CT News Junkie | One Man Champions Adoption Rights On Hartford Street Corner
Please share this story with your friends - we have to work to change adoption laws and this man is doing just that! Bravo!
Trace
SURVEY FOR ALL FIRST NATIONS ADOPTEES
ADOPTEES - we are doing a COUNT
Saturday, March 31, 2012
One Man Champions Adoption Rights On Hartford Street Corner
CT News Junkie | One Man Champions Adoption Rights On Hartford Street Corner
Please share this story with your friends - we have to work to change adoption laws and this man is doing just that! Bravo!
Trace
Please share this story with your friends - we have to work to change adoption laws and this man is doing just that! Bravo!
Trace
One Man Champions Adoption Rights On Hartford Street Corner
CT News Junkie | One Man Champions Adoption Rights On Hartford Street Corner
Please share this story with your friends - we have to work to change adoption laws and this man is doing just that! Bravo!
Trace
Please share this story with your friends - we have to work to change adoption laws and this man is doing just that! Bravo!
Trace
One Man Champions Adoption Rights On Hartford Street Corner
CT News Junkie | One Man Champions Adoption Rights On Hartford Street Corner
Please share this story with your friends - we have to work to change adoption laws and this man is doing just that! Bravo!
Trace
Please share this story with your friends - we have to work to change adoption laws and this man is doing just that! Bravo!
Trace
One Man Champions Adoption Rights On Hartford Street Corner
CT News Junkie | One Man Champions Adoption Rights On Hartford Street Corner
Please share this story with your friends - we have to work to change adoption laws and this man is doing just that! Bravo!
Trace
Please share this story with your friends - we have to work to change adoption laws and this man is doing just that! Bravo!
Trace
One Man Champions Adoption Rights On Hartford Street Corner
CT News Junkie | One Man Champions Adoption Rights On Hartford Street Corner
Please share this story with your friends - we have to work to change adoption laws and this man is doing just that! Bravo!
Trace
Please share this story with your friends - we have to work to change adoption laws and this man is doing just that! Bravo!
Trace
Adoptee Advice - use this search method
Search Tips: Google Alerts (ehababes)
Alerts can be a useful tool for individuals in the process of searching for a
family member.
Google Alerts are email updates of the latest relevant Google
results based on your queries. You decide a search query you wish to monitor.
For example, if you are searching for a child born on December 1, 1990 in
Illinois and surrendered to Easter House, you could set up the following
alerts:
Born December 1, 1990 in IL
Born 12/1/1990
Easter
House
Google will regularly search for your keywords and send you an email
report containing links to any information that matches your alert. You should
put in several variations of your information as you can not know how another
person might enter it. You may write your DOB as 12/1/1990 and they would
post to a registry under December 1, 1990.
Alerts are easy to set up. Simply
visit the
Google Alert page and start entering your keywords and phrases.
If you
need help, visit the Google Alert Getting Started Guide.
Many adoptees who find their family name can then search on Facebook and Google - believe me, we can use all the help when we search!
Please post a comment on what search tips you recommend!
Trace
Friday, March 30, 2012
Why we had a Facebook Page SPLIT FEATHERS (but no longer)
Yup, it’s what all the experts say you need - and it’s the
way to find new people who become new friends.
In fact, this blog Split Feathers has found many new
adoptees (like Michael and his brother who are Native adoptees but don’t know
their tribe yet).
That is the purpose of Facebook (FB) - to connect you with friends and let you
comment and talk and like and share. I try and make time to read friend’s posts
and I’m sure you do, too.
Because of Facebook I have reconnected with friends from
school and college and friends I knew when I lived in various places but moved
away. I have adoptees friends I have not met in person (yet) and Native
American friends who are not adoptees. It’s a giant circle, really!
It’s a kind of meeting place - and you can have groups of
people, business pages (like our Blue Hand Books) and lists of interests (I am figuring out Facebook like all of you are,
yes.)
2019 UPDATE: We ended our relationship with Facebook - too many issues with violating our privacy.
Thank you! Chi Megwetch and Pilamaye! Trace
Thursday, March 29, 2012
WA #NDN tribe gain full control on Child Welfare matters
Port Gamble S'Klallam Obtain Full Control Over Child Welfare Matters
After a decade-long effort in conjunction with the federal and state departments of Health and Human Services, the state Attorney General's Office, and tribal lawyers, the Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe has achieved a landmark goal -- complete control over the welfare of their own children. The 1,000-member Tribe in western Washington became the first in the nation to assume all control of guardianships, foster care, and adoptions for their children. Under an agreement with the federal government, the Tribe has disengaged the oversight by DSHS and is now solely responsible for its child-welfare cases.
The contemporary practice of removing Native American children from reservations in child-welfare cases has been likened to the infamous boarding-school era, when the federal government forcibly placed Native children in state or religious institutions to “assimilate” them into “American” culture.
To break away from this system, Port Gamble S'Klallam's children and families coordinator Jolene George has spent years working with DSHS to draft policies on how they would handle child-welfare protocols, which are listed under Title IV-E of the Social Security Act. "We will no longer lose our children," George said. "We didn't do this with a grant. We put our efforts, our money and whatever we could to do this."
Francine Swift, a member of the Port Gamble S'Klallam Tribal Council, said it's vital to have children stay on the reservation so they don't forget their ancestry and traditions. She said that before the Indian Child Welfare Act, children were adopted out and lost complete contact with their relatives, ancestors, and culture. "We never want to see our kids go through this again," Swift said.
After a decade-long effort in conjunction with the federal and state departments of Health and Human Services, the state Attorney General's Office, and tribal lawyers, the Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe has achieved a landmark goal -- complete control over the welfare of their own children. The 1,000-member Tribe in western Washington became the first in the nation to assume all control of guardianships, foster care, and adoptions for their children. Under an agreement with the federal government, the Tribe has disengaged the oversight by DSHS and is now solely responsible for its child-welfare cases.
The contemporary practice of removing Native American children from reservations in child-welfare cases has been likened to the infamous boarding-school era, when the federal government forcibly placed Native children in state or religious institutions to “assimilate” them into “American” culture.
To break away from this system, Port Gamble S'Klallam's children and families coordinator Jolene George has spent years working with DSHS to draft policies on how they would handle child-welfare protocols, which are listed under Title IV-E of the Social Security Act. "We will no longer lose our children," George said. "We didn't do this with a grant. We put our efforts, our money and whatever we could to do this."
Francine Swift, a member of the Port Gamble S'Klallam Tribal Council, said it's vital to have children stay on the reservation so they don't forget their ancestry and traditions. She said that before the Indian Child Welfare Act, children were adopted out and lost complete contact with their relatives, ancestors, and culture. "We never want to see our kids go through this again," Swift said.
This is one excellent example of tribes in action - and it is happening in more states! Happy Dance!
Trace
Monday, March 26, 2012
Anishinabe Elder Dave Courchene on the 8th fire and prophecy
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r90_2qEXP1E&w=560&h=315]
Read about this elder here: http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2012/03/15/on-prophecies-and-the-new-age-elder-dave-courchene-discusses-the-way-forward-103034
We are all related.... that is certain... Trace
Read about this elder here: http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2012/03/15/on-prophecies-and-the-new-age-elder-dave-courchene-discusses-the-way-forward-103034
We are all related.... that is certain... Trace
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Utah officials on Native children foster care statistics
American Indian children too often in foster care
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/53755655-78/indian-foster-american-care.html.csp?page=1
Utah Officials try to keep children in their homes, out of system.
By Brooke Adams | The Salt Lake Tribune, Mar 24 2012
More than 33 years after Congress passed the Indian Child Welfare Act, American Indian children in Utah are still being removed from their homes and placed in foster care far too often — a troubling statistic that is the focus of the state’s tribes and government officials.
True, there has been a vast improvement in out-of-home placements over those decades. In 1976, two years before passage of the act, American Indian children in Utah were 1,500 times more likely to be in foster care than other children in the state, said Utah Appeals Court Judge William Thorne, who spoke March 16 at the first Indian Child Welfare Conference to be held in Salt Lake City.
Read story here:
Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978
Congress passed the Indian Child Welfare Act to prevent breakup of American Indian families after a 1976 report showed “an alarmingly high percentage” of children were in “non-Indian” foster and adoptive homes or institutions. It governs what is supposed to happen if an American Indian child is placed in state custody, giving tribal courts jurisdiction for children who are members or eligible for membership in a recognized tribe.
Broken Circle: What is an orphan?
Children were orphans because there were no other relatives to care for them.
We know how "adoption" created new families for these orphans. That makes sense - it was a safety net.
Ask yourself: how is the word orphan to be interpreted today?
In the Third World and Indian Country, those places on Earth where the most destitute live in poverty, an orphan is not necessarily without parents: some of these children are without necessities: food, water, medicine and clothing.
We know Americans will rescue the child but not their parent. Americans will call these children orphans. Is that true? Is it not selfish for an American to choose a child over the parent of that child?
Are Americans OK with separating that child from their parent via closed adoption?
The numbers of adoptees (7-10 million) today answers that question - yes.
In Indian Country kinship adoption means an orphaned child is raised with an auntie, grandparent or other relative. Families remain intact and the child will not lose their family, language or their culture.
America's closed adoption model for Indians was purely destructive, severing a child's contact with culture, language and tribal kin, erasing their sovereign membership and their treaty rights. A few Americans involved in the Indian Adoption Projects have apologized, so we know they admit they did this heinous thing.
