Editor’s note: This article is compiled from CBSNews and CNN news stories about the jailing and deportation threat to a 19-year-old Georgia college student who grew up most of her life in the U.S. Ximena Arias Cristobal has no criminal background and is a contributor to the community. Although similar, and tragic stories like this are going on around the country, what is most significant about this story (and others) is that even in a conservative county, where 70% voted for Trump, people were both saddened and outraged at the cruelty displayed toward this teen, wondering why she was targeted. It appears that some Trump supporters seem to be waking up to the lie that Trump’s deportations are aimed at “hardened criminals.” In fact, the lie is a smokescreen, a cover for the government to do mass deportations of immigrants. It is really an attack on everyone’s rights. It is worth noting, too, that recent research into homicides (allegedly committed by undocumented immigrants in Texas ) “shows that undocumented immigrants have lower criminal conviction and arrest rates than native‐born Americans, and that legal immigrants had the lowest of all.” Ximena, who is now using her case to speak out, said the incident has changed her world. “It kind of flips your world…. Before we lived in fear, now a lot more.” — People’s Tribune
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Traffic violation charges against Ximena Arias Cristobal, the 19-year-old Georgia teen and college student detained by federal immigration officers following a May 5 traffic stop have been dismissed. The officer who stopped her for allegedly making a traffic violation (made by another car,) arrested her because of that mistake, and because she was driving without a license. She was then detained by immigration authorities, but released from immigration custody May 22 after posting a bond. The deportation threat against her, however, continues.
Ximena said she forgives the arresting officer because he was just doing his job, but that he acted “very unprofessional with his words” and “unprofessional with how he treated me.” The officer asked the teen: “Have you ever been to jail?” “No. Sir,” she responded. “Well you’re going now,” the officer said. “I cannot go to jail. I have my finals next weekend. My family really depends on this,” Ximena said.
A CBS reporter, visiting the family after Ximena’s arrest, said that despite being in the U.S. illegally, Ximena was said to have “an otherwise typical American upbringing.” Ximena’s mother said she “loves the U.S. She really does not know Mexico at all.” Ximena, who called home while the reporter was at the family’s home, said what scared her the most was “Not being able to stay in the US. After I’ve lived here my whole entire life, my life is here and I’m scared I’m going to have to start all over again in a country that I don’t know.”
One of Ximena’s sisters told reporters, “Our family is a good family. They’re not criminals. They might have come here illegally, but they came here to fulfill their dreams.” The family is also worried about their father, as he was in the same detention center as Ximena, before allowed out on bond. Ximena told reporters that “knowing my parents moved from another country with nothing in their pockets and gave me the life they so much wanted for themselves keeps me going.”
This case is especially significant in that it is taking place in a red district headed by immigration hardliner Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene — and it is making many in the community uneasy. A Republican state lawmaker representing the district said, “There’s been an uprising of heartbreak for our community because a lot of people felt like we were going after the hard criminals.”
Ximena is speaking out to spread awareness. She told abcnews.go.com/US: “I know everything that I’m going through is very unjust. And it’s not only my case, but millions of people are going through this in the U.S. At Stewart [ICE Detention Center]. I met a lot of people going through tougher situations than me, and I think they deserve justice because they are not criminals . . . There’s a lot of very sad cases in there, mine is just a speck of what you see and that’s the sad truth,” she said. “A lot of us are being treated as criminals, like we’re the worst criminals ever, but we are not.”
The Trump administration’s Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that nothing has changed, that Ximena and her father are in this country illegally and must face consequences.
