Obama’s aunt Zeituni Onyang |
After President Obama’s illegal alien aunt defied deportation orders, one group has filed an arrest request with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and is publicly demanding that the president deport her.
Americans for Legal Immigration PAC, or ALIPAC, is urging Obama to honor his rhetoric about the rule of law by ousting Zeituni Onyango from the United States.
“President Obama has promised the American public that his administration will honor the principles of open government, the Constitution, and the Rule of Law,” ALIPAC President William Gheen said. “Obama must either deport his aunt or destroy his own credibility by showing her favoritism.”
Onyango has enlisted the help of an immigration lawyer to help her win asylum and stay in the U.S. after ignoring a court order that she leave the country or be deported
Margaret Wong and Associates is representing Zeituni Onyango, the 56-year-old Kenyan half-sister of Obama’s deceased father, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reports. Onyango and her lawyer are scheduled to attend an immigration hearing in Boston on April 1.
Onyango, revealed in November to be dwelling on Flaherty Way in a South Boston slum, has been living in the United States illegally, and refusing to leave the U.S. for her Kenyan homeland after a judge rejected her request for asylum in 2004.
“She is currently a fugitive from justice and is staying with friends in Cleveland vowing to fight against being deported now that her nephew is president,” ALIPAC contends.
The Bush administration issued a directive requiring high-level approval before agents could arrest fugitive immigrants on Oct. 31, the Associated Press reported. Immigration and Customs Enforcement documents reveal U.S. officials were concerned about implications of detaining Onyango in the days before the election.
ICE spokeswoman Kelly Nantel said the order was lifted by the end of November.
Onyango reportedly left her home in Boston public housing to escape media coverage in December. She traveled to Cleveland and hired Wong to assist her in her fight to remain in the U.S. while staying with relatives in an African immigrant community.
ALIPAC President William Gheen |
On Dec. 17, an immigration judge stayed an order to deport Onyango.
The judge reopened her case for asylum on Dec. 30, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Executive Office of Immigration Review said.
Earlier this month, Onyango attended Obama’s swearing-in ceremony and an inaugural ball at Washington’s Renaissance Mayflower Hotel, a historic luxury hotel, the Associated Press reported. Rogers claims she never met with the president during inaugural festivities. She arrived with her immigration lawyer as her guest.
However, ALIPAC is asking the public to contact talk radio shows, the White House and Immigration and Customs Enforcement to demand that Onyango leave the United States or face deportation by month’s end.
In November 2008, Obama told Katie Couric, “If she is violating laws those laws have to be obeyed. We’re a nation of laws. Obviously that doesn’t lessen my concern for her, I haven’t been able to be in touch with her. But I’m a strong believer you have to obey the law.”
On Jan. 21, 2009, Obama said, “Let me say this as simply as I can. Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency.”
“The ‘rule of law,’ in its most basic form, is the principle that no one is above the law,” an ALIPAC statement said. “The principle is intended to be a safeguard against arbitrary governance, whether by a totalitarian leader or by mob rule. Thus, the rule of law is hostile both to dictatorship and to anarchy.”
Gheen said Obama’s promise means nothing if he refuses to enforce the law and send his aunt home.
“Actions speak louder than words, Mr. President,” he said. “If you do not execute the deportation order for your aunt, then your lip service about the rule of law is no change from George Bush.”