Fairfield native Sharma hopes to stay in the country, if Congress acts

FAIRFIELD — Fairfield native Shristi Sharma was the first person from Iowa to win the prestigious Robertson Scholarship to study at both Duke University and the University of North Carolina, but because of immigration law, she may have to leave it all behind before she graduates.

It’s not because Sharma or her parents violated any laws. It’s because, in a couple of years when she turns 21, she will no longer be authorized to stay in the country under her parents’ temporary work visas.

Her parents, Asha and Suresh Sharma of Fairfield, immigrated to the United States from India when Sharma was 5 years old. Though she has spent nearly her entire life in America and considers it her home, she may be forced to return to India, a country she said she barely knows. The visa backlog for India is so long that the federal government estimates her family will get green cards in 2099, when she will be 96 years old.

Sharma, who graduated from Maharishi School in 2021, is not the only one in this predicament. She is what is known as a “documented Dreamer,” the child of immigrants who are waiting for the federal government to process their green cards. Though their parents are allowed to work while their application is being processed, their children can only stay with them until they are 21, when they have to “self-deport” to the country where they were born, or hope they can immigrate to a third country.

Because Sharma is not a citizen, she’s faces limitations even now. Since she is a dependent on her parents’ temporary work visas, she is not allowed to work.

“The only thing I can do in this country is study,” she said. “Any internship I take has to be unpaid. I’ve even offered to work for free, but there’s only so much free labor you can do, especially in a STEM field. I do research at UNC, and I’m skipping out on what a normal student would get paid for working in this lab.”

Dip Patel, founder of “Improve the Dream,” estimates that about 250,000 people in the U.S. are these “documented Dreamers” who will be forced to leave the country when they turn 21. Patel is one of them. He was born in India, and at the age of 4, his parents moved to Canada and then America to start a small business. They came on an E-2 visa, a visa for investors or those who come to establish a business, but it has no path to citizenship.

“The children of these visa holders face self-deportation when they turn 21,” he said. “There’s no mechanism in place to give them a pathway to stay. When I was growing up, friends asked me why, since I’ve been here legally so long, why not apply for citizenship? Unfortunately, that’s not how it works. Most Americans don’t know that immigrants can grow up here legally and then be forced to leave the only country they know.”

Patel founded “Improve the Dream” as an organization to lobby on behalf of documented Dreamers. He said it’s completely youth-led and volunteer-run, with no paid staff. Members of the organization have testified before Congress on their plight.

Their work is paying off, and they have received support from Republicans and Democrats alike. U.S. Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks, a Republican, was one of four co-sponsors of a bill called the America’s Children Act, which offered a pathway to permanent residency for documented Dreamers so they would not have to face deportation upon turning 21.

Iowa’s other members of Congress have co-signed the legislation, including U.S. Rep. Ashley Hinson, a Republican, U.S. Rep. Cindy Axne, a Democrat, and U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst, a Republican. Patel said Iowa’s other two federal members of Congress, U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley and U.S. Rep. Randy Feenstra, have not officially endorsed the legislation. However, Grassley indicated during a town hall meeting earlier this month that he was open to such a bill as long as it was bipartisan.

Patel said the America’s Children Act has not been passed, but he and other documented Dreamers are hoping for relief through an amendment that is part of the National Defense Authorization Act. The amendment would prevent the children of legal immigrants from aging out of legal status when they turn 21. The House of Representatives passed the amendment, and it will now be taken up by the Senate in September.

Sharma said she is crossing her fingers the amendment will pass, because her future depends on it. If Congress does not provide relief for documented Dreamers like her, she will have a tough choice to make when she turns 21.

“I’d have to leave in the middle of college, and no one is going to hire you with three-fourths of a degree,” she said. “I’m not sure I could go back to India. I’m so used to the western system, I’d probably move to Canada or the U.K., and within five or six years, I’d be a citizen in those countries.”

Sharma said she hopes to convince the public, and members of Congress, that it makes no sense to force her to take her talents to another country. In fact, her younger sister Antariksha, a sophomore at Maharishi School, is in the same predicament she is, because she was also born in India.

Sharma said it saddens her to see the turmoil this has caused her parents because they have done nothing wrong, and have followed the country’s immigration laws. They tried to shield their children from it as much as they could so they wouldn’t stress about it.

“I know they feel guilty for putting us through this, but they only had good intentions, and I have to remind them that they’re doing the best they could for me and my sister,” she said. “They brought us to this land of opportunity, and now these opportunities are limited because of our visa status.”

Call Andy Hallman at 641-575-0135 or email him at andy.hallman@southeastiowaunion.com