Amidst citizenship application delay, Elgin family separated from father, family business closes

Lazaro Reynoso, 41, is known in his community in Elgin as being generous and hardworking. The owner of a recycling business, he was frequently known to invite people who were down on their luck to have breakfast with him at a McDonald’s.

For the past six months, however, there have been no shared breakfasts at McDonald’s.

As part of the process of applying for his U.S. citizenship, Reynoso was scheduled for a visa interview in June 2019, at the US. Consulate in Ciudad Juarez, located in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. What appeared to be a routine interview to get him closer to U.S. citizenship has turned into a nightmare that has lasted six months — and has no end in sight.

Despite Reynoso being married to a U.S. citizen, (his wife, Maria, 41) and having the necessary papers prepared by an immigration lawyer in preparation for the interview, Reynoso was denied his visa and is unable to return to the U.S. According to his sister, Alex Velazquez, also of Elgin, her brother had filed the required “forgiveness letter” (an I-192 Waiver, allowing re-entry into the U.S.), then filed a second one at the request of the consulate, paying the required $1,000 fee each time, plus lawyer fees. Still, he has not yet received permission from the U.S. to return.

‘Heartbreaking’

Reynoso’s sister, Alex Velazquez, owns and operates Village Green Cleaners in Huntley. When she sees her brother’s friends around town, they ask about him, using their affectionate nickname for Reynoso: “Where’s Guero?” they ask her. “We want Guero back!”

Reynoso came to the U.S. as an 11-year-old boy. He and his sister come from a family of 10 children who were born in an impoverished small town seven hours south of Mexico City.

“It was very hard to get here, trying to survive,” remembers Velazquez.

Reynoso grew up in the U.S., married his wife, Maria, and they have raised three children, ages 17, 12, and 5 in Elgin.

Velazquez says both she and Reynoso worked hard and established their own small businesses respectively. Fifteen years ago, Velazquez opened Village Green Cleaners. The year before, Reynoso opened up his own recycling business.

Velazquez remembers early on, when Reynoso borrowed $5,000 from his sister to help grow his business. Velazquez loaned it to him, with Reynoso promising to pay the money back as soon as he could.

According to Velazquez, Reynoso kept his word.

“He paid me back little by little,” she said. “There were days when he said, ‘I can’t get you the money,’ but I told him, ‘Just hold on. It’s going to get better. In summer, it’s going to get better.’”

Velazquez says her brother kept working hard slowly building up his recycling business by purchasing a used truck, a tractor, and a machine to crush cans. A year after borrowing the money from Velazquez, he paid her back in full.

“Little by little, he grew the recycling into a big business,” she says. “He was very happy. I’m so proud of him.”

Now, Velazquez’s voice frequently breaks with emotion as she tells the story of her brother. “He had everything in order,” she says. “He has no criminal record—not even a parking ticket. Before he left, the lawyer said, ‘Don’t worry. In two weeks you’re going to be back [in the U.S.].’”

Because of Reynoso’s long absence from his business, his wife has been forced to close his recycling business for good, including terminating his employees.

“It’s heartbreaking to see how hard he worked for his business, and everything is going to the garbage,” says Velazquez.

‘He says he has to stay strong’

Over the winter break, Jenny Reynoso, 17, a senior at St. Edward Central Catholic High School, went with her mother and two brothers to visit her father in Juarez. The family had not been all together since last June. While he awaits permission to return to the U.S., he has rented a small room in Juarez. He works in a laundromat, earning 20 pesos – the equivalent of one dollar — each day.

“It’s very different over here,” says Jenny, describing Mexico. “You see a lot of poverty in the street: people asking for money, asking for food.”

While eating a meal with her family in Juarez, a little girl approached the table.

“She came to us talking in a different language,” says Jenny. “There are lots of indigenous people here who speak many different dialects. My dad was able to kind of understand what she was saying. She explained that she hadn’t eaten in a while and how she was hungry and asked if we could help her out.”

The Reynosos helped the girl get food, but Jenny says it doesn’t feel like enough.

“Seeing that makes me realize all the privileges that we get, being American, being in America,” she says. “I see all these kids, all these people, even dogs in the street and I wish that there was so much more that I could do for them, but there’s only so much we can do. There’s a lot of poverty. But there’s also some bright sides to all of it: there are nice views of the mountains. But unfortunately, there are a lot of bad sides.”

Jenny says having her family separated by a border has been difficult and has made her feel shock, anger, and sadness, sometimes questioning her faith.

“I’ll be honest — I never saw my Dad cry until all this started happening,” she says. “But he says he has to stay strong.”

The day she had to tell her 13 year-old brother Johnny was particularly difficult.

“I didn’t know how to tell him,” she remembers. “When I told him, he just started breaking down. I told him we’re going to see our dad again, he’s just not able to come home right now.”

Even though Velazquez says that a lawyer told her family that the process of getting Reynoso home to Illinois again could take another year, she is hopeful that her brother will be home in plenty of time to see his oldest daughter graduate from high school this year.

In the meantime, Jenny tries to reassure her father.

“The other day we sat down and I told him that he didn’t have to worry about us so much,” she says. “I go to school and I work as much as I can. I help my mom, I try to help my brothers. He was just telling me that he’s sad he can’t be there to experience things with us and help us out with things.”

“It’s hard, but we’re handling it,” she says. “When my Dad comes back, it’s basically going to be trying to make up for time lost,” she says. “I don’t think he’s going to open his [recycling] shop again, but he’s going to see what he can do to get us financially stable again.”

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