2 months ago
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A Ukrainian woman was arrested by federal immigration agents last week while attending her scheduled green card interview at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services building in downtown San Diego, an occurrence that immigration attorneys say is becoming increasingly common.
Viktoriia Bulavina first entered the country in 2022 through a Biden-era humanitarian parole program for Ukrainians displaced by the war. Her daughter was participating in a gymnastics competition in the U.S. when the war started, and they were later reunited through the Uniting for Ukraine program. As of Sept. 30, 2023, more than 158,000 people arrived in the United States as part of that process, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
She later met her husband, Victor Korol, who is a U.S. citizen, in San Diego. On Thursday, they went to what was supposed to be their final marriage-based green card appointment. Near the end of the interview, she was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in front of her husband.
Though the couple had heard on the news that some people had been detained at their appointments, Korol said they had hoped that wouldn’t happen to them.
“We were worried about that,” he said. “We give it a thought that she has a good status. And you can’t really not go to the interview if you want to get the green card.”
A USCIS official referred questions to ICE. Neith...
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