Can you imagine - Native children (thousands!) removed by the Indian Adoption Projects for the sole purpose of destroying families and tribal nations? It happened and yes, it was devastating.
America still places a stranglehold on Indian people with its judgement of us. This has gone on many years. Every treaty that was made was broken; all because American leaders wanted to secure more land and what was on those lands (minerals, water and food).
Plot after plot, year after year, you see the American government screwing Indians and stealing from tribes, or turning us against one another, one way or the other.
It's about control. It's about creating poverty and making us fight each other over scraps. This America goverment does not want us to be united in our struggle. They'd prefer us fighting each other over what little we're lucky enough to be granted or given by them.
A Northern Cheyenne friend said they start a fire in your front yard so you don't know what they are doing in your backyard. They divert our attention this way, and have used it many times successfully.
That is why states historically do not deal with Indians - only the federal government. This is supposed to mean the feds are more fair or the feds have a better grasp of treaties and history - yet they control us with their beauracy, laws and delays.
Fast forward. Do you see American kids being sent to Africa or Russia for adoption? No.
Americans are the biggest adopter in all the world. It's their savior complex. Americans believe they offered a better life for Indians, International and Third World adoptees.
As an adoptee, it was real pain for me. I cannot grasp how deep that pain went or my confusion and fear when my mother disappeared after I was born. She never returned. Eventually I stopped crying. I blanked out the hurt yet that deep pain reached into every aspect of my life. It took many years for me to step into the circle and rejoin my relatives... My mother was not dead but I was orphaned.
I hope you will leave a comment.
Saturday, March 24, 2012
The day they took my baby...Australia news
The day they took my baby - ABC Sydney - Australian Broadcasting Corporation
As Australia and Canada reveals what coercion happened in their news programs, when will the USA admit what happened to our mothers?
One can only hope we see this happen here and soon... Trace
As Australia and Canada reveals what coercion happened in their news programs, when will the USA admit what happened to our mothers?
One can only hope we see this happen here and soon... Trace
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
The Fight to obtain our Original Birth Certificates: Unsealed Initiative: NY's Adoptee Rights Bill
Adoptee Rights Coalition - the Fight to obtain our Original Birth Certificates: Unsealed Initiative: NY's Adoptee Rights Bill: Google+ Tweet This page was updated in March 2012; please refer to Unsealed Initiative for more information.
As some of you know, many Native adoptees were placed with Lois Wyse and Spence Chapin Adoption Agencies, who were part of the Indian Adoption Projects. New York needs to open their adoption records - let the secrets and lies be exposed and made truth... Trace
The Fight to obtain our Original Birth Certificates: Unsealed Initiative: NY's Adoptee Rights Bill
Adoptee Rights Coalition - the Fight to obtain our Original Birth Certificates: Unsealed Initiative: NY's Adoptee Rights Bill: Google+ Tweet This page was updated in March 2012; please refer to Unsealed Initiative for more information.
As some of you know, many Native adoptees were placed with Lois Wyse and Spence Chapin Adoption Agencies, who were part of the Indian Adoption Projects. New York needs to open their adoption records - let the secrets and lies be exposed and made truth... Trace
As some of you know, many Native adoptees were placed with Lois Wyse and Spence Chapin Adoption Agencies, who were part of the Indian Adoption Projects. New York needs to open their adoption records - let the secrets and lies be exposed and made truth... Trace
The Fight to obtain our Original Birth Certificates: Unsealed Initiative: NY's Adoptee Rights Bill
Adoptee Rights Coalition - the Fight to obtain our Original Birth Certificates: Unsealed Initiative: NY's Adoptee Rights Bill: Google+ Tweet This page was updated in March 2012; please refer to Unsealed Initiative for more information.
As some of you know, many Native adoptees were placed with Lois Wyse and Spence Chapin Adoption Agencies, who were part of the Indian Adoption Projects. New York needs to open their adoption records - let the secrets and lies be exposed and made truth... Trace
As some of you know, many Native adoptees were placed with Lois Wyse and Spence Chapin Adoption Agencies, who were part of the Indian Adoption Projects. New York needs to open their adoption records - let the secrets and lies be exposed and made truth... Trace
The Fight to obtain our Original Birth Certificates: Unsealed Initiative: NY's Adoptee Rights Bill
Adoptee Rights Coalition - the Fight to obtain our Original Birth Certificates: Unsealed Initiative: NY's Adoptee Rights Bill: Google+ Tweet This page was updated in March 2012; please refer to Unsealed Initiative for more information.
As some of you know, many Native adoptees were placed with Lois Wyse and Spence Chapin Adoption Agencies, who were part of the Indian Adoption Projects. New York needs to open their adoption records - let the secrets and lies be exposed and made truth... Trace
As some of you know, many Native adoptees were placed with Lois Wyse and Spence Chapin Adoption Agencies, who were part of the Indian Adoption Projects. New York needs to open their adoption records - let the secrets and lies be exposed and made truth... Trace
The Fight to obtain our Original Birth Certificates: Unsealed Initiative: NY's Adoptee Rights Bill
Adoptee Rights Coalition - the Fight to obtain our Original Birth Certificates: Unsealed Initiative: NY's Adoptee Rights Bill: Google+ Tweet This page was updated in March 2012; please refer to Unsealed Initiative for more information.
As some of you know, many Native adoptees were placed with Lois Wyse and Spence Chapin Adoption Agencies, who were part of the Indian Adoption Projects. New York needs to open their adoption records - let the secrets and lies be exposed and made truth... Trace
As some of you know, many Native adoptees were placed with Lois Wyse and Spence Chapin Adoption Agencies, who were part of the Indian Adoption Projects. New York needs to open their adoption records - let the secrets and lies be exposed and made truth... Trace
The Fight to obtain our Original Birth Certificates: Unsealed Initiative: NY's Adoptee Rights Bill
Adoptee Rights Coalition - the Fight to obtain our Original Birth Certificates: Unsealed Initiative: NY's Adoptee Rights Bill: Google+ Tweet This page was updated in March 2012; please refer to Unsealed Initiative for more information.
As some of you know, many Native adoptees were placed with Lois Wyse and Spence Chapin Adoption Agencies, who were part of the Indian Adoption Projects. New York needs to open their adoption records - let the secrets and lies be exposed and made truth... Trace
As some of you know, many Native adoptees were placed with Lois Wyse and Spence Chapin Adoption Agencies, who were part of the Indian Adoption Projects. New York needs to open their adoption records - let the secrets and lies be exposed and made truth... Trace
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Illinois Adoptees can open their records!
http://www.idph.state.il.us/vitalrecords/vital/non_certified.htm
| ||||||||||||
| THIS FORM is to
be used by adopted or surrendered persons to submit a request
for a non-certified copy of the original birth certificate. Once completed, the
form, along with a legible copy of identification (driver's license, state
issued identification card or passport) and a check or money order for $15 (made
payable to Illinois Department of Public Health) should be sent to IARMIE. THIS FORM is to be used by birth parents to specify their wishes regarding contact and the release of their identifying information on the original birth certificate. This form, along with a legible copy of identification (driver’s license, state issued identification card or passport) and either a completed IARMIE Medical Questionnaire form or a check or money order for $15 (made payable to Illinois Department of Public Health) should be sent to the IARMIE . Either of these forms and required documentation should be sent to: Illinois Department of Public Health Division of Vital Records Attention: IARMIE 925 E. Ridgely Ave. Springfield, IL 62702-2737 Questions may be directed to the Illinois Adoption Registry at 877-323-5299. Get more information about the Illinois Adoption Registry and Medical Information Exchange. Link to Chicago Tribune story: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-adoption-birth-certificates-20120318,0,7825341,full.story |
Illinois Adoptees can open their records!
http://www.idph.state.il.us/vitalrecords/vital/non_certified.htm
| ||||||||||||
| THIS FORM is to be used by adopted or surrendered persons to submit a request for a non-certified copy of the original birth certificate. Once completed, the form, along with a legible copy of identification (driver's license, state issued identification card or passport) and a check or money order for $15 (made payable to Illinois Department of Public Health) should be sent to IARMIE. THIS FORM is to be used by birth parents to specify their wishes regarding contact and the release of their identifying information on the original birth certificate. This form, along with a legible copy of identification (driver’s license, state issued identification card or passport) and either a completed IARMIE Medical Questionnaire form or a check or money order for $15 (made payable to Illinois Department of Public Health) should be sent to the IARMIE . Either of these forms and required documentation should be sent to: Illinois Department of Public Health Division of Vital Records Attention: IARMIE 925 E. Ridgely Ave. Springfield, IL 62702-2737 Questions may be directed to the Illinois Adoption Registry at 877-323-5299. Get more information about the Illinois Adoption Registry and Medical Information Exchange. Link to Chicago Tribune story: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-adoption-birth-certificates-20120318,0,7825341,full.story |
Saturday, March 17, 2012
#323 - Milestones in Blogging
 |
| Book cover photo |
Three years ago, a blog about American Indian Adoptees was a dream and the history of the Indian Adoption Projects was buried. Now it’s out there.
Three years ago, this blog was born. I set it up in 2009 but I didn’t blog much that year since I was just getting my feet wet - it seemed daunting at first. It was the technical parts of blogging that were new to me. But I had plenty to say and lots of research, news and history to share.This is my 323rd post. It’s hard to wrap my head around that and how this one little blog has had over 43,000 visits.
