Jesus Manuel Valenzuela-Rodriguez
Photos: Facebook
Vietnam U.S Veteran considered a non-citizen by the U.S. Homeland Security Department will vote in the next election.
By H. Nelson Goodson
October 22, 2012
Colorado Springs, CO - U.S. Marine Veteran Jesus Manuel Valenzuela-Rodriguez, 59, confirmed that he will cast his vote in the upcoming November 6 elections in Colorado, despite an attempt by the U.S. Homeland Security Department (DHS) to bar him from voting because he is considered a non-citizen. On September 12, he was notified by the El Paso County Office of the Clerk and Recorder that DHS had sent a list of registered voting non-citizens to the Colorado Secretary of State, which included his name.
Valenzuela-Rodriguez challenged the DHS non-citizen notification with the State of Colorado by providing documents that he is an U.S. Citizen and succeeded to be recognized as an American by the state clearing his way to exercise his right to vote in Colorado.
"The State of Colorado says I am a Citizen of America and I can vote. I showed all my documents and they took copies, and for once in 7 years of hell, I was told welcome home you are a Citizen of America. So now, I will exercise my rights and who stops me, will have to answer. For, I am an American Citizen," Valenzuela-Rodriguez posted on his Brothers Valenzuela Facebook page on Monday.
On October 12, both Manuel and his brother Valente Valenzuela, 62, an Army Veteran from Colorado addressed and spoke about the issue of the banished U.S. Veterans at the University of Texas El Paso Campus in El Paso, Texas. The Valenzuelas who have become advocates for deported Veterans had faced the threat of deportation themselves for misdemeanor crimes, but were able to stay in the U.S., until their immigration case gets resolved. The Valenzuelas were born in Mexico to a U.S. Citizen mother from New Mexico. Their father was a Mexican national, but later legalised and became a U.S. Citizen. By birth right to a U.S. Citizen in another country, their born children become automatically U.S. Citizens, according to federal law.
Since then, they have learned of hundreds of Veterans facing deportation or who have been deported regardless of their contributions and honorable service in the armed forces protecting the freedom of Americans and the U.S. Constitution.
In 2011, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) figures confirmed that at least 3,000 War Veterans were in process of being deported to their native countries.
The Valenzuela brothers have put forth the issue of the deportation of U.S. Veterans in the national political ring, despite President Barack H. Obama and former Governor Mitt Romney's exclusion of the issue in their debates or in their current campaigns for U.S. President.
On October 13, a group of U.S. Deported Veterans led by Army Veteran Hector Barajas opened the first U.S. Deported Veterans Support House (Safehouse) in El Rosarito Beach, Baja California, Mexico to help other deported Veterans from the U.S. ajust to being dislocated and facing removal trauma caused by DHS and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement when separating families.
Valenzuela will cast his vote on Tuesday, November 6, at 11:00 a.m. at the First Methodist Church, 420 N. Nevada, Colorado Springs, Colorado.
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Thank you for reporting this story. It is appalling that the Brothers Valenzuela have gone through so much red tape, and have been treated like "less than nothing" by their government until recently. I am not a politician or a relative, I am just a private citizen who is not afraid to take a stand for what is right. I wish our local Colorado Politicians would have shared as much conviction to help our Brothers instead of not wanting to get involved or lending their support. It's never too late to do the right thing.
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