‘I feel very sorry that there are people in my country who show their hatred towards my family this way’

Mexican by birth and a resident of the United States since she was three years old, Guadalupe Gutiérrez, 21, got married this past June in California, after two years of dating her partner. And the excitement of being a newlywed was quickly followed by a pleasant surprise: two days later, President Joe Biden announced a path to regularization for half a million undocumented migrants who are married to American citizens.

Gutiérrez’s husband is from California. As she doesn’t have legal resident status, she met all the necessary conditions to benefit from the program. Along with her marriage license, she had received a precious gift: a promise of the long-awaited papers that, after 18 years, would allow her to legally reside in what has been her country almost all her life. “We were very excited because, without knowing it, we [qualified to] request it,” Gutiérrez recalls.

To enter the Keeping Families Together program, also known as Parole in Place, beneficiaries had to have gotten married before June 18, 2024, the day Biden introduced the legislation. Under the program, legal status would be granted to migrants who, having entered the country illegally, were married to American citizens and had been living in the United States for at least 10 years.

This time around, Gutiérrez was luckier than during her previous attempt to regularize her status. The DACA program, which granted residency to migrants who arrived irregularly as children, ended when her process was underway.

She wasted no time and, on June 19, the first day that the deadline for receiving applications was open, she submitted hers. But a judge’s suspension order has cut her luck short. “Now, I’m in the same situation [as last time]. I applied and it’s on hold again,” she laments.

She’s referring to the decision made by a federal judge in Texas. On the night of Monday, July 26, a week after Guadalupe Gutiérrez submitted her application, U.S. District Judge J. Campbell Barker temporarily halted the program that would have given Gutiérrez the legal status she so longs for. Behind the court order is the lawsuit filed by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who — along with prosecutors from 15 other Republican-governed states — asked to block the program on the grounds that it was unconstitutional because it hadn’t been authorized by Congress.

For 18 years — since she was brought over from her native Mexico at the age of three — Gutiérrez has been suffering the consequences of having crossed the border in an irregular manner. She studies business and cosmetology, but her status as an illegal resident prevents her from accessing financial aid for her education. “I don’t have the same opportunities as other people who were born here, because I can’t qualify for funding for my studies,” she explains. “With my papers in order, I would also have opportunities to find work and help my family,” she adds.

“I felt sad [when the program was stopped]. It’s the same situation I’ve already been through. It’s very unfair, because undocumented people who live here help the country financially. They work, pay taxes, lead a quiet life. And they think we come here to cause problems,” she sighs.

Those who oppose immigration reform think otherwise. In the lawsuit that caused the suspension, Paxton claimed that the program has an “obvious political interest” and that the regularization of undocumented immigrants “incentivizes illegal immigration and will irreparably harm the Plaintiff states.”

President Biden criticized the judge’s order and warned that his administration will continue the fight to have it reversed. “Nothing I did changed the requirements people have to meet to adjust their status under immigration law. All I did was make it possible for these long-time residents to file the paperwork here, together with their families.”

Before the reform, if Gutiérrez wished to obtain the residence permit that applies to her because she married a U.S. citizen, she would have had to leave the country, wait 10 years and apply for it from a consulate. An unattractive prospect for someone who has just gotten married and whose home has always been in the United States.

The same day that the judge issued his order, Gutiérrez had received the notification for the next step in the process: the taking of fingerprints. Now, she is hesitating whether to go or not, but her lawyer from CHIRLA (the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights) advises her to go, because “if the process is reactivated, they would already have my data,” she shrugs.

CHIRLA has joined other organizations that defend migrants to ask that the voice of those affected be heard. “We don’t understand why a united family becomes a threat to Texas and other states. It’s important that the community knows that the pause in granting these permits doesn’t stop the process: applications can still be submitted. The community is urged to seek assistance from trusted organizations and experts on the subject,” advises Angelica Salas, executive director of CHIRLA.

“Everything is confusing and complicated,” Kali Pliego admits. A 43-year-old native of Minnesota, Pliego has been married to a Mexican man for 17 years. Like Guadalupe Gutiérrez, she and her husband filed the application last week to regularize his status. He’s also received the notice to have his fingerprints taken and doesn’t know what to expect. Days after filing for “parole-in-place,” Pliego gave an interview to EL PAÍS, in which she expressed hope for the initiative.

Now, two and a half months later, she understands why her husband was distrustful. “He knows that there’s an anti-immigrant sentiment in a part of the society in this country. He has to measure his hopes by taking into account that there are people who are against him,” she says.

Regularizing her husband’s status would mean, among many other advantages, that he could access a better job than the one he currently has. “He has to put up with things because he doesn’t feel he has the right to complain if someone treats him badly. Our goal is for him to have the option to choose, because right now, he doesn’t have that freedom,” she explains. Additionally, their son could visit his family in Mexico. He has never been to the country and he doesn’t want to travel without his father.

Pliego emphasizes that the judge’s decision to suspend the program as “pure politics,” because she doesn’t believe there’s anything illegal about it. “The fact that he stopped it before hearing the arguments from each side is a sign of his political ideology.”

Despite their displeasure, the couple isn’t afraid of the possibility that the suspension of the program could be definitive, because it wouldn’t change the life they’ve led for the last 17 years. “It would affect us morally, but not in our daily life,” she says. What does scare them is that the Republican candidate, former President Donald Trump, could get re-elected. “My biggest fear is that Trump wins,” she admits. “Then, they’ll knock on my door to get my husband out of the country.” She recalls that the anxiety they suffered during the four years of the Trump administration was “horrible.”

Pliego says that she knows many people who are awaiting the results of the presidential election to request regularization, because they believe that their future depends on who will be the next occupant of the White House. And she’s outraged by those responsible for pausing the process. “It’s a disgrace. It makes me very sad that there are people in my country who show their hatred against my family in this way,” she laments.

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