in Los Angeles after talking with reporters.
The National Immigrants Solidarity Network called her arrest and deportation “a shameful move,…a clear signal from the government to terrify people who dare to speak up and fight injustice.”
The Associated Press has reported that Arellano has pledged to continue her campaign for immigration reform from Mexico.
In an interview with Weekly Report a few days before her arrest, Arellano deflected questions about what would happen to Saul if she were detained or deported.
Emma Lozano, president of Sin Fronteras, an immigrant advocacy group in Chicago and Arellano’s top ally, will take care of Saul, according to the Associated Press.
On Aug. 15, when Arellano announced her plans to leave the Adalberto United Methodist Church in Chicago, she spoke of holding a prayer vigil in Washington, D.C., Sept. 12 to urge Congress to pass comprehensive immigration reform before the upcoming presidential elections.
Arellano’s supporters state they will go ahead with the vigil as scheduled.
Arellano had declared that she was not afraid of being taken into custody and that traveling outside of the Chicago church would not increase her chances of being detained.
“From the time I took sanctuary, it’s been a possibility that they would arrest me in the place and time of their choosing,” Arellano said. “If immigration wants to arrest me, then [they should] arrest me there [in Washington] in front of the men and women who make the big decisions and who are ignoring the millions of families who are shouting that we need changes in the immigration laws.”
Over the past year, her situation became symbolic of the struggles facing the many mixed-status families – those made up of both undocumented and legal residents currently living in the United States.
“Congress must act in September to stop the separation of families, the torture of four million U.S.-citizen children, the raids and deportations, [and] the no-match sanctions,” Arellano said the day she announced her plans to lobby in Washington, D.C.
In December 2002, while working as a janitor at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport, Arellano was caught in an Immigration and Customs Enforcement sweep. After her appeals failed, she defied her deportation order last year and sought sanctuary with Saul inside the Adalberto United Methodist Church, where she had lived ever since.
Religious sanctuary has no legal basis for protection under U.S. Iaws. ICE had maintained it would arrest Arellano at a time and place of its choosing.
Saul has traveled the country extensively and even addressed Mexico’s Congress, pleading for his mother’s future.
“He has met other children who are also living under difficult situations because of their parent’s deportation, and he wants to be a part of this struggle,” Arellano told Weekly Report.
Hispanic Link.
