Highland Hospital nurse Maria Mendoza-Sanchez and her husband, Eusebio Sanchez, lost their last-ditch bid to delay their removal after nearly two decades in the United States and were deported to Mexico Wednesday night. Neither have criminal records. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) didn’t care. Accompanying Mendoza-Sanchez and her husband to Mexico was their 12-year-old U.S. citizen child. Their daughters, the youngest only 16, stayed behind to continue their education and somehow cope without their parents or little brother:
At the airport Wednesday night, the 46-year-old mother related how she had arrived in Oakland in 1994 when she was young and in love. She began working in a nursing home, where she was promoted several times, then studied to become a nurse. Eusebio had started working in construction, and later graduated to become a truck driver for the last 12 years.
Asked by a reporter Wednesday night if not getting the stay of the deportation order was a failure, she said no.
“I don’t feel it was a failure — it’s a challenge,’’ said Maria, much like the many others she has faced and overcome during the last 23 years she’s lived in the U.S. “I’m not leaving this country defeated, because I graduated from the university and that was not in my plans when I came here, or when I was a kid,” she said.
“I feel very satisfied with all the goals I’ve accomplished,” Maria added. Likewise, she wants her daughters to follow their dreams and not let anything get in the way of achieving their goals.
According to The Mercury News, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), who attempted to intervene on the family’s behalf, delivered the news Tuesday night that their request to ICE had been denied. And on Wednesday night, following ICE’s order, the family tearfully said goodbye at San Francisco International Airport. “Today I am going to leave, as I promised to do,’’ Mendoza-Sanchez said to press at the airport. “But it’s hard to leave my kids behind.”
For nearly two decades the family attempted to fix their legal status, but for undocumented immigrants already in the U.S., no line to “get papers” exists. Mendoza-Sanchez and her family are proof positive:
In a wide-ranging interview with the Bay Area News Group on Tuesday night, after losing her bid to delay deportation, Maria said she is studying all her alternatives, and immigrating to Canada is one of them.
Not only does Canada “need good nurses,” Maria said, but she and her husband must find jobs that pay enough to help support their daughters. The couple has saved some money to help cover those costs for a time, she said, but it will not last forever.
“My kids have to eat somehow,’’ said 46-year-old registered nurse.
And as horrifically as Mendoza-Sanchez was treated by Trump’s immoral mass deportation force, she still holds hope, the same kind of hope that immigrants bring with them to the U.S. in the first place: “Something good is going to happen,’’ she said. “You know what we always say: When a door closes, a window opens. One day there will be another president who will not be Trump. And that person will consider the whole situation.’’
It’s important that if you watch only one video today, make it the video of Mendoza-Sanchez, her husband, and their son saying goodbye to their family and supporters at SFO Wednesday night, and remember that this is what we’re sanctioning through our tax dollars. It’s also important to state that while some may say that this is not who we are, this is America now. Donald Trump is president, and this is exactly what he promised.
So, we must ask ourselves, does any of this make us safer? Does any of this make sense? If not, call your member of Congress and tell them to keep families together by opposing any funding in the budget for Trump’s immoral mass deportation force. And, ultimately, keep fighting to get Trump and his mass deportation accomplices out of office once and for all.
As immigrant rights leader Frank Sharry said following the deportation of Jesus Lara, another undocumented dad with no criminal record, “history is watching us. We either wake up and stand up today, or we will look back with regret in the future. There is a better way.”