Miriam Aguirre was separated from her daughter 25 years ago, until the day she walked into her home in Tijuana, Mexico. Aguirre could not believe her eyes and collapsed into her daughter’s arms, who posted the reunion on Facebook.
https://www.facebook.com/mimialonso16/videos/1749948695030169/?permPage=1
Aguirre could barely breathe from the joy of seeing her daughter again. Her other daughter watched via video chat, and she said “thought I had to call an ambulance,” from the other side of the phone. The rest of the family were over come with joy as well.
Miriam Martínez’s mother and father separated in the 1980’s, and she went to the United States with her dad and sister. “My mom stayed in Mexico,” Martínez said. “I don’t know the exact details but I can only assume my father thought we would have a better opportunity in the States than in Mexico.”
Miriam’s mother is originally from Veracruz, but she eventually moved to Tijuana for its proximity to the border and with the hope that her daughters crossed it one day. The two girls remained undocumented in the United States for almost two decades, until President Obama’s executive order to guarantee the protection of tens of thousands of young people that arrived to the country illegally when they were children. The sisters fell into that category.
Martinez felt a sense of relief with DACA, as she was protected from being deported. Even though she married a U.S. citizen, it wasn’t until this year that she was granted a temporary travel permission for immigrants who are not permanent residents, such as DACA recipients.
Her authorized re-entry to the United States brought on a new possibility: “Legal Entry meant that my U.S. born husband would be able to petition me and I would be able to become a resident and travel to see my mother,” she stated.
She goes on to describe how it happened: “We started the process in February … we had our immigration interview May 16, I received my green card in the mail exactly a week later, on a Tuesday, by Friday of the same week my husband and I hopped on a bus and headed to Mexico.” On Friday, May 26, mother and daughter met again.
Like Miriam’s, thousands of families are torn apart because of difficult immigration policies. Although Obama’s DACA has helped hundreds of thousands of people get a better life by staying legally in the United States, Trump’s stand on the matter is worrisome, to say the least. The president seems set on backtracking the executive order, giving in to pressure from far right wing interests.
Miriam Aguirre’s sobs are the cries of a mother that has not seen her child for more than 20 years. As she exclaims in Spanish: “Oh my girl, oh my beautiful little girl, my little baby,” one can’t help but wonder how many more families have stories like hers, suffering from the same circumstances.
Check out the video here!