The most important thing for me to say is this: Thank you. I don’t think I say it enough. That you all come back here week after week, reading, commenting, and sharing this blog means the world to me. That you’ve spent your hard-earned money on my memoir One Small Sacrifice, told your friends about it, talked about it on Facebook, visited my Book Page, you’ve taught me my vision for this history to be told - it was not wrong. It’s not every day I get to say this - thank you.
To recap the life of this blog, I thought I would highlight some of the biggest milestones of the past three years.Top Search Engine: Google (they referred 4,500 people to this blog)
Most Searched Word: Split Feather Syndrome
Most Page Views: Split Feathers Study (1,253 people have read this study on Native American adoptees called Split Feathers which is incredible!)
Most Visitors from another Blog: Cassi’s blog “Adoption Truth” http://adoptiontruth-casjoh.blogspot.com/
Visitors around the world who regularly read this blog: USA, Canada, Germany, United Kingdom, Russia, France, Australia, India, South Korea, and the Netherlands.
I could go on and on, but for now let me just say that you all are the best. Thank you.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Order a copyRead an excerpt
Watch the trailer
Friday, March 16, 2012
Coerced Adoptions in Canada NEWS
‘You suffered just as much’: Adoptees gain new insight into parents’ choices as coerced adoption stories come to light... Read this news story from Canada here: http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/03/15/you-suffered-just-as-much/
Since a National Post investigation began uncovering stories about coerced adoption among unmarried women from the 1940s to the 1980s, several adoptees have contacted the newspaper saying the reports have validated their mothers’ accounts and helped prove that the choice to surrender was not fully hers. Some women had told their stories on the record for the first time, and they said their children have since expressed shock and compassion.
Coerced Adoptions in Canada NEWS
‘You suffered just as much’: Adoptees gain new insight into parents’ choices as coerced adoption stories come to light... Read this news story from Canada here: http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/03/15/you-suffered-just-as-much/
Since a National Post investigation began uncovering stories about coerced adoption among unmarried women from the 1940s to the 1980s, several adoptees have contacted the newspaper saying the reports have validated their mothers’ accounts and helped prove that the choice to surrender was not fully hers. Some women had told their stories on the record for the first time, and they said their children have since expressed shock and compassion.
Since a National Post investigation began uncovering stories about coerced adoption among unmarried women from the 1940s to the 1980s, several adoptees have contacted the newspaper saying the reports have validated their mothers’ accounts and helped prove that the choice to surrender was not fully hers. Some women had told their stories on the record for the first time, and they said their children have since expressed shock and compassion.
Coerced Adoptions in Canada NEWS
‘You suffered just as much’: Adoptees gain new insight into parents’ choices as coerced adoption stories come to light... Read this news story from Canada here: http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/03/15/you-suffered-just-as-much/
Since a National Post investigation began uncovering stories about coerced adoption among unmarried women from the 1940s to the 1980s, several adoptees have contacted the newspaper saying the reports have validated their mothers’ accounts and helped prove that the choice to surrender was not fully hers. Some women had told their stories on the record for the first time, and they said their children have since expressed shock and compassion.
Since a National Post investigation began uncovering stories about coerced adoption among unmarried women from the 1940s to the 1980s, several adoptees have contacted the newspaper saying the reports have validated their mothers’ accounts and helped prove that the choice to surrender was not fully hers. Some women had told their stories on the record for the first time, and they said their children have since expressed shock and compassion.
Coerced Adoptions in Canada NEWS
‘You suffered just as much’: Adoptees gain new insight into parents’ choices as coerced adoption stories come to light... Read this news story from Canada here: http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/03/15/you-suffered-just-as-much/
Since a National Post investigation began uncovering stories about coerced adoption among unmarried women from the 1940s to the 1980s, several adoptees have contacted the newspaper saying the reports have validated their mothers’ accounts and helped prove that the choice to surrender was not fully hers. Some women had told their stories on the record for the first time, and they said their children have since expressed shock and compassion.
Since a National Post investigation began uncovering stories about coerced adoption among unmarried women from the 1940s to the 1980s, several adoptees have contacted the newspaper saying the reports have validated their mothers’ accounts and helped prove that the choice to surrender was not fully hers. Some women had told their stories on the record for the first time, and they said their children have since expressed shock and compassion.
Coerced Adoptions in Canada NEWS
‘You suffered just as much’: Adoptees gain new insight into parents’ choices as coerced adoption stories come to light... Read this news story from Canada here: http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/03/15/you-suffered-just-as-much/
Since a National Post investigation began uncovering stories about coerced adoption among unmarried women from the 1940s to the 1980s, several adoptees have contacted the newspaper saying the reports have validated their mothers’ accounts and helped prove that the choice to surrender was not fully hers. Some women had told their stories on the record for the first time, and they said their children have since expressed shock and compassion.
Since a National Post investigation began uncovering stories about coerced adoption among unmarried women from the 1940s to the 1980s, several adoptees have contacted the newspaper saying the reports have validated their mothers’ accounts and helped prove that the choice to surrender was not fully hers. Some women had told their stories on the record for the first time, and they said their children have since expressed shock and compassion.
Coerced Adoptions in Canada NEWS
‘You suffered just as much’: Adoptees gain new insight into parents’ choices as coerced adoption stories come to light... Read this news story from Canada here: http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/03/15/you-suffered-just-as-much/
Since a National Post investigation began uncovering stories about coerced adoption among unmarried women from the 1940s to the 1980s, several adoptees have contacted the newspaper saying the reports have validated their mothers’ accounts and helped prove that the choice to surrender was not fully hers. Some women had told their stories on the record for the first time, and they said their children have since expressed shock and compassion.
Since a National Post investigation began uncovering stories about coerced adoption among unmarried women from the 1940s to the 1980s, several adoptees have contacted the newspaper saying the reports have validated their mothers’ accounts and helped prove that the choice to surrender was not fully hers. Some women had told their stories on the record for the first time, and they said their children have since expressed shock and compassion.
Monday, March 12, 2012
Does your path choose you?
 |
| What is your path in our world... |
Did I know where it would lead? I think I did! I followed my interests like a map.
Somehow I knew writing was my eventual path by age 10. I wrote in my journals religiously. No one ever told me to write... In those days I devoured magazines, a study of our strange and evolving American culture. At one period in my 20s and 30s, I wrote three to 20 pages a day. That led to the discipline I needed to be a writer and have a solid "skill set" to do the work.
By early 1996 I did not choose journalism; it chose me. First I was hired as editor at a weekly newspaper in Hayward, Wisconsin. Then Paul DeMain, the publisher of News From Indian Country, hired me that fall. It was obvious to me I only wanted to write about Native people and Native news. Paul and I created Ojibwe Akiing about a month after I started. After four years and a variety of duties on two Native newspapers, I had earned my unofficial degree in Native journalism from Paul DeMain.
Then the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation called and wanted to interview me for the editor position in June 1999. I flew to Connecticut for the interview and started work on August 16. That year I published a chapter in the book “Olympics at the Millennium: Power, Politics and the Games, 2000” based on my interviews with the family of Olympian Jim Thorpe, a Sac and Fox. It was published by Rutgers Press, in time for the Sydney Olympics.
One thing led to another. Yes, life experience shapes our thoughts and determines our path. The Old Ones visit in our dreams to guide us. We need to pay attention. Our path can take us down many new roads to many new people and we can learn so much in these challenges if we follow the signs which are our interests. For me, being a journalist and blogger is a gift with power, one that I treat with respect and humility. If you abuse power, you lose it.
The poet warrior John Trudell's life is a source of my inspiration. Trudell suffered the loss of his entire family in a fire, which could have ended his life as a writer and activist. How he healed is how I intend to heal my own recent losses of close friends and beloved family members.
How we heal is entirely up to us, but we have to chose it. If we bury and deny our grief, it will inevitably hurt us more. Even our being adopted is a path. Where it leads is up to us.
After the tragedies, Trudell began to write in a manner as fearless and uncompromising as his political stance with the American Indian Movement, by picking up the pen... He said, "When I went to the writing, it was the most vengeful thing I could do. I won't say I started writing out of love. When I started out to write, I did not want to explode. Writing lines, poems, songs -- that became my explosion."
Can't escape the heat
Disguised as a memory
Howling at the sky
Always chasing almost love that way
Loaded heart in the need to run
Almost always chasing love that way
There's a way you're expected to obey
Don't bite the hand that feeds you
Don't you know what freedom means
Bad dog Bad dog
--John Trudell, "Bad Dog"
Please share how your path chose you in the comments section.... Trace
Friday, March 9, 2012
10 Things You Need to Know About Native American Women
February 5, 2012 by Laura Paskus
It’s no exaggeration to say that American Indian women are missing from most media coverage, history books and classroom discussions. But at least journalism students, instructors and state educators in Nebraska are doing something to help end America’s ignorance of Native women and the contributions they make to their communities, their tribes and to the nation as a whole.
Last year, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln College of Journalism and Mass Communications published the magazine, Native Daughters. With a grant from the Carnegie Foundation and under the guidance of five university professors, students spent 18 months reporting and writing about American Indian women who are artists, activists, lawyers, cops, warriors, healers, storytellers and leaders.
