WBEZ: Asian Americans Hopeful for Immigration Reform

Asian Americans are expressing hope that any immigration reform will address the particular concerns of their community.

“I think that (Asian immigrants) come to the United States in different ways than Mexican-Americans might,” said Tuyet Le, executive director of the Asian American Institute in Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood told WBEZ. “So even the notion of being undocumented… psychologically, they may have had visas and overstayed them,” she explained, “So even those terminologies are different.”

Their biggest concern is the backlog of applications for citizenship. For some the wait can be decade. Thic can be particularly hard for families trying to reunite.

“A lot of Korean-Americans apply for permanent residency,” said Sik Sohn, executive director of the Korean American Resource and Cultural Center, “but it took so long…. A lot of people, their status has been changing to undocumented because of that waiting period.”

It’s estimated Asian American account for 10 percent of the illegal immigrants to this country.