Don’t forget fathers separated from families
This week is Father’s Day and World Refugee Day. I am both a father and a refugee, but due to delays in the program meant to reunite separated refugee families, it has been almost eight years since my family has been together.
I’ve never met my youngest son.
I fled my home in Sri Lanka nearly 10 years ago after I was attacked multiple times by the Sri Lankan army.
I grew up during the Sri Lankan Civil War, which ended in 2009 when the Sri Lankan army defeated a rebel organization, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.
I married my wife the next year, and in April 2011, our first son was born. That was one of the happiest days of my life, but I also felt scared about the danger facing my newly formed family.
Shortly after I got married, the Sri Lankan army sought revenge in former rebel strongholds, including my neighborhood. The army often kidnapped young men, torturing and returning some and murdering others.
I was kidnapped and beaten several times.
One night, they abducted my wife’s cousin and he was never seen again. My wife’s own father was murdered by the Sri Lankan army when she was just 4 years old, and she helped convince me that I needed to leave the country.
While I managed to escape with my life, in a way her greatest fear still came true: our children are growing up without their father, just like she did.
I fled to India, but the journey by boat was too dangerous for my wife and infant son, so I had to go alone. While my wife and son were eventually able to join me in India, they ultimately had to return to Sri Lanka when their visas neared expiration.
My wife soon learned she was pregnant with our second child, who was born in 2014 in Sri Lanka, where my family has continued to endure near constant harassment and attacks.
Meanwhile, after enduring years of tortuous conditions in a migrant detention camp, I was finally safely resettled as a refugee in the United States in 2018, and I now live in Texas.
In July 2020, I filed petitions to reunite with my wife and children through the “followto-join” program, which was built into the U.S. refugee system over 40 years ago to quickly reunite separated refugee families by allowing spouses and unmarried children to join their family members in the United States.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has transferred my petitions to three different processing centers over the course of nearly two years, but has made no apparent progress and my petitions remain pending.
The International Refugee Assistance Project recently filed a lawsuit on my behalf to reunite me with my family, but there are thousands of other people like me, separated from their loved ones because of unreasonable delays in the family reunification program.
These delays are due to processing backlogs resulting from Trump-era policies and compounded by the pandemic.
I worry constantly for my family’s safety, and it pains me to think about how many moments I have missed without them by my side. At night, I lie awake talking on the phone with my wife. She tells me about our sons, now 11 and 7.
They work hard studying English in preparation to join me in the United States. But lately, they have become depressed. The stress of our separation and the constant threats to their safety have taken a toll, and I feel powerless to bring my family to safety.
I love Texas and my life in this country. The weather is beautiful, and I have a job that I like in a restaurant. Yet I know my life here will remain incomplete without my family.
I can’t wait to meet my youngest son in person, to be able to play with him and his brother and show them how much they mean to me. Mostly, I want them to experience the same freedom I now have.
I have this same hope for all parents who remain separated from their children because they are refugees.
This Father’s Day and this World Refugee Day, I ask the Biden administration to fix the follow-to-join process so that my family and all families in my situation have the opportunity to be safe and together again.