Now the Nebraska Department of Education has also released a companion curriculum for the magazine. You can download it for free here.
Can’t wait even one minute more to learn about Native women? Here’s a teaser of what you can learn more about in Native Daughters—and what you can share with your students via the new curriculum.
1. “A lot of people think that us women are not leaders, but we are the heart of the nation, we are the center of our home, and it is us who decide how it will be.”–Philomine Lakota, Lakota language teacher, Red Cloud High School, Pine Ridge, S.D.
2. The art forms Native women practice stand as reminders of cultural endurance. “Their crafts survived the Greasy Grass (Battle of Little Big Horn), Wounded Knee One (1890) and Two (1973),” writes Christina DeVries in Native Daughters. “Their spirits survived the Trail of Tears, the Relocation and Termination program and continued struggles against cultural annihilation.”
3. In 1997, Ms. magazine named Winona LaDuke (Anishinaabeg) Woman of the Year. That same year, the activist also debuted her first novel, Last Standing Woman.
4. Of nearly 2 million women enlisted in the U.S. armed forces, 18,000 are American Indian women. Their representation in the military is disproportionately high—and Native women are more likely to be sexually harassed, which increases their chances of developing post-traumatic stress disorder.
5. The number of Native women applying to medical school has increased since 2003, peaking in 2007 when 77 Native women applied nationwide.
6. In 2007, when Cassandra Manuelito-Kerkvliet (Diné) was named president of Antioch University, she became the first American Indian woman president of a mainstream university. Not only that, but about half of the nation’s tribal colleges are led by Native women presidents.
7. Cecelia Fire Thunder (Lakota) became the Oglala Lakota Tribe’s first woman president. She has fought against domestic abuse, saying it’s not a part of traditional culture, and been a leader for women’s reproductive rights. In 2006, when the South Dakota state legislature prohibited abortion, Fire Thunder announced plans to build a women’s clinic on the reservation, and therefore beyond state jurisdiction. She was impeached by the tribal council, who said she was acting outside her duties as president.
8. Women lead nearly one-quarter of the nation’s 562 federally recognized tribes.
9. “Through the late 1700s, Cherokee women were civically engaged. They owned land and had a say during wartime,” writes Astrid Munn in Native Daughters. “But this changed after the tribe ceded large tracts of land to the U.S. government in 1795.” Since the mid-1980s, though, a generation of Native women activists, lawmakers and attorneys have been changing that history and working to empower women again.
10. Indian Country could never survive without Native women.
Photo of magazine cover. To order copies of the magazine, contact Joe Starita. You can also visit nativedaughters.org to watch video clips and extended raw footage of the interviews.
Link to Native Daughters: http://cojmc.unl.edu/nativedaughters/
It’s no exaggeration to say that American Indian women are missing from most media coverage, history books and classroom discussions. But at least journalism students, instructors and state educators in Nebraska are doing something to help end America’s ignorance of Native women and the contributions they make to their communities, their tribes and to the nation as a whole.Last year, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln College of Journalism and Mass Communications published the magazine, Native Daughters. With a grant from the Carnegie Foundation and under the guidance of five university professors, students spent 18 months reporting and writing about American Indian women who are artists, activists, lawyers, cops, warriors, healers, storytellers and leaders.
Now the Nebraska Department of Education has also released a companion curriculum for the magazine. You can download it for free here.
Can’t wait even one minute more to learn about Native women? Here’s a teaser of what you can learn more about in Native Daughters—and what you can share with your students via the new curriculum.
1. “A lot of people think that us women are not leaders, but we are the heart of the nation, we are the center of our home, and it is us who decide how it will be.”–Philomine Lakota, Lakota language teacher, Red Cloud High School, Pine Ridge, S.D.
2. The art forms Native women practice stand as reminders of cultural endurance. “Their crafts survived the Greasy Grass (Battle of Little Big Horn), Wounded Knee One (1890) and Two (1973),” writes Christina DeVries in Native Daughters. “Their spirits survived the Trail of Tears, the Relocation and Termination program and continued struggles against cultural annihilation.”
3. In 1997, Ms. magazine named Winona LaDuke (Anishinaabeg) Woman of the Year. That same year, the activist also debuted her first novel, Last Standing Woman.
4. Of nearly 2 million women enlisted in the U.S. armed forces, 18,000 are American Indian women. Their representation in the military is disproportionately high—and Native women are more likely to be sexually harassed, which increases their chances of developing post-traumatic stress disorder.
5. The number of Native women applying to medical school has increased since 2003, peaking in 2007 when 77 Native women applied nationwide.
6. In 2007, when Cassandra Manuelito-Kerkvliet (Diné) was named president of Antioch University, she became the first American Indian woman president of a mainstream university. Not only that, but about half of the nation’s tribal colleges are led by Native women presidents.
7. Cecelia Fire Thunder (Lakota) became the Oglala Lakota Tribe’s first woman president. She has fought against domestic abuse, saying it’s not a part of traditional culture, and been a leader for women’s reproductive rights. In 2006, when the South Dakota state legislature prohibited abortion, Fire Thunder announced plans to build a women’s clinic on the reservation, and therefore beyond state jurisdiction. She was impeached by the tribal council, who said she was acting outside her duties as president.
8. Women lead nearly one-quarter of the nation’s 562 federally recognized tribes.
9. “Through the late 1700s, Cherokee women were civically engaged. They owned land and had a say during wartime,” writes Astrid Munn in Native Daughters. “But this changed after the tribe ceded large tracts of land to the U.S. government in 1795.” Since the mid-1980s, though, a generation of Native women activists, lawmakers and attorneys have been changing that history and working to empower women again.
10. Indian Country could never survive without Native women.
Photo of magazine cover. To order copies of the magazine, contact Joe Starita. You can also visit nativedaughters.org to watch video clips and extended raw footage of the interviews.
Link to Native Daughters: http://cojmc.unl.edu/nativedaughters/
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Tribes want to regain authority in adoptions of off-reservation American Indian kids
by Jon Collins, Minnesota Public Radio
St. Paul, Minn. — Minnesota American Indian tribes and their allies in the state Legislature are seeking to plug a gap in child custody laws opened by a state Supreme Court decision last year.
The court's decision derailed the common practice of giving tribal courts a role during pre-adoption and adoption for off-reservation American Indian kids.
Until the late 1970s, American Indian children across the country were adopted outside their communities at very high rates. The practice had a devastating effect on tribes, as generations of youth were cut loose from their cultural identities.
"People thought they understood that children would fare better if they were raised in white middle class homes," said Andrew Small, a lawyer and former tribal judge in the state. "When you remove a child from their home, that begins a process that sometimes is impossible to stop... a child is going to be lost to the tribe."
In 1978, Congress passed the Indian Child Welfare Act, which was designed to allow tribes a say in child custody and adoption proceedings. Since then, Minnesota state courts dealing with custody of an American Indian child off the reservation have been able to transfer jurisdiction to tribal court, even in the later part of the proceedings, which are called adoptive or pre-adoptive stages.
But a Minnesota Supreme Court decision late last year found a gap in the Indian Child Welfare Act. The court decided that neither federal nor Minnesota statute explicitly allowed state courts, when dealing with an American Indian child living away from a reservation, to transfer jurisdiction during the later portion of custody proceedings.
Although Small warns that the issue isn't "black and white," he said a failure to pass legislation explicitly giving state courts the right to transfer jurisdiction to tribal courts might lead to a slight uptick in the sort of outside adoptions that first inspired Congress to pass the Indian Child Welfare Act in the first place.
"You're excluding the possibility that adoptive and pre-adoptive placement will be undertaken in a distinct and unique way of the tribe," Small said. "Children in that situation are typically going to be adopted out of their tribes."
Rep. Susan Allen, the first American Indian to serve in the Minnesota State Legislature, introduced a bill to fill the gap last week.
"The statute is adding [to] a procedure that's already in place," Allen said. "It's just extending that procedure to adoption proceedings."
Dawn Blanchard, Minnesota ombudsman for American Indian families, saw the state Supreme Court decision was a "fluke."
"For us it's sensitive, just because American Indians don't want their kids adopted outside the tribe," Blanchard said. "This [bill] kind of helps keep it the way it should be and the way it should be going."
The Minnesota Chippewa Tribe and the three Dakota tribes have passed resolutions in support of the bill. The bill's next stop will be a hearing in the House Civil Law Committee.
March 3, 2012
St. Paul, Minn. — Minnesota American Indian tribes and their allies in the state Legislature are seeking to plug a gap in child custody laws opened by a state Supreme Court decision last year.
The court's decision derailed the common practice of giving tribal courts a role during pre-adoption and adoption for off-reservation American Indian kids.
Until the late 1970s, American Indian children across the country were adopted outside their communities at very high rates. The practice had a devastating effect on tribes, as generations of youth were cut loose from their cultural identities.
"People thought they understood that children would fare better if they were raised in white middle class homes," said Andrew Small, a lawyer and former tribal judge in the state. "When you remove a child from their home, that begins a process that sometimes is impossible to stop... a child is going to be lost to the tribe."
In 1978, Congress passed the Indian Child Welfare Act, which was designed to allow tribes a say in child custody and adoption proceedings. Since then, Minnesota state courts dealing with custody of an American Indian child off the reservation have been able to transfer jurisdiction to tribal court, even in the later part of the proceedings, which are called adoptive or pre-adoptive stages.
