Jill Singleton: 0:01

Welcome to the Crossing Voices from the Lighthouse. Today we sit down with attorney Cari Pastor, an immigration lawyer with more than 35 years of experience who has walked alongside the Lighthouse through countless challenges. For Cari, the law is more than a career. It's a vocation, shaped by her own family's immigrant story and sustained by deep faith. Cari opens up about the realities of the asylum process, cutting through the myths and misinformation that cloud public understanding, and she names what's truly at stake for the families and children who come here seeking safety. Cari also speaks with candor about the brokenness of our immigration system, offers stories of both heartbreak and hope from the courtroom, and reflects on the faith that gives her strength to continue. Cari's words are both sobering and full of hope. Here's our conversation. Well, hello, Cari Pastor. It's wonderful to have you here today on our podcast. I've been waiting for this opportunity to have a chance to chat with you, so why don't you start by telling our listeners a little bit about you and about your work?

Cari Pastor: 1:11

Okay, well, good morning and it's nice to be here. Thank you for inviting me. So a little bit about me. I'm an immigration lawyer. I've been an immigration lawyer now for over 35 years. It is the only law that I practice because, of course, it's full-time. It's very complicated. My parents were both from Cuba and my mom came on a green card through work sponsorship and my father actually fled and applied for asylum. He was detained when he got here and after he won his asylum case he was released, and that was during the revolution in Cuba in 1959. So I have always kind of been dealing with immigration and, of course, interested in it. So that's kind of how I got into the field.

Jill Singleton: 1:58

Sounds like it's something that's really close to your heart and something that you do really with passion, and that you're really driven to do, much more so than a job, just a regular job.

Cari Pastor: 2:10

It is, it is. And interestingly enough, at this age I've been asked am I thinking about retirement? And I always respond by saying no, I just plan to drop dead in court, in immigration court, someday.

Jill Singleton: 2:22

Well, I hope that doesn't happen, but it's what the future will bring. Yeah, so do you specialize in any particular kind of immigration law?

Cari Pastor: 2:33

So my firm, which the firm has been around for 20 years. So I started out at a nonprofit with the Catholic Church their legal immigration program in Detroit, and then I went to a firm a private firm for a few years and then I started my own. So actually it's been 25 years. Time does fly and the firm does everything. I have associates that do business immigration, they do family immigration, but I specialize in litigation. So I do all the immigration court work. I do appeals, I do a lot of federal district court work which during the first Trump administration and now that there's an increase in that and I do federal appellate work. I actually just got back last week from a trial in the US District Court regarding citizenship. So it's yeah, it's court. That's pretty much what I do, what I specialize in.

Jill Singleton: 3:29

I see. So I think there's obviously there's a lot of talk right now in the public and in the media about immigration and about the immigration challenges that we face in this country, and I think that there are some things that are really misunderstood. And I guess I'd like to start by asking you because the Lighthouse, as you know, we focus on asylum seekers, so I think that there's a lot of misunderstanding about what that process looks like and whether people who are coming here as asylum seekers are quote unquote legal here as asylum seekers are quote unquote legal. I was wondering if you could sort of address the asylum seeking process in the United States and help people understand how does that work, what's the idea behind it and how does it actually work in practice.

Cari Pastor: 4:18

And that is a great question because in fact that's the area of immigration that's been most under attack recently, right, because there's all sorts of misinformation about it. So the history of it comes from international law and it comes from a time when Hitler was in power and there was Jewish people that were trying to come to the United States and they were denied. And once they're back and we kind of pretty much know how awful that was. So after that the US decided that we need to welcome people that are seeking asylum that are going to be persecuted and tortured, and that was eventually codified in the Immigration and Nationality Act and a lot of it kind of tracks what the UN Committee on Refugee and the treaties have said. So that's where the law comes from and I guess the most important at least I think the most important part of the law is something called non-reformment, which is, if a person is facing persecution, then we are not going to send them back to that place where they will be persecuted. Prosecution, then we are not going to send them back to that place where they will be persecuted.

Cari Pastor: 5:30

Now that law has evolved and there's, you know, a lot of case law on it and regulations and so forth. So the process is person can either come to the port of entry, which would be you know wherever you would normally enter the United States a bridge, a tunnel, a land border and you would apply for asylum. A lot of people don't do it that way, simply because a lot of port of entries will turn the person around and say, oh, you can't do that. I've heard people being told to go to the consulate and consulates don't accept asylum applications, so you can't do that. So a lot of people will cross in and then, once they're in, they will either turn themselves over to Border Patrol or they will get to wherever they're going in the United States and then apply for asylum. There is nothing illegal about that, despite what we're hearing. That is the way it's supposed to be done, either at a port of entry or once you cross through and you turn yourself in to ICE or usually it's Customs and Border Protection at the ports of entry and you request asylum. That is perfectly fine.

Cari Pastor: 6:30

Now, the way that it's worked in the past the person is detained, asked a couple of questions about why they're afraid, and then they are paroled into the country, so released into the country under parole so that they can go to a United States Citizenship and Immigration Services and apply for asylum, and that's known as affirmative asylum.

