By Melissa Ludwig
The San Antonio Express-News
June 11, 2009
Benita Veliz can stay. For now.
On Wednesday morning, a federal immigration judge granted the St. Mary’s University honors graduate a three-month continuance, staving off deportation to Mexico.
An unauthorized immigrant, Veliz was jailed in January after a traffic stop.
The continuance also gives the 23-year-old Veliz more time to lobby for the DREAM Act, a law that would carve a path to citizenship for some unauthorized immigrants whose parents brought them here before age 16.
Veliz’s parents brought her to San Antonio on a tourist visa when she was 8 years old and the family never left. Veliz worked doggedly in school, graduating from Jefferson High School in 2002 as valedictorian and later from St. Mary’s University.
Under the proposed law, immigrants must serve in the military or earn a college degree to stay permanently.
“My future is still uncertain but I am very grateful for this time,” said Veliz, who was all smiles after the short hearing. “I have never lost hope that there will be a change in immigration law.”
Veliz’s lawyer, Nancy Shivers, said there is no reasonable way for Veliz to earn residency or citizenship. She has family here, but none are able to petition for her to stay. She does not know her family in Mexico. If Veliz returned there, she would be barred from returning to the United States for at least 10 years.
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