But a Minnesota Supreme Court decision late last year found a gap in the Indian Child Welfare Act. The court decided that neither federal nor Minnesota statute explicitly allowed state courts, when dealing with an American Indian child living away from a reservation, to transfer jurisdiction during the later portion of custody proceedings.
Although Small warns that the issue isn't "black and white," he said a failure to pass legislation explicitly giving state courts the right to transfer jurisdiction to tribal courts might lead to a slight uptick in the sort of outside adoptions that first inspired Congress to pass the Indian Child Welfare Act in the first place.
"You're excluding the possibility that adoptive and pre-adoptive placement will be undertaken in a distinct and unique way of the tribe," Small said. "Children in that situation are typically going to be adopted out of their tribes."
Rep. Susan Allen, the first American Indian to serve in the Minnesota State Legislature, introduced a bill to fill the gap last week.
"The statute is adding [to] a procedure that's already in place," Allen said. "It's just extending that procedure to adoption proceedings."
Dawn Blanchard, Minnesota ombudsman for American Indian families, saw the state Supreme Court decision was a "fluke."
"For us it's sensitive, just because American Indians don't want their kids adopted outside the tribe," Blanchard said. "This [bill] kind of helps keep it the way it should be and the way it should be going."
The Minnesota Chippewa Tribe and the three Dakota tribes have passed resolutions in support of the bill. The bill's next stop will be a hearing in the House Civil Law Committee.
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Adoptees deported by US? Yes
By Kim Sung-soo
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2012/03/137_106204.html
Until 2001, when Korean children were sent to the U.S. for overseas adoption, it was their adoptive parents’ responsibility to naturalize them as U.S. citizens.
In addition, adoption agencies both in Korea and the U.S. were responsible for post-adoption services that should monitor adoptees and their adoptive parents until the children are fully integrated into U.S. society. This is a key principle of overseas adoption.
However, the reality is not the same as the principle. The U.S. deports foreign adoptees aged 29 and older who haven’t been naturalized when they commit certain crimes. Washington must stop this practice immediately.
Unlike European governments, the U.S. government did not automatically grant citizenship to overseas adoptees until 2001. The Child Citizenship Act of 2000 came into force on Feb. 27, 2001, allowing all internationally adopted children under 18 on that date, and all those adopted in the future, to become U.S. citizens automatically. However, adoptees 18 or older on that date could not be covered by the act.
Many adoptees discovered, usually when applying for federal student loans or a passport, that they had never been naturalized by their foster parents. I know three Korean adoptees ― Monte, Tim, and Matthew ― who could not benefit from the act.
Monte was born in 1970 in Korea and was sent to the U.S. in 1978. Although he served in the U.S. military, he was deported to Korea in 2009. Monte claims that when he was arrested, he did not know that he had been set up by his truck driving partner to transport drugs. Like most other Korean adoptees sent to the U.S., Monte is culturally American and does not speak Korean.
Tim was born in Korea in 1974, and in 1977 he went to the U.S. as an adoptee. His adoptive parents cut their ties with him after he graduated from high school, so he left his home and wandered throughout the U.S. He became homeless and addicted to drugs for over 15 years. Ultimately he was arrested, imprisoned, and deported to Korea, where he became homeless again in April 2011. He has no trace of his birth family on his adoption records.
Matthew was born in Korea in 1978 and he went to the U.S. at the age of six months, but his parents did not naturalize him. He was not deported, but willingly returned to Korea in February 2011 to be close to his family and experience Korea as a young man.
When the Seoul government discovered that Matthew, technically an “overseas Korean citizen,” was back in the country, he received a compulsory enlistment notice from the Korean military. After a prolonged struggle over paperwork that reflected both his permanent residency in the U.S. and his Korean citizenship, Matthew was finally granted an exemption from military enlistment because he is also technically an “orphan.”
Matthew would like to have dual citizenship, just as other adoptees have that option. But because he received his Green Card only in the past few years, he would be in his 40s by the time he gains U.S. citizenship. In the interim, he would be required to live within the U.S. Meanwhile, adoptees with only U.S. citizenship may live in Korea indefinitely on an F-4 visa.
As the U.S. leads the world in terms of the numbers of children adopted from other countries, it should also lead the world in the humanitarian treatment of them. However, we are now seeing that adoptees from not just Korea, but many other countries, are being deported from the U.S. even on minor charges.
Under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), amended and expanded by the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) of 1996, non-citizens may apply for “waivers” to deportations, based on factors such as length of residency in the U.S. and potential hardship if deported.
However, no such exceptions are available to “aggravated felons.” Aggravated felonies include crimes such as drug trafficking, but may also include misdemeanor charges. For instance, the IIRAIRA expanded the INA so a person may be treated as an aggravated felon for committing a theft punishable by only one year in prison. This opens up the risk of adoptees to be deported for petty crimes such as shoplifting.
While recognizing that non-adopted people who immigrated as children are also subject to this law, I believe that the U.S. Congress, through passing the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, has already shown its belief that international adoptees should be automatic citizens.
I urge the U.S. government to correct defects in the U.S. legal system by quickly passing an amendment that would allow all overseas adoptees ― even adults like Tim, Matthew, and Monte ― to rightfully receive their U.S. citizenship. This would stop the deportations and also give the benefits and protection of citizenship to all law-abiding international adoptees.
Dr. Kim Sung-soo is the author of a biography of Korean Quaker Ham Sok-hon and executive director of Transparency International-Korea. Reach him at wadans@empas.com.
Adoptees deported by US? Yes
By Kim Sung-soo
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2012/03/137_106204.html
Until 2001, when Korean children were sent to the U.S. for overseas adoption, it was their adoptive parents’ responsibility to naturalize them as U.S. citizens.
In addition, adoption agencies both in Korea and the U.S. were responsible for post-adoption services that should monitor adoptees and their adoptive parents until the children are fully integrated into U.S. society. This is a key principle of overseas adoption.
However, the reality is not the same as the principle. The U.S. deports foreign adoptees aged 29 and older who haven’t been naturalized when they commit certain crimes. Washington must stop this practice immediately.
Unlike European governments, the U.S. government did not automatically grant citizenship to overseas adoptees until 2001. The Child Citizenship Act of 2000 came into force on Feb. 27, 2001, allowing all internationally adopted children under 18 on that date, and all those adopted in the future, to become U.S. citizens automatically. However, adoptees 18 or older on that date could not be covered by the act.
Many adoptees discovered, usually when applying for federal student loans or a passport, that they had never been naturalized by their foster parents. I know three Korean adoptees ― Monte, Tim, and Matthew ― who could not benefit from the act.
Monte was born in 1970 in Korea and was sent to the U.S. in 1978. Although he served in the U.S. military, he was deported to Korea in 2009. Monte claims that when he was arrested, he did not know that he had been set up by his truck driving partner to transport drugs. Like most other Korean adoptees sent to the U.S., Monte is culturally American and does not speak Korean.
Tim was born in Korea in 1974, and in 1977 he went to the U.S. as an adoptee. His adoptive parents cut their ties with him after he graduated from high school, so he left his home and wandered throughout the U.S. He became homeless and addicted to drugs for over 15 years. Ultimately he was arrested, imprisoned, and deported to Korea, where he became homeless again in April 2011. He has no trace of his birth family on his adoption records.
Matthew was born in Korea in 1978 and he went to the U.S. at the age of six months, but his parents did not naturalize him. He was not deported, but willingly returned to Korea in February 2011 to be close to his family and experience Korea as a young man.
When the Seoul government discovered that Matthew, technically an “overseas Korean citizen,” was back in the country, he received a compulsory enlistment notice from the Korean military. After a prolonged struggle over paperwork that reflected both his permanent residency in the U.S. and his Korean citizenship, Matthew was finally granted an exemption from military enlistment because he is also technically an “orphan.”
Matthew would like to have dual citizenship, just as other adoptees have that option. But because he received his Green Card only in the past few years, he would be in his 40s by the time he gains U.S. citizenship. In the interim, he would be required to live within the U.S. Meanwhile, adoptees with only U.S. citizenship may live in Korea indefinitely on an F-4 visa.
As the U.S. leads the world in terms of the numbers of children adopted from other countries, it should also lead the world in the humanitarian treatment of them. However, we are now seeing that adoptees from not just Korea, but many other countries, are being deported from the U.S. even on minor charges.
Under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), amended and expanded by the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) of 1996, non-citizens may apply for “waivers” to deportations, based on factors such as length of residency in the U.S. and potential hardship if deported.
However, no such exceptions are available to “aggravated felons.” Aggravated felonies include crimes such as drug trafficking, but may also include misdemeanor charges. For instance, the IIRAIRA expanded the INA so a person may be treated as an aggravated felon for committing a theft punishable by only one year in prison. This opens up the risk of adoptees to be deported for petty crimes such as shoplifting.
While recognizing that non-adopted people who immigrated as children are also subject to this law, I believe that the U.S. Congress, through passing the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, has already shown its belief that international adoptees should be automatic citizens.
I urge the U.S. government to correct defects in the U.S. legal system by quickly passing an amendment that would allow all overseas adoptees ― even adults like Tim, Matthew, and Monte ― to rightfully receive their U.S. citizenship. This would stop the deportations and also give the benefits and protection of citizenship to all law-abiding international adoptees.
Dr. Kim Sung-soo is the author of a biography of Korean Quaker Ham Sok-hon and executive director of Transparency International-Korea. Reach him at wadans@empas.com.
