Green Card Holders From India Anxiously Watch Immigration Debate

They are hoping that the current immigration debate raging on Capitol Hill will culminate in laws that will allow them to bring their nuclear families to the U.S. from abroad.

"U.S. immigration laws have torn apart my family and have forced me into being a single mom," bemoaned Rhea, who lives by herself with her two-year-old son. "I often find myself searching for words to explain to my child why his dad is not with him," she told India-West.

The reason he is not is that U.S. immigration laws are currently structured in such a way that the spouses and children of green card holders living overseas have to endure waits of five or more years before they can be reunited on U.S. soil. For Mexican citizens, it's even longer.

"There are 1.5 million families who are either outlawed or exiled from their loved ones because of Congress," noted Paul Donnelly, the former communications director of the U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform, who was hired last March as a strategic consultant by unitefamilies.org, an internet support group that currently has around 750 members nationwide.

Unitefamilies was launched last year by Ajit Natarajan, a 32-year-old Silicon Valley engineer who says he has been turned down by prospective brides in India because they do not want the long separation his green card status will force them to endure.

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