Here is a true story about a family who came here legally, was granted indefinite deferred action status because of their religious beliefs, and are now being told to leave America. All this while tens of thousands cross the southern border illegally, with many not registering, without holding jobs or benefitting society.
Coming To America
The Romeikes chose to homeschool; they fled Germany in 2008. It is not recognized in Germany that parents have a fundamental right to homeschool their children, and such a practice is only allowed under very narrow conditions.
When Uwe and Hannelore Romeike decided in 2006 that God was calling them to homeschool their five children, Germany responded swiftly by imposing fines that exceeded the family’s income, forcibly taking the children out of the home to take them to school, and threatening to take the children out of the home permanently.
As a result, the Romeikes fled to America, where HSLDA assisted them in applying for asylum. The United States government under President Obama granted the Romeike family indefinite deferred action status in 2013, allowing them to live, work, and remain in the United States without fear of deportation.
Changes?
When the Romeikes checked in in September 2023, they were informed that their deferred status had been revoked. Four weeks have been given to the family to apply for German passports so they can be deported. A “change in orders” was offered without prior notice as the only explanation to the family.
After living peacefully in the United States for ten years, the Romeikes have built a second life: they have two American citizens and two children who married Americans (one of whom welcomed their first child recently).
Deportation to Germany will fracture these families while exposing the Romeikes to renewed persecution in Germany, where homeschooling is still illegal in almost every case.
Hope remains, however. The executive branch of government has intervened once already to grant a respite to the Romeikes, and it has the authority to do it again.
You can help the family by signing the petition to allow this homeschooled family to stay in America by signing your name here.