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2012/03/137_106204.html
Until 2001, when Korean children were sent to the U.S. for overseas adoption, it was their adoptive parents’ responsibility to naturalize them as U.S. citizens.
In addition, adoption agencies both in Korea and the U.S. were responsible for post-adoption services that should monitor adoptees and their adoptive parents until the children are fully integrated into U.S. society. This is a key principle of overseas adoption.
However, the reality is not the same as the principle. The U.S. deports foreign adoptees aged 29 and older who haven’t been naturalized when they commit certain crimes. Washington must stop this practice immediately.
Unlike European governments, the U.S. government did not automatically grant citizenship to overseas adoptees until 2001. The Child Citizenship Act of 2000 came into force on Feb. 27, 2001, allowing all internationally adopted children under 18 on that date, and all those adopted in the future, to become U.S. citizens automatically. However, adoptees 18 or older on that date could not be covered by the act.
Many adoptees discovered, usually when applying for federal student loans or a passport, that they had never been naturalized by their foster parents. I know three Korean adoptees ― Monte, Tim, and Matthew ― who could not benefit from the act.
Monte was born in 1970 in Korea and was sent to the U.S. in 1978. Although he served in the U.S. military, he was deported to Korea in 2009. Monte claims that when he was arrested, he did not know that he had been set up by his truck driving partner to transport drugs. Like most other Korean adoptees sent to the U.S., Monte is culturally American and does not speak Korean.
Tim was born in Korea in 1974, and in 1977 he went to the U.S. as an adoptee. His adoptive parents cut their ties with him after he graduated from high school, so he left his home and wandered throughout the U.S. He became homeless and addicted to drugs for over 15 years. Ultimately he was arrested, imprisoned, and deported to Korea, where he became homeless again in April 2011. He has no trace of his birth family on his adoption records.
Matthew was born in Korea in 1978 and he went to the U.S. at the age of six months, but his parents did not naturalize him. He was not deported, but willingly returned to Korea in February 2011 to be close to his family and experience Korea as a young man.
When the Seoul government discovered that Matthew, technically an “overseas Korean citizen,” was back in the country, he received a compulsory enlistment notice from the Korean military. After a prolonged struggle over paperwork that reflected both his permanent residency in the U.S. and his Korean citizenship, Matthew was finally granted an exemption from military enlistment because he is also technically an “orphan.”
Matthew would like to have dual citizenship, just as other adoptees have that option. But because he received his Green Card only in the past few years, he would be in his 40s by the time he gains U.S. citizenship. In the interim, he would be required to live within the U.S. Meanwhile, adoptees with only U.S. citizenship may live in Korea indefinitely on an F-4 visa.
As the U.S. leads the world in terms of the numbers of children adopted from other countries, it should also lead the world in the humanitarian treatment of them. However, we are now seeing that adoptees from not just Korea, but many other countries, are being deported from the U.S. even on minor charges.
Under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), amended and expanded by the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) of 1996, non-citizens may apply for “waivers” to deportations, based on factors such as length of residency in the U.S. and potential hardship if deported.
However, no such exceptions are available to “aggravated felons.” Aggravated felonies include crimes such as drug trafficking, but may also include misdemeanor charges. For instance, the IIRAIRA expanded the INA so a person may be treated as an aggravated felon for committing a theft punishable by only one year in prison. This opens up the risk of adoptees to be deported for petty crimes such as shoplifting.
While recognizing that non-adopted people who immigrated as children are also subject to this law, I believe that the U.S. Congress, through passing the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, has already shown its belief that international adoptees should be automatic citizens.
I urge the U.S. government to correct defects in the U.S. legal system by quickly passing an amendment that would allow all overseas adoptees ― even adults like Tim, Matthew, and Monte ― to rightfully receive their U.S. citizenship. This would stop the deportations and also give the benefits and protection of citizenship to all law-abiding international adoptees.
Dr. Kim Sung-soo is the author of a biography of Korean Quaker Ham Sok-hon and executive director of Transparency International-Korea. Reach him at wadans@empas.com.
Adoptees deported by US? Yes
By Kim Sung-soo
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2012/03/137_106204.html
Until 2001, when Korean children were sent to the U.S. for overseas adoption, it was their adoptive parents’ responsibility to naturalize them as U.S. citizens.
In addition, adoption agencies both in Korea and the U.S. were responsible for post-adoption services that should monitor adoptees and their adoptive parents until the children are fully integrated into U.S. society. This is a key principle of overseas adoption.
However, the reality is not the same as the principle. The U.S. deports foreign adoptees aged 29 and older who haven’t been naturalized when they commit certain crimes. Washington must stop this practice immediately.
Unlike European governments, the U.S. government did not automatically grant citizenship to overseas adoptees until 2001. The Child Citizenship Act of 2000 came into force on Feb. 27, 2001, allowing all internationally adopted children under 18 on that date, and all those adopted in the future, to become U.S. citizens automatically. However, adoptees 18 or older on that date could not be covered by the act.
Many adoptees discovered, usually when applying for federal student loans or a passport, that they had never been naturalized by their foster parents. I know three Korean adoptees ― Monte, Tim, and Matthew ― who could not benefit from the act.
Monte was born in 1970 in Korea and was sent to the U.S. in 1978. Although he served in the U.S. military, he was deported to Korea in 2009. Monte claims that when he was arrested, he did not know that he had been set up by his truck driving partner to transport drugs. Like most other Korean adoptees sent to the U.S., Monte is culturally American and does not speak Korean.
Tim was born in Korea in 1974, and in 1977 he went to the U.S. as an adoptee. His adoptive parents cut their ties with him after he graduated from high school, so he left his home and wandered throughout the U.S. He became homeless and addicted to drugs for over 15 years. Ultimately he was arrested, imprisoned, and deported to Korea, where he became homeless again in April 2011. He has no trace of his birth family on his adoption records.
Matthew was born in Korea in 1978 and he went to the U.S. at the age of six months, but his parents did not naturalize him. He was not deported, but willingly returned to Korea in February 2011 to be close to his family and experience Korea as a young man.
When the Seoul government discovered that Matthew, technically an “overseas Korean citizen,” was back in the country, he received a compulsory enlistment notice from the Korean military. After a prolonged struggle over paperwork that reflected both his permanent residency in the U.S. and his Korean citizenship, Matthew was finally granted an exemption from military enlistment because he is also technically an “orphan.”
Matthew would like to have dual citizenship, just as other adoptees have that option. But because he received his Green Card only in the past few years, he would be in his 40s by the time he gains U.S. citizenship. In the interim, he would be required to live within the U.S. Meanwhile, adoptees with only U.S. citizenship may live in Korea indefinitely on an F-4 visa.
As the U.S. leads the world in terms of the numbers of children adopted from other countries, it should also lead the world in the humanitarian treatment of them. However, we are now seeing that adoptees from not just Korea, but many other countries, are being deported from the U.S. even on minor charges.
Under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), amended and expanded by the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) of 1996, non-citizens may apply for “waivers” to deportations, based on factors such as length of residency in the U.S. and potential hardship if deported.
However, no such exceptions are available to “aggravated felons.” Aggravated felonies include crimes such as drug trafficking, but may also include misdemeanor charges. For instance, the IIRAIRA expanded the INA so a person may be treated as an aggravated felon for committing a theft punishable by only one year in prison. This opens up the risk of adoptees to be deported for petty crimes such as shoplifting.
While recognizing that non-adopted people who immigrated as children are also subject to this law, I believe that the U.S. Congress, through passing the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, has already shown its belief that international adoptees should be automatic citizens.
I urge the U.S. government to correct defects in the U.S. legal system by quickly passing an amendment that would allow all overseas adoptees ― even adults like Tim, Matthew, and Monte ― to rightfully receive their U.S. citizenship. This would stop the deportations and also give the benefits and protection of citizenship to all law-abiding international adoptees.
Dr. Kim Sung-soo is the author of a biography of Korean Quaker Ham Sok-hon and executive director of Transparency International-Korea. Reach him at wadans@empas.com.
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2012/03/137_106204.html
Until 2001, when Korean children were sent to the U.S. for overseas adoption, it was their adoptive parents’ responsibility to naturalize them as U.S. citizens.
In addition, adoption agencies both in Korea and the U.S. were responsible for post-adoption services that should monitor adoptees and their adoptive parents until the children are fully integrated into U.S. society. This is a key principle of overseas adoption.
However, the reality is not the same as the principle. The U.S. deports foreign adoptees aged 29 and older who haven’t been naturalized when they commit certain crimes. Washington must stop this practice immediately.
Unlike European governments, the U.S. government did not automatically grant citizenship to overseas adoptees until 2001. The Child Citizenship Act of 2000 came into force on Feb. 27, 2001, allowing all internationally adopted children under 18 on that date, and all those adopted in the future, to become U.S. citizens automatically. However, adoptees 18 or older on that date could not be covered by the act.
Many adoptees discovered, usually when applying for federal student loans or a passport, that they had never been naturalized by their foster parents. I know three Korean adoptees ― Monte, Tim, and Matthew ― who could not benefit from the act.
Monte was born in 1970 in Korea and was sent to the U.S. in 1978. Although he served in the U.S. military, he was deported to Korea in 2009. Monte claims that when he was arrested, he did not know that he had been set up by his truck driving partner to transport drugs. Like most other Korean adoptees sent to the U.S., Monte is culturally American and does not speak Korean.
