Vet wins 14-year battle
After being granted U.S. citizenship, former soldier plans to keep fighting for other deported veterans
Cameras surrounded a smiling Hector BarajasVarela as he stood outside a small building known as “The Bunker,” a support house for deported U.S. military veterans in Tijuana, Mexico, not far from the California border.
Tucked in his left arm was a blue folder with a letter from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, delivering the good news he had waited more than a decade to hear. As cameras clicked, BarajasVarela held a cellphone in his right hand, telling his mother in Southern California that he’s coming home. Then, he turned to a friend, gave him a high five and a hug.
“I got it,” he said, laughing. “I got it, bro. Two weeks.”
Barajas-Varela, an Army veteran, learned Thursday that he has been granted U.S. citizenship, 14 years after he was deported to Mexico because he committed a crime. In two weeks, on April 13, he will attend a naturalization ceremony in San Diego, the last step in the process of becoming an American.
“On paper, it’s nice to be validated,” he told Saturday. “It’s the government validating what most of us already feel.”
“This is our country,” he said of the United States. “Nothing is going to change about what we feel and who we are and what we’re willing to risk our lives for.”
Barajas-Varela was born in Mexico, but he grew up in the Los Angeles area. He became a permanent resident, or a green-card holder, in 1992. Three years later, he joined the Army and was honorably discharged in 2002. But not long after, Barajas-Varela lost his legal residency because he committed a crime. He was convicted of shooting at an occupied vehicle
in the Los Angeles area. Nobody was hurt, and Barajas-Varela spent 13 months in prison and another month on parole. He was deported to Mexico in 2004.
He has lived in Tijuana since, in a small shelter he had turned into a haven for people like himself: veterans who lost the right to live in the United States because of criminal convictions. The Deported Veterans Support House has served about 20 people since 2013. The Bunker provides services and legal resources to deportees adjusting to a life outside the United States. The support house also has identified and made contact with more than 300 deported men and women from more than three dozen countries, Barajas-Varela said.
Barajas-Varela could have applied for citizenship before he was discharged in the Army, but he had mistakenly believed that serving in the military automatically guaranteed it.
He finally applied while he was living in Mexico, and in 2016, passed the English and civics portions of the naturalization process. Applicants are required to pass oral and written English tests, and another one on U.S. government and history.
Last April, California Gov. Jerry Brown, a Democrat, pardoned Barajas-Varela for the crime that led to his deportation, removing a potential barrier from his path to citizenship.
“He has shown that since his release from custody, he has lived an honest and upright life, exhibited good moral character, and conducted himself as a law-abiding citizen,” according to the pardon, which also cites medals that Barajas-Varela received while in the Army.
In December 2017, Barajas-Varela filed a federal lawsuit to compel the USCIS to make a decision on his citizenship application, according to the American Civil Liberties Union of San Diego and Imperial counties. The lawsuit was dismissed after the agency agreed to make a decision by Thursday.
Despite gaining his citizenship, Barajas-Varela said he plans to stay in Mexico and live in The Bunker for another year to continue his work supporting deported veterans.
“To make sure that if I leave, it doesn’t close down . ... I got a commitment to these guys,” he said.
Two deported veterans are now living in The Bunker, Barajas-Varela said. The support house opened a second location last year in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, near the Texas border, and another one is in the works in the Dominican Republic.
For years, deported veterans have received little to no attention in Washington, because politicians are unlikely to support convicted criminals. The Trump administration’s hard-line immigration policy has steered the debate toward cutting legal immigration, creating a border wall and imposing travel restrictions on people from predominantly Muslim countries.
Barajas-Varela is the second deported veteran to receive a pardon from Brown, the California governor, according to the ACLU. The first was Marco Chavez, a Marine Corps veteran who regained his lawful residency and was allowed to come back to California in December. He had been deported to Mexico 15 years earlier over an animal cruelty conviction.
Barajas-Varela said he plans to eventually move back to the Los Angeles area to be with his family, to have a house and to find a job there. He has an 11-year-old daughter who was born after he was deported.
“I have a responsibility to my daughter, to make sure she gets to college,” he said.