By Lida Dianti

To some U.S. veterans, the tragedy of war is more than the violence or conflict on the ground. It is a shadow that follows them home in the form of unemployment, PTSD and substance abuse. Non-citizen veterans—despite spending years of their lives defending this country—must not only unpack shell shock but also face the threat of deportation.

Though they are promised naturalization, far too many U.S. military veterans, who are generally green card holders, never actually naturalize and are subject to deportation if they pick up a criminal conviction when they return home, even if it is just for a misdemeanor offense. Thousands of immigrants have served to uphold the systems that protect the American people only to be vilified by the same institutions they risked their lives to defend.

Many deported veterans contend that military recruiters mislead them to enlist, telling them that they would become a U.S. citizen by virtue of joining the military.  As a result, immigrants often are completely unaware that they can be deported even with their veteran status.

Margaret Stock of Cascadia Cross-Border Law in Anchorage, Alaska, who has represented deported servicemen, expressed a common misconception among immigrant veterans.

"They raised their right hands and swore to defend the Constitution," Stock told the Los Angeles Times. "They thought that made them citizens."

Other veterans say that they in fact filed their naturalization paperwork while they were in the military, but the federal government lost the paperwork or never responded.  Still others say that the military could have helped them naturalize during basic training, but failed to do so.  The Pentagon reports that since 2009, about 9,800 men and women have earned their citizenship during basic military training. More than 89,000 people have received citizenship through military service since 9/11.

It is important to note that naturalization after deployment has long been a benefit provided to servicemen. As early as the Civil War, immigrants have played a pivotal role in the U.S. military. One in six troopers in George Custer’s 7th Cavalry at the Battle of the Little Big Horn was an Irish immigrant. The promise of U.S. citizenship after military service has been a long-standing practice that provided immigrants with a highly valued avenue to naturalization. The history of military service in America would be significantly different without the inclusion of immigrants and the promise of citizenship that followed.

In recent years, as veterans return from Iraq and Afghanistan, they find adjusting to civilian life to be difficult. Many of them struggle with PTSD and substance abuse as they work to regain a sense of the lives they led before suffering the trauma of war.

The ACLU of California is partnering with Deported Veterans Support House, a shelter and resource center for deported veterans based in Tijuana, Mexico, on a project to end the unjust deportations of U.S. military veterans.  Although a 2011 Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) memo provides veterans special consideration in deportation hearings, more often than not, this consideration is ignored or applied inconsistently.

Since January, the ACLU of California has documented 70 cases of veterans deported to countries around the world, and is evaluating each case for possible avenues for legal relief to enable these veterans to come home.

“For these men, their deportation is like a life sentence – it means permanent separation from their families, their lives, their livelihoods and the only country that most of them have ever known,” said Jennie Pasquarella, attorney and immigrants’ rights director for the ACLU of California. “They honorably served our country, and they also served their time in the criminal justice system. They should not serve a life of exile as well. It’s time for the United States to bring them home.”

Currently, the ACLU is representing Daniel Torres in his quest to become a U.S. citizen.  Torres is a former Marine who served in Iraq and is now living in Tijuana.  When Torres enlisted, he took an oath “to support and uphold” the Constitution and defend the only country he called home. He certainly was “American” enough to serve in Iraq. But what he possessed in tenacity, military prowess and leadership, he lacked in legal immigration status.

"We're not just some foreigners that got deported," Torres told NPR. "We feel like Americans that have been banished, in exile from the country we love the most."

Lida Dianti is communications intern at the ACLU of Southern California.

By Reverend J. Edwin Bacon Jr.

For much of the past two years, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors has engaged in a prolonged and costly battle that purports to restore historical accuracy to the county’s seal by placing a cross atop a mission.

The county’s stance seems simple enough, until you consider what is really at stake: elevating one religion over all others in a county with a rich and diverse history.

Fortunately, U.S. District Judge Christina A. Snyder rejected the county’s argument in response to a lawsuit filed by the ACLU Foundation of Southern California and Caldwell Leslie & Proctor on behalf of seven religious leaders of diverse faiths. The court’s ruling is an important victory for all Angelenos because it upholds the U.S. and California constitutional provisions against establishing a state religion or showing preference for one faith over another.

In her decision Snyder agreed, writing:

Unlike textbooks or educational guidelines, the County’s seal is not an educational tool, but a symbolic and representative one, not unlike a flag or a badge. It carries with it an aura of prestige, authority, and approval. By singling out the cross for addition to the seal, the County necessarily lends its prestige and approval to the depiction of one faith’s sectarian imagery.

No doubt some will argue that today’s decision is a blow to the religious freedom of some, or nod to political correctness. Such specious arguments, however, ignore reality.

First, let’s be clear. The real San Gabriel Mission that is depicted in the seal didn’t have a cross on it until recently, and there were other long periods in the past where there was no cross. So much for historical accuracy.

Second, in 2004, when faced with a lawsuit, the board opted to eliminate the cross from the seal precisely because of its religious significance. The board’s decision then was an unambiguous admission that the cross represented one thing and one thing only: Christianity. To say otherwise is to deny the truth of Christianity’s principal symbol, which signifies that Jesus Christ is the son of God who died to save the world from its sins.

Third, religious freedom does not give people the right to demand that the government adopt or express favoritism towards their preferred religion. The ruling preserves true religious freedom – the ability of individuals to go to the church, mosque, synagogue or other religious house of worship, or none, without any interference from the government.

Today’s ruling is actually a victory for people of all faiths who were once again reassured that the government doesn’t get to play favorites when it comes to religious matters.

As the Los Angeles Daily News’ Kevin Modesti rightly noted in 2015:  “People of all faiths — or no faith — have a right to expect to have equal standing before the government. Official government displays shouldn’t contain the symbol of one religion any more than it should have a Democratic donkey or Republican elephant.”

That’s important in a county as diverse as Los Angeles, where little more than half the residents identify as having a religion – more than 4 million do not identify as affiliating with any religious congregation according to a 2000 report by the Los Angeles Almanac.

Our ability to practice our faith without fear of government interference is rooted in our nation’s history. The county’s attempt to impose one symbol on a seal that is prominently displayed on buildings, vehicles, letter head and numerous other places undermines that very principle by holding one image above all others.

As ACLU SoCal noted in its lawsuit: “Symbols of religious faith are the principal means by which organized religion communicates the common belief systems and bond among adherents. Such symbols are instantly and universally recognizable for the religion each exclusively represents.”

By ordering the county to remove the cross, the court made it plain that, at least in Los Angeles County, the government has no business playing favorites with faith.

Reverend J. Edwin Bacon Jr. is rector of All Saints Church in Pasadena.