Paperwork makes life difficult for American-born kids of migrants who return to Mexico
American-citizen kids of migrant parents don’t have access to basic services in Mexico.
It’s an increasingly common problem: lack of papers, but on the other side of the border.
Migrants who first crossed into the United States to work and had kids during their stay before returning to Mexico find it challenging to get access to basic services for their American children, reports Adriana Gomez Licon for the Associated Press.
As a result of Mexican and U.S. bureaucracies, these children of undocumented workers cannot register for school or sign up for health care at public hospitals that provide medicines.
“They won’t give me my kids’ grades. I won’t be able to take them to a doctor,” Rogelio Hernandez, one of these migrant parents who came back to Mexico, told the AP.
The Mexican government requires any official document from another country to be certified inside that country with an “apostille” seal and then translated into Spanish by a certified translator in Mexico.
This is becoming a growing problem in Mexico where thousands of migrants are returning due to tougher immigration laws and the poor state of the US economy.
According to the Pew Hispanic Center, more than 300,000 U.S.-born children have been brought to Mexico since 2005 out of a total of 1.4 million people who moved back from the United States during that period.
Mexico’s health officials state that they offer a temporary health care plan for U.S. citizen children. The education department spokesman also said that each Mexican state can temporarily waive requirements and let children into school despite the lack of official paperwork.
In Washington, Janet Napolitano, Secretary of Homeland Security said that the U.S. government worries about these American-born kids of migrants and what’s happening to them.
Read more testimonies about these Mexican families in the AP report.
(Photo: flickr.com/sqent)
