From thisibelieve.org:
http://thisibelieve.org/essay/83871/

I Believe in U Visas

The U Visa is an immigration provision, enacted in 2000, that grants legal immigration status to crime victims who are helpful in the investigation or prosecution of the crimes against them. It is surprising but wonderful that such a provision protects vulnerable immigrants in times like these.

A middle aged couple was sitting in the waiting area of my nonprofit immigrant service organization. They were so happy in each other’s company. The woman was stroking the man’s hand. And she was so lovely! I wondered who they were. They were beckoned by someone to go get services inside the office. A few minutes later my coworker Jess poked her head in my office and said, “Estella’s parents just got here from Guatemala, and it was no trouble at all. They went to the Consulate and got their visas on got right on a plane. You can’t believe how happy Estella and her parents are. They hadn’t seen each other in so long.” So I told Jess how I first met Estella at a community meeting, where she gave me a police report about her having been abducted and raped and dumped on the street. She told me that it was the middle of the night and she had no idea where she was, or how to get out, or what to do next. She was in agonizing physical and moral pain. I could almost see her then, lying broken and alone on the wet asphalt. My heart started to break. But it didn’t break. Because the wondrous, transformative U Visa — in Rod Blagojevich’s infamous words, this Effing Golden Thing — was created specially to make things a whole lot better for Estella and thousands of people like her. I knew it would set her on her path forward, and I could make that happen. Estella was in therapy to deal with what happened then. So instead of despair, I felt hope. I felt JOY.

Estella got her U Visa. And now, because she was still just a kid when this happened, her parents qualified as beneficiaries of her application and now they’re here. They weren’t here when the badness happened, and that hurts. But the pain is offset a million parts to one by the amazing thing that came of all of it – they’re together again. And Estella is studying to be a dentist, and her parents can live with her and they can work because they’re legal here.

I feel pulled in my work by the incredible fulfillment of talking with a victim who doesn’t know why the District Attorney’s office sent her to us, and watching her eyes as she comprehends that things are going to get unimaginably better soon. I feel pulled by the 19 year old Esteban who couldn’t sleep the night that we called him to tell him his work permit had arrived because he was so excited that it would let him apply for a drivers license. His mom said he was bouncing off the walls! I feel pulled by Paula, who told her story of horrible abuse to the whole country through the Associated Press and KQED because she was so overwhelmed by her turn of fortune that she wanted to be part of reaching and serving anyone else in her situation. When she came to a workshop for people with approved U Visas, she told the other new U Visa holders where to go to apply for a Social Security card and how to do it. It was so beautiful to see her take charge of the group, show the others her Social Security application and explain each step. I feel pulled by Norma, who glowed with happiness and, well, empowerment, as she told me how much different her life is now that instead of being ostracized, she belongs.

The reason I developed all the elements of the ISLA — Immigrant Survivors Legal Aid — is that in all my life, and all my reading and talking with other people with great jobs, nothing has come close to this. The knowledge was hard to get, and the tools were hard to build, but now that I have them, my capacity to reach and serve immigrant crime victims is a gigantic lever that radically changes things from abject pain to unimagined possibility. It is too good to leave it lying around. It needs to be nurtured and developed and used.