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U.S. NEWSSaturday 18 July 2015
Tens of thousands fear deportation as US-Cuba relations thaw
ALICIA A. CALDWELL Attorneys Grisel Ybarra, left, and Monica Barba Neumann look over documents at their office in Though she served her
CURT ANDERSON Miami. Ybarra and Neumann represent several clients who could face deportation. debt to society for the drug
Associated Press conviction, what she didn’t
MIAMI (AP) — The future is (AP Photo/Alan Diaz) know at the time was that
murky for tens of thousands her criminal record would
of Cuban immigrants who of President Raul Castro tified by her nickname be- in South Florida’s booming prompt immigration au-
have been ordered by has not given them per- cause of her pending de- cocaine trade in the 1980s. thorities to issue a deporta-
immigration authorities to mission to return. It’s un- portation order, is waiting By the middle of the de- tion order in 2000.
leave the country, with the clear whether the Cuban and wondering what the cade she’d become in- “I was young, stupid. It’s
United States and Cuba government’s position will future holds. volved in the business her- hurting me,” said Sisi. “It’s
moving closer to fully re- change. A 50-year-old grandmother self and eventually served coming back now, a lot.”
storing diplomatic ties, in- Sisi, who spoke to The Asso- who moved to Miami with 2 ½ years in prison, cutting For decades deportation
cluding re-opening em- ciated Press on the condi- her family when she was 4, ties to her brief life of crime to Cuba has been compli-
bassies for the first time in tion that she only be iden- Sisi married a man involved in 1989. cated by the lack of diplo-
54 years. matic ties and the Cuban
As many as 25,000 Cubans government’s decision not
living in the United States to provide travel docu-
have outstanding depor- ments for most immigrants
tation orders, according to facing deportation.
Immigration and Customs A 1984 repatriation agree-
Enforcement. They include ment includes a list of 2,746
people who pose a threat people who had come
to national security or have to the U.S. in 1980 as part
serious criminal convictions of the Mariel boatlift who
and are considered pri- should be deported. The
orities for immigration en- mass migration from Cuba
forcement agents. to Florida started when
Despite being an enforce- then-President Fidel Castro
ment priority, those immi- announced he would al-
grants haven’t yet been low anyone who wanted
sent back to Cuba be- to leave the Communist is-
cause the government land nation.q
