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I can read quite well - especially the part where it mentions that the family was staying in the USA on a tourist visa - I missed the part where that document was converted into refugee status. You see, the story dances around the critical issue of their residence status - had they really applied for asylum? Had they been granted interviews for their case? Had their "tourist visa" been extended for 12 years? Or was this all the fault of their "bad immigration lawyer"?
Intention is not action - and desires do not necessarily change the facts that the legal procedures are not followed. The FBI went after the family because their residency status was invalid. If the father was fleeing for political asylum reasons, it is strange that he did not do so from the moment he entered the USA - the dialog is unclear, but one must surmise that the father fled and then brought his family to the USA.
My point is this - if the father made a declaration for political asylum the minute he set foot in the USA, and then brought his family - I would have more sympathy. But this is clearly not what happened here. And this is where I have the problem with the whole story - that the family entered on one basis and then set up shop on the assumption that they could stay. They did not have permanent residency, they did not have a business visa - they just came in and stayed. And when 9-11 hit and the government got serious for a second about illegals - they got picked up. Not because they were Muslim or Arab, but because they were illegally residing in the USA. True?
And I still want to know how you file taxes to the federal government if you do not have a Social Security or an Alien Registration number.
Was the government heavy handed - certainly! I never said I agreed with that action. - but stick to the facts and avoid the weepy part - and tell me why they were fingered? - was it because they played the system and tried to slip through the cracks? Seems like it to me.
