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Congress Is Often Handed Tough Immigration
Cases
By NICK ANDERSON, Times Staff Writer
WASHINGTON--His
name isn't Elian. But Vladimir Malofienko's immigration case is another
poignant drama playing out on Capitol Hill, where Congress often becomes
the U.S. immigration court of last
resort. Vova, as the Ukrainian boy is
known, was 2 years old and living near the infamous Chernobyl nuclear
plant in 1986 when an accident at the plant caused it to spew radioactive
gases and particles into the atmosphere. Four years later, Vova was
diagnosed with leukemia and, under a special program to help the victims
of Chernobyl, came to the United States for emergency
treatment. Now 15, he lives with his
parents in New Jersey, his cancer in remission but his immigration status
up in the air. The Malofienkos hope that Congress will intervene so they
will not be sent back to a country where top-flight medical care is hard
to find. Around the United States, many
immigrant families with compelling stories of hardship and special
circumstance continually come to Congress to seek relief from a Byzantine
immigration system often bent on steering them back to their
homelands. Moved by their plight, members
of Congress frequently introduce "private" bills that attempt to preempt
the administrative process. This year, more than 90 such bills await
action. The controversial measure that seeks permanent U.S. residency
status for Elian Gonzalez--the Cuban youngster rescued in November after
his mother and 10 other Cubans drowned when their boat sank off
Florida--is just one of
them.
Vova's
Measure Is Bottled Up in House Sen.
Frank R. Lautenberg (D-N.J.), sponsor of a bill to grant the Malofienko
family permanent U.S. residency, has said that forcing Vova to return to
Ukraine "would be placing an innocent child near the front of the line on
death row." But Vova's bill, though
passed by the Senate, so far has failed to clear the House. Aides said
that the bill is hung up in a House committee that wants assurance all
administrative remedies for the family have been
exhausted. The tortuous path taken by
such cases helps explain why legislation involving 6-year-old Elian faces
double trouble. First, special
immigration bills undergo strict scrutiny in the House and under
established precedent must win nearly unanimous support in the chamber.
That seems a dim possibility in Elian's case, which has divided both
Republicans and Democrats. The many twists and turns in the case in Miami
and Cuba have also given lawmakers
pause. Second, lawmakers are aware that
for every Elian there are many Vovas--and for that matter, uncounted other
immigrants with heart-wrenching stories who lack the access needed just to
get a bill drawn up. Said Rep. Jose E.
Serrano (D-N.Y.), an outspoken critic of congressional intervention in the
Elian case: "What we're doing here is we're opening the door for a lot of
people to say: 'What about me?' " A bill
to simply grant Elian U.S. citizenship--and thus foil attempts by federal
immigration officials to return the boy to Cuba--has languished in
Congress for
months.
Issue
Monitored 'Hour by Hour' The more
recent measure to give Elian permanent residency intends to shift
authority over his fate to a family court in Florida. The bill also would
grant that status to six of Elian's relatives, including his father, which
sponsors say would allow them to fairly express their views in the court
proceedings. Sen. Connie Mack (R-Fla.), a
key proponent of the new bill, said that the Republican-controlled Senate
soon could take it up and that he is monitoring momentum shifts on the
issue "hour by hour." As a potential
fallback, Mack has floated the idea of a nonbinding resolution to urge the
government to allow Elian to be examined by an independent panel of
psychologists to help determine whether the boy should stay in the United
States or return to Cuba. In the House,
lawmakers and aides say, it also is conceivable--though unlikely--the GOP
leadership could break with precedent because of the extraordinary
circumstances of the case and seek an up-or-down majority vote on the bill
to give Elian permanent residency. Only a
dozen private immigration bills have passed in the last six years, down
from hundreds in the 1950s and '60s. In part that is because lawmakers
have grown wary of accusations of favoritism or
impropriety. Allegations surfaced in 1969
of improper campaign contributions and gifts to Washington lobbyists in
exchange for hundreds of private bills introduced to help Chinese seamen
escape deportation. And roughly a decade later, the ABSCAM sting, in which
undercover FBI agents posing as Arab sheiks or their representatives
offered bribes to obtain private immigration bills, helped force seven
members out of Congress. Sometimes the
bills are brought on behalf of celebrities, which can work to their
advantage or disadvantage. Television actor Michael Wilding, a British
subject and son of actress Elizabeth Taylor, became an American citizen
after passage of a 1988 bill, even though he had a 1974 conviction for
marijuana possession. That conviction, under other law, would have barred
his immigration. But in another notable
1988 case, Congress refused to pass a private bill to allow tennis star
Ivan Lendl to bypass a five-year waiting period required for U.S.
citizenship. California, with more
immigrants than any other state, has spawned many of the private
immigration bills. In the last two years, several California lawmakers
have carried such bills, including Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein and
Reps. Ellen O. Tauscher (D-Pleasanton), Matthew G. Martinez (D-Monterey
Park) and James E. Rogan (R-Glendale). In fact, Rogan and Feinstein teamed
up on the only private immigration bill to be passed in the current
Congress. The Rogan-Feinstein law cleared
the way for a Thai immigrant named Suchada Kwong to become a permanent
U.S. resident. Kwong, 33, who lives in Washington state but has relatives
in California, asked for help after her husband--a U.S. citizen sponsoring
her immigration--died in a car accident before the couple could give a
required interview to the Immigration and Naturalization Service. As a
result, she faced deportation if Congress had not acted.
Feinstein
Offers 2 Private Bills In January,
Feinstein also introduced private immigration bills on behalf of two
Southern California teenagers: Tony Lara of Northridge, a native of El
Salvador who overcame high odds to graduate from high school and become a
state wrestling champion, and Guy Taylor of Garden Grove, a Canadian
national who has lived with his grandmother since being orphaned when he
was 16. But even as she pitched those
bills, Feinstein said that Congress should beware of playing favorites in
such a tangled, emotional field as immigration
law. "I have received scores of phone
calls from citizens in California who say if this child [Elian] were
Salvadoran, if he were a Mexican child, if he were a child from China, the
child would be sent back to his country," Feinstein said in a speech
urging Senate rejection of the bill granting the boy citizenship.
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