Cari Pastor: 6:52

Other times, and more recently under both the Biden administration and, I believe, the Obama administration, what was happening is people were coming in, they were being asked a series of very few questions during Biden administration, almost no questions at all and then they were released and put in immigration proceedings in immigration court to apply for asylum in court.

Cari Pastor: 7:14

So that was the other way, while, whether you're applying with USCIS, us Citizenship and Immigration Services or the immigration court, you are allowed to remain in the United States and after 150 days that you submitted your application and it's pending, then you can apply for work authorization.

Cari Pastor: 7:32

So all of these things are done to help the person seeking refuge right and they will have their day either before USCIS or an immigration court to prove their case, to prove whether they are persecuted and whether they are persecuted on a basis that is recognized under the law, which religion, ethnicity, race, political opinion, those types of things. So there are, I believe, five categories. So if you fit into one of those and you can prove that you were persecuted and you can prove that you fear persecution and that there's nowhere within your home country that you can move to, then you would be granted asylum. Asylum is discretionary, so the discretion part is very big now, both at USC as an immigration court. So you have to show that you've paid your taxes, that you don't have any criminal convictions, things like that, basically, that you have behaved while you're here, that you're a good person and that, yes, you will be persecuted if you return. That's kind of it in a nutshell.

Jill Singleton: 8:36

Wow, okay, that's a lot. And how does that differ from a refugee? Because we hear about refugees as well. So what's the difference from a refugee? Because we hear about refugees as well. So what's the difference between a refugee and an asylum seeker?

Cari Pastor: 8:48

Okay, so under the law a refugee is someone that's been processed overseas. Okay, so that might be what we hear about, the big displacements you know the war in Syria, for example right, and so people left. They would then go to a UN refugee camp or office and they would apply for status there, right, so the UN would maybe recognize them as a refugee. And then there are nonprofits, and I can only speak to the US because I don't know how they handle it in other countries, but obviously the UN deals with all different countries, but in the US there are several nonprofits that have applied to receive refugees.

Cari Pastor: 9:28

So when I was working for the Catholic Church in Detroit, we also had a refugee division, and what would happen is we would say these are the numbers of families that we can take, and I remember back in those days, which was the 90s, we would take over a thousand families a year. And so once that person is recognized as a refugee, once one of the nonprofits has accepted them, they will then come to. They do it now, would find housing, would help them find work, and then they had a stipend, I believe, for the first six months, a small stipend, depending on how many people were in a family, and so it was the nonprofit's job to relocate them, help them find work, get them into English classes, help them open bank accounts, things like that, and so they already come in with a status, as opposed to an asylum seeker that really comes in without a status and then is requesting asylum.

Jill Singleton: 10:33

Right, and that's the very reason that the lighthouse exists. Right is that we recognize that people, once they're released from detention and are in especially that vulnerable period, before that 150 days has passed and they are eligible for their work papers and their social security numbers to even be able to pay taxes, they're in a very vulnerable state. Is that a fair?

Cari Pastor: 10:54

statement. That is a very fair statement because, unlike the refugee program, the asylum program does not have any of those safeguards. There isn't a program to help them find work, there's no program to help them find where to learn English, there's no one to teach them how to open a bank account or how to rent a place or sign a lease or anything like that. So all of those safeguards that a refugee has is not available to an asylum seeker. So an organization like Lighthouse is extremely crucial in those first few months when an asylum seeker. So an organization like Lighthouse is extremely crucial in those first few months when an asylum seeker is released and is able to apply for asylum.

Jill Singleton: 11:31

It's really just, it's so much to even think about and consider what people are facing in these situations. You know many stories. I know many stories you know from walking with people on their journeys. I guess that raises the question for me because, to a one you know, 130 people have come through the lighthouse in the eight years that we've been running and we've been able to house them and provide all the services and the safeguards that you were just mentioning.

Jill Singleton: 11:57

And to a one, they have been, you know, very hardworking, appreciative. You know very hardworking, appreciative, earnest, and I have been just so impressed by their integrity and their faith and their appreciation for this country is really it's quite impressive and their commitment to work hard and that is just so counter to the messages that we're hearing in the media. You know, there's sort of a very wide paintbrush, you know, being crossed over folks and saying, you know they're all criminals or they're all this, they're just sending us dangerous people and things like that. What do you have to say? You know, how do we speak to that narrative? How do we speak truth into that narrative? How do we speak to that narrative? How do?

Cari Pastor: 12:45

we speak truth into that narrative. Well, as all media, you take the sensationalism because that's what people watch and that's what people sell. So you take the few that have committed a crime or that were deported because they committed crimes and have somehow reentered, and you focus on that and say, well, everybody's like that, everybody is that person, right. So to me it reminds me a lot of racism, right, where you take a group of people and, because they're different, you categorize every person in that specific category, whether it's religion or race or whatever. As you know, whatever stereotype you want to put Lazy or criminals or shysters or whatever. And that's what's happening with asylum seekers as a group, right, they'll take the one or two that you know are breaking the laws or murdering or whatever, right, bad things they're