Tim was born in Korea in 1974, and in 1977 he went to the U.S. as an adoptee. His adoptive parents cut their ties with him after he graduated from high school, so he left his home and wandered throughout the U.S. He became homeless and addicted to drugs for over 15 years. Ultimately he was arrested, imprisoned, and deported to Korea, where he became homeless again in April 2011. He has no trace of his birth family on his adoption records.
Matthew was born in Korea in 1978 and he went to the U.S. at the age of six months, but his parents did not naturalize him. He was not deported, but willingly returned to Korea in February 2011 to be close to his family and experience Korea as a young man.
When the Seoul government discovered that Matthew, technically an “overseas Korean citizen,” was back in the country, he received a compulsory enlistment notice from the Korean military. After a prolonged struggle over paperwork that reflected both his permanent residency in the U.S. and his Korean citizenship, Matthew was finally granted an exemption from military enlistment because he is also technically an “orphan.”
Matthew would like to have dual citizenship, just as other adoptees have that option. But because he received his Green Card only in the past few years, he would be in his 40s by the time he gains U.S. citizenship. In the interim, he would be required to live within the U.S. Meanwhile, adoptees with only U.S. citizenship may live in Korea indefinitely on an F-4 visa.
As the U.S. leads the world in terms of the numbers of children adopted from other countries, it should also lead the world in the humanitarian treatment of them. However, we are now seeing that adoptees from not just Korea, but many other countries, are being deported from the U.S. even on minor charges.
Under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), amended and expanded by the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) of 1996, non-citizens may apply for “waivers” to deportations, based on factors such as length of residency in the U.S. and potential hardship if deported.
However, no such exceptions are available to “aggravated felons.” Aggravated felonies include crimes such as drug trafficking, but may also include misdemeanor charges. For instance, the IIRAIRA expanded the INA so a person may be treated as an aggravated felon for committing a theft punishable by only one year in prison. This opens up the risk of adoptees to be deported for petty crimes such as shoplifting.
While recognizing that non-adopted people who immigrated as children are also subject to this law, I believe that the U.S. Congress, through passing the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, has already shown its belief that international adoptees should be automatic citizens.
I urge the U.S. government to correct defects in the U.S. legal system by quickly passing an amendment that would allow all overseas adoptees ― even adults like Tim, Matthew, and Monte ― to rightfully receive their U.S. citizenship. This would stop the deportations and also give the benefits and protection of citizenship to all law-abiding international adoptees.
Dr. Kim Sung-soo is the author of a biography of Korean Quaker Ham Sok-hon and executive director of Transparency International-Korea. Reach him at wadans@empas.com.
Adoptees deported by US? Yes
By Kim Sung-soo
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2012/03/137_106204.html
Until 2001, when Korean children were sent to the U.S. for overseas adoption, it was their adoptive parents’ responsibility to naturalize them as U.S. citizens.
In addition, adoption agencies both in Korea and the U.S. were responsible for post-adoption services that should monitor adoptees and their adoptive parents until the children are fully integrated into U.S. society. This is a key principle of overseas adoption.
However, the reality is not the same as the principle. The U.S. deports foreign adoptees aged 29 and older who haven’t been naturalized when they commit certain crimes. Washington must stop this practice immediately.
Unlike European governments, the U.S. government did not automatically grant citizenship to overseas adoptees until 2001. The Child Citizenship Act of 2000 came into force on Feb. 27, 2001, allowing all internationally adopted children under 18 on that date, and all those adopted in the future, to become U.S. citizens automatically. However, adoptees 18 or older on that date could not be covered by the act.
Many adoptees discovered, usually when applying for federal student loans or a passport, that they had never been naturalized by their foster parents. I know three Korean adoptees ― Monte, Tim, and Matthew ― who could not benefit from the act.
Monte was born in 1970 in Korea and was sent to the U.S. in 1978. Although he served in the U.S. military, he was deported to Korea in 2009. Monte claims that when he was arrested, he did not know that he had been set up by his truck driving partner to transport drugs. Like most other Korean adoptees sent to the U.S., Monte is culturally American and does not speak Korean.
Tim was born in Korea in 1974, and in 1977 he went to the U.S. as an adoptee. His adoptive parents cut their ties with him after he graduated from high school, so he left his home and wandered throughout the U.S. He became homeless and addicted to drugs for over 15 years. Ultimately he was arrested, imprisoned, and deported to Korea, where he became homeless again in April 2011. He has no trace of his birth family on his adoption records.
Matthew was born in Korea in 1978 and he went to the U.S. at the age of six months, but his parents did not naturalize him. He was not deported, but willingly returned to Korea in February 2011 to be close to his family and experience Korea as a young man.
When the Seoul government discovered that Matthew, technically an “overseas Korean citizen,” was back in the country, he received a compulsory enlistment notice from the Korean military. After a prolonged struggle over paperwork that reflected both his permanent residency in the U.S. and his Korean citizenship, Matthew was finally granted an exemption from military enlistment because he is also technically an “orphan.”
Matthew would like to have dual citizenship, just as other adoptees have that option. But because he received his Green Card only in the past few years, he would be in his 40s by the time he gains U.S. citizenship. In the interim, he would be required to live within the U.S. Meanwhile, adoptees with only U.S. citizenship may live in Korea indefinitely on an F-4 visa.
As the U.S. leads the world in terms of the numbers of children adopted from other countries, it should also lead the world in the humanitarian treatment of them. However, we are now seeing that adoptees from not just Korea, but many other countries, are being deported from the U.S. even on minor charges.
Under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), amended and expanded by the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) of 1996, non-citizens may apply for “waivers” to deportations, based on factors such as length of residency in the U.S. and potential hardship if deported.
However, no such exceptions are available to “aggravated felons.” Aggravated felonies include crimes such as drug trafficking, but may also include misdemeanor charges. For instance, the IIRAIRA expanded the INA so a person may be treated as an aggravated felon for committing a theft punishable by only one year in prison. This opens up the risk of adoptees to be deported for petty crimes such as shoplifting.
While recognizing that non-adopted people who immigrated as children are also subject to this law, I believe that the U.S. Congress, through passing the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, has already shown its belief that international adoptees should be automatic citizens.
I urge the U.S. government to correct defects in the U.S. legal system by quickly passing an amendment that would allow all overseas adoptees ― even adults like Tim, Matthew, and Monte ― to rightfully receive their U.S. citizenship. This would stop the deportations and also give the benefits and protection of citizenship to all law-abiding international adoptees.
Dr. Kim Sung-soo is the author of a biography of Korean Quaker Ham Sok-hon and executive director of Transparency International-Korea. Reach him at wadans@empas.com.
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2012/03/137_106204.html
Until 2001, when Korean children were sent to the U.S. for overseas adoption, it was their adoptive parents’ responsibility to naturalize them as U.S. citizens.
In addition, adoption agencies both in Korea and the U.S. were responsible for post-adoption services that should monitor adoptees and their adoptive parents until the children are fully integrated into U.S. society. This is a key principle of overseas adoption.
However, the reality is not the same as the principle. The U.S. deports foreign adoptees aged 29 and older who haven’t been naturalized when they commit certain crimes. Washington must stop this practice immediately.
Unlike European governments, the U.S. government did not automatically grant citizenship to overseas adoptees until 2001. The Child Citizenship Act of 2000 came into force on Feb. 27, 2001, allowing all internationally adopted children under 18 on that date, and all those adopted in the future, to become U.S. citizens automatically. However, adoptees 18 or older on that date could not be covered by the act.
Many adoptees discovered, usually when applying for federal student loans or a passport, that they had never been naturalized by their foster parents. I know three Korean adoptees ― Monte, Tim, and Matthew ― who could not benefit from the act.
Monte was born in 1970 in Korea and was sent to the U.S. in 1978. Although he served in the U.S. military, he was deported to Korea in 2009. Monte claims that when he was arrested, he did not know that he had been set up by his truck driving partner to transport drugs. Like most other Korean adoptees sent to the U.S., Monte is culturally American and does not speak Korean.
Tim was born in Korea in 1974, and in 1977 he went to the U.S. as an adoptee. His adoptive parents cut their ties with him after he graduated from high school, so he left his home and wandered throughout the U.S. He became homeless and addicted to drugs for over 15 years. Ultimately he was arrested, imprisoned, and deported to Korea, where he became homeless again in April 2011. He has no trace of his birth family on his adoption records.
Matthew was born in Korea in 1978 and he went to the U.S. at the age of six months, but his parents did not naturalize him. He was not deported, but willingly returned to Korea in February 2011 to be close to his family and experience Korea as a young man.
When the Seoul government discovered that Matthew, technically an “overseas Korean citizen,” was back in the country, he received a compulsory enlistment notice from the Korean military. After a prolonged struggle over paperwork that reflected both his permanent residency in the U.S. and his Korean citizenship, Matthew was finally granted an exemption from military enlistment because he is also technically an “orphan.”
Matthew would like to have dual citizenship, just as other adoptees have that option. But because he received his Green Card only in the past few years, he would be in his 40s by the time he gains U.S. citizenship. In the interim, he would be required to live within the U.S. Meanwhile, adoptees with only U.S. citizenship may live in Korea indefinitely on an F-4 visa.
