Abbie Arevalo Herrera takes part in “Dances of Universal Peace,” a spiritual practice involving chants, prayer, music and movement.
If Abbie Arevalo Herrera hadn’t heeded her lawyer’s warning to skip an immigration interview in August, she might not still be living in sanctuary at a Richmond church. She could have been deported to her native Honduras, the country she fled in 2013 after what she describes as years of domestic violence at the hands of an ex-partner who continued to make threats on her life from afar.
In recent years, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, commonly known as ICE, has shown up at appointments with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to deport undocumented immigrants seeking legal status. Last November, an undocumented Mexican immigrant named Samuel Oliver-Bruno living in sanctuary at a Durham, North Carolina, church was seized by ICE agents and deported after showing up for an appointment with USCIS to have his fingerprints recorded as part of a petition to delay his deportation. An ICE spokesman told the Raleigh News & Observer that Oliver-Bruno had “no legal basis to remain in the U.S.”
Others have been detained at their I-130 interviews, which are part of the process many immigrants go through to obtain permanent residency. That’s what Arevalo’s lawyer, Alina Kilpatrick, says almost happened to Arevalo, whose husband, Elmer — a permanent U.S. resident — was called to an I-130 interview with USCIS in Norfolk, accompanied by Kilpatrick and an interpreter. Arevalo was also called to the interview, but on Kilpatrick’s advice, she did not attend for fear that she would be detained and deported. During the meeting with a USCIS official, a security officer entered the room and asked the interpreter, a Latina woman, to step into the hallway.
“The [USCIS] official said, ‘That’s really not the person you’re looking for.’ And then the security officer looks very puzzled, and I said, ‘No, [Arevalo]’s not here. She didn’t come,’ ” Kilpatrick says. “What this proves is that the entire interview in this case was just a ruse to try to get Abbie out of the sanctuary so they could snatch her.”
In response to questions about the encounter, a USCIS spokeswoman says the agency cannot comment on individual cases. Asked whether there is coordination with ICE, the spokeswoman declined comment, citing pending litigation (the American Civil Liberties Union filed a class action lawsuit last year on behalf of immigrant couples detained at USCIS interviews).
The interview, which Kilpatrick says went on as planned without Arevalo present, was the latest step in her pursuit of permanent residence. Arevalo sought sanctuary at First Unitarian Universalist Church of Richmond in June 2018 after being notified of her imminent deportation. She has lived there since then with two of her three children — a 3-year-old son who was born in the United States and a 12-year-old daughter who made the trip from Honduras with her.
Kilpatrick says USCIS gave her a letter stating Arevalo would receive a decision in the mail on the I-130, which is a step in the process of acquiring permanent residence. This summer, ICE sent six-figure fines to Arevalo and other immigrants living in sanctuary across the country for not complying with their deportation orders. Arevalo’s amounted to $295,630.
ICE officials began issuing such notices last December. “ICE is committed to using various enforcement methods — including arrest, detention, technological monitoring and financial penalties — to enforce U.S. immigration law and maintain the integrity of legal orders issued by judges,” an agency spokesperson says via email.
The notice Arevalo received didn’t indicate how much per day she was fined, Kilpatrick says, although it referenced a section of the Immigration and Nationality Act that says the penalties are set at $500 each day an immigrant doesn’t comply with a deportation order. An ICE spokesperson says in an email that the fines are now set at $799 per day to keep up with inflation, as required by law. An ICE spokesperson did not answer specific questions about the fine, including whether immigrants would continue to receive penalties if they remain in sanctuary. President Donald Trump issued an executive order in January 2017 for enforcement of civil penalties, which had been in place but rarely imposed, according to The Washington Post.
Arevalo says that whatever happens, she wants her children to be in a safe place.
“It’s not easy to be who I am. I’m a mother, I’m a woman, I’m an immigrant,” Arevalo says in Spanish during a phone interview. “I’m hoping that my children will never have to feel any of what I’m feeling.”
Abbie Arevalo Herrera is joined by family members and supporters for her one-year anniversary of being in sanctuary at First Unitarian Universalist Church of Richmond.
Members of the church’s congregation and others in the community have volunteered to help Arevalo since she began living there. The chairwoman of the sanctuary steering committee, Alex Gecker, says that volunteers assist with day-to-day tasks such as grocery shopping, or act as 24/7 security at the entrance — more than 100 people participate.
“A year ago, I would have said, ‘No, we can’t handle that.’ And here we are doing it, because no one’s going to let Abbie be there by herself. No one’s going to abandon her,” Gecker says. “Her life depends on being here.”
For millennia, places of worship have housed people fleeing persecution, Gecker says. The Rev. Jeanne Pupke, senior minister at First Unitarian Universalist Church of Richmond, says the congregation housed meetings for people resisting the draft during the Vietnam War.
“I feel we need to be here for her,” Pupke says. Both Pupke and Gecker say they think the church can sustain a volunteer force for as long as Arevalo needs to stay there, a timeline that appears indefinite. Her path to residency involves a series of hurdles, including obtaining waivers and getting her case reopened by immigration courts to have her removal order thrown out, which Kilpatrick says she wouldn’t try to do until after the 2020 elections, hoping for a change in policy. Without the removal order, Arevalo would be able to spend a short amount of time in Honduras to complete the mandated visa interview and medical exam there. But if she left the U.S. while her removal order was still in place, she couldn’t return to the country for five years.
“It’s a very complicated process, a very multistep process, and everything has to go perfectly in order for it to work,” Kilpatrick says.
While she’s grateful for what the church and supporters are doing for her, Arevalo says she often feels discouraged and afraid.
“I can’t have a normal life with my children, I can’t work, I can’t do so many things that a free woman can do,” Arevalo says. “There are many people interested in helping immigrants, but I think it’s still not enough because the monster that is the immigration system is so large.”