Outside Supreme Court, many Californians share their immigrant stories

Six-year-old Sophie Cruz, left, speaks during a rally in front of the U.S. Supreme Court next to her father Raul Cruz and supporter Jose Antonio Vargas, who came to the United States illegally as a child. Vargas previously worked with the Los Angeles Times.

April 18, 2016 3:14 PM PT

Reporting from Washington — For the last five Fridays, Andrea Delgadillo has staged a sometimes lonely vigil on the steps of the Supreme Court in favor of President Obama’s immigration actions.

The 19-year-old California Lutheran University student lined up shoes and small American flags to demonstrate to the justices – really, to Americans -- how much families like hers have benefited from easing the threat of deportation.

On Monday, she had a little backup.

Thousands of immigrants and their allies rallied in front of the court, many camping overnight, as the justices heard arguments in a landmark case challenging the legality of the executive actions.

Many of those gathered were from California, home to sizable numbers of the more than 4 million immigrants who could benefit if Obama’s deportation relief is allowed to stand.

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Mario Gochez of New Jersey joins supporters of immigration reform in front of the Supreme Court in Washington.

(Pablo Martinez Monsivais / Associated Press)

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Supporters of immigration reform outside the Supreme Court.

(Pablo Martinez Monsivais / Associated Press)

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A rally outside the Supreme Court.

(Pablo Martinez Monsivais / Associated Press)

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A rally outside the court building.

(Pablo Martinez Monsivais / Associated Press)

Among them were Olivia Medina, a 79-year-old former farmworker in strawberry-rich Oxnard, whose son could gain legal status under the action; and Sophie Cruz, the 6-year-old American citizen who captured hearts last year when she broke through Pope Francis’ parade barricade in Washington, D.C., to hand him a letter describing the fear of losing her parents to deportation.

“We need them to treat us with justice and dignity, because we are not criminals, because of our contributions,” said Sophie’s father, Raul Cruz of South Gate, who attended college in Mexico and has worked in L.A. flipping hamburgers, in a bakery and now at a factory that galvanizes metal.

“This is a country of immigrants,” he said through an interpreter. “This is America. We are America.”

Even though many, like Medina, who traveled from Oxnard’s La Hermandad Hank Lacayo Youth and Family Center, have legal status or citizenship, they have extended families and friends who face the threat of deportation, a reminder of the mixed-status complications of so many immigrant families.

“My compadre’s son,” said one man from the group, whose members took turns waiting since Sunday so that a few of them could be admitted inside the court for the proceedings.

“My sister,” said another.

Obama in 2012 granted deportation relief to young people who were brought here illegally as children, the so-called Dreamers, enabling them to apply for work permits and driver’s licenses as long as they are in school or the military and have no criminal records.

In 2014, as immigration reforms languished in Congress, the president expanded the program and added a component that would benefit parents, like 19-year-old Omar Urquieta’s mother -- she works two jobs, at McDonalds and cleaning houses -- who have been in the U.S. illegally for years but have children who are American citizens.

“I’m here to tell her story, so other kids don’t have to go through what I did,” said Urquieta, a Marine stationed in Virginia, who grew up in the San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys. He was outside the court Monday with his wife, Alondra Slack, 19, whom he met in high school, and their dog, Pachuco, named for the zoot suit Latino culture of an earlier L.A. era.

Delgadillo, a sophomore business major, who is on a spring internship in Washington, started showing up Friday mornings with other activists, lining up the shoes with American flags as a symbol of the immigrant journeys.

Her parents brought her to the U.S. as a 4-year-old, and they worked in restaurants in San Francisco, starting as dishwashers, then moving up. Her mom became a hostess and cashier; her dad a cook. They launched their own catering company a few years ago, serving a shrimp ceviche in particular that has become a party circuit favorite.

“My parents, they pay taxes, they worked two jobs, they put their kids through private education,” said Delgadillo, who has been able to secure temporary legal status under Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

“DACA has made my dreams so far come true,” she said, even though her parents would not qualify under Obama’s programs because their children were not born in the U.S. “They need to see how much people have benefited.”

It breaks her heart, she said, to see families deported, and she can’t imagine being sent back if Obama’s actions are overturned.

“I cannot tell you anything about Mexico; my home has been California.”

For the latest from Congress and the 2016 campaign, follow @LisaMascaro.

For more, go to www.latimes.com/politics.

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