As the U.S. leads the world in terms of the numbers of children adopted from other countries, it should also lead the world in the humanitarian treatment of them. However, we are now seeing that adoptees from not just Korea, but many other countries, are being deported from the U.S. even on minor charges.
Under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), amended and expanded by the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) of 1996, non-citizens may apply for “waivers” to deportations, based on factors such as length of residency in the U.S. and potential hardship if deported.
However, no such exceptions are available to “aggravated felons.” Aggravated felonies include crimes such as drug trafficking, but may also include misdemeanor charges. For instance, the IIRAIRA expanded the INA so a person may be treated as an aggravated felon for committing a theft punishable by only one year in prison. This opens up the risk of adoptees to be deported for petty crimes such as shoplifting.
While recognizing that non-adopted people who immigrated as children are also subject to this law, I believe that the U.S. Congress, through passing the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, has already shown its belief that international adoptees should be automatic citizens.
I urge the U.S. government to correct defects in the U.S. legal system by quickly passing an amendment that would allow all overseas adoptees ― even adults like Tim, Matthew, and Monte ― to rightfully receive their U.S. citizenship. This would stop the deportations and also give the benefits and protection of citizenship to all law-abiding international adoptees.
Dr. Kim Sung-soo is the author of a biography of Korean Quaker Ham Sok-hon and executive director of Transparency International-Korea. Reach him at wadans@empas.com.
Adoptees deported by US? Yes
By Kim Sung-soo
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2012/03/137_106204.html
Until 2001, when Korean children were sent to the U.S. for overseas adoption, it was their adoptive parents’ responsibility to naturalize them as U.S. citizens.
In addition, adoption agencies both in Korea and the U.S. were responsible for post-adoption services that should monitor adoptees and their adoptive parents until the children are fully integrated into U.S. society. This is a key principle of overseas adoption.
However, the reality is not the same as the principle. The U.S. deports foreign adoptees aged 29 and older who haven’t been naturalized when they commit certain crimes. Washington must stop this practice immediately.
Unlike European governments, the U.S. government did not automatically grant citizenship to overseas adoptees until 2001. The Child Citizenship Act of 2000 came into force on Feb. 27, 2001, allowing all internationally adopted children under 18 on that date, and all those adopted in the future, to become U.S. citizens automatically. However, adoptees 18 or older on that date could not be covered by the act.
Many adoptees discovered, usually when applying for federal student loans or a passport, that they had never been naturalized by their foster parents. I know three Korean adoptees ― Monte, Tim, and Matthew ― who could not benefit from the act.
Monte was born in 1970 in Korea and was sent to the U.S. in 1978. Although he served in the U.S. military, he was deported to Korea in 2009. Monte claims that when he was arrested, he did not know that he had been set up by his truck driving partner to transport drugs. Like most other Korean adoptees sent to the U.S., Monte is culturally American and does not speak Korean.
Tim was born in Korea in 1974, and in 1977 he went to the U.S. as an adoptee. His adoptive parents cut their ties with him after he graduated from high school, so he left his home and wandered throughout the U.S. He became homeless and addicted to drugs for over 15 years. Ultimately he was arrested, imprisoned, and deported to Korea, where he became homeless again in April 2011. He has no trace of his birth family on his adoption records.
Matthew was born in Korea in 1978 and he went to the U.S. at the age of six months, but his parents did not naturalize him. He was not deported, but willingly returned to Korea in February 2011 to be close to his family and experience Korea as a young man.
When the Seoul government discovered that Matthew, technically an “overseas Korean citizen,” was back in the country, he received a compulsory enlistment notice from the Korean military. After a prolonged struggle over paperwork that reflected both his permanent residency in the U.S. and his Korean citizenship, Matthew was finally granted an exemption from military enlistment because he is also technically an “orphan.”
Matthew would like to have dual citizenship, just as other adoptees have that option. But because he received his Green Card only in the past few years, he would be in his 40s by the time he gains U.S. citizenship. In the interim, he would be required to live within the U.S. Meanwhile, adoptees with only U.S. citizenship may live in Korea indefinitely on an F-4 visa.
As the U.S. leads the world in terms of the numbers of children adopted from other countries, it should also lead the world in the humanitarian treatment of them. However, we are now seeing that adoptees from not just Korea, but many other countries, are being deported from the U.S. even on minor charges.
Under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), amended and expanded by the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) of 1996, non-citizens may apply for “waivers” to deportations, based on factors such as length of residency in the U.S. and potential hardship if deported.
However, no such exceptions are available to “aggravated felons.” Aggravated felonies include crimes such as drug trafficking, but may also include misdemeanor charges. For instance, the IIRAIRA expanded the INA so a person may be treated as an aggravated felon for committing a theft punishable by only one year in prison. This opens up the risk of adoptees to be deported for petty crimes such as shoplifting.
While recognizing that non-adopted people who immigrated as children are also subject to this law, I believe that the U.S. Congress, through passing the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, has already shown its belief that international adoptees should be automatic citizens.
I urge the U.S. government to correct defects in the U.S. legal system by quickly passing an amendment that would allow all overseas adoptees ― even adults like Tim, Matthew, and Monte ― to rightfully receive their U.S. citizenship. This would stop the deportations and also give the benefits and protection of citizenship to all law-abiding international adoptees.
Dr. Kim Sung-soo is the author of a biography of Korean Quaker Ham Sok-hon and executive director of Transparency International-Korea. Reach him at wadans@empas.com.
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2012/03/137_106204.html
Until 2001, when Korean children were sent to the U.S. for overseas adoption, it was their adoptive parents’ responsibility to naturalize them as U.S. citizens.
In addition, adoption agencies both in Korea and the U.S. were responsible for post-adoption services that should monitor adoptees and their adoptive parents until the children are fully integrated into U.S. society. This is a key principle of overseas adoption.
However, the reality is not the same as the principle. The U.S. deports foreign adoptees aged 29 and older who haven’t been naturalized when they commit certain crimes. Washington must stop this practice immediately.
Unlike European governments, the U.S. government did not automatically grant citizenship to overseas adoptees until 2001. The Child Citizenship Act of 2000 came into force on Feb. 27, 2001, allowing all internationally adopted children under 18 on that date, and all those adopted in the future, to become U.S. citizens automatically. However, adoptees 18 or older on that date could not be covered by the act.
Many adoptees discovered, usually when applying for federal student loans or a passport, that they had never been naturalized by their foster parents. I know three Korean adoptees ― Monte, Tim, and Matthew ― who could not benefit from the act.
Monte was born in 1970 in Korea and was sent to the U.S. in 1978. Although he served in the U.S. military, he was deported to Korea in 2009. Monte claims that when he was arrested, he did not know that he had been set up by his truck driving partner to transport drugs. Like most other Korean adoptees sent to the U.S., Monte is culturally American and does not speak Korean.
Tim was born in Korea in 1974, and in 1977 he went to the U.S. as an adoptee. His adoptive parents cut their ties with him after he graduated from high school, so he left his home and wandered throughout the U.S. He became homeless and addicted to drugs for over 15 years. Ultimately he was arrested, imprisoned, and deported to Korea, where he became homeless again in April 2011. He has no trace of his birth family on his adoption records.
Matthew was born in Korea in 1978 and he went to the U.S. at the age of six months, but his parents did not naturalize him. He was not deported, but willingly returned to Korea in February 2011 to be close to his family and experience Korea as a young man.
When the Seoul government discovered that Matthew, technically an “overseas Korean citizen,” was back in the country, he received a compulsory enlistment notice from the Korean military. After a prolonged struggle over paperwork that reflected both his permanent residency in the U.S. and his Korean citizenship, Matthew was finally granted an exemption from military enlistment because he is also technically an “orphan.”
Matthew would like to have dual citizenship, just as other adoptees have that option. But because he received his Green Card only in the past few years, he would be in his 40s by the time he gains U.S. citizenship. In the interim, he would be required to live within the U.S. Meanwhile, adoptees with only U.S. citizenship may live in Korea indefinitely on an F-4 visa.
As the U.S. leads the world in terms of the numbers of children adopted from other countries, it should also lead the world in the humanitarian treatment of them. However, we are now seeing that adoptees from not just Korea, but many other countries, are being deported from the U.S. even on minor charges.
Under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), amended and expanded by the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) of 1996, non-citizens may apply for “waivers” to deportations, based on factors such as length of residency in the U.S. and potential hardship if deported.
However, no such exceptions are available to “aggravated felons.” Aggravated felonies include crimes such as drug trafficking, but may also include misdemeanor charges. For instance, the IIRAIRA expanded the INA so a person may be treated as an aggravated felon for committing a theft punishable by only one year in prison. This opens up the risk of adoptees to be deported for petty crimes such as shoplifting.
While recognizing that non-adopted people who immigrated as children are also subject to this law, I believe that the U.S. Congress, through passing the Child Citizenship Act of 2000, has already shown its belief that international adoptees should be automatic citizens.
I urge the U.S. government to correct defects in the U.S. legal system by quickly passing an amendment that would allow all overseas adoptees ― even adults like Tim, Matthew, and Monte ― to rightfully receive their U.S. citizenship. This would stop the deportations and also give the benefits and protection of citizenship to all law-abiding international adoptees.
Dr. Kim Sung-soo is the author of a biography of Korean Quaker Ham Sok-hon and executive director of Transparency International-Korea. Reach him at wadans@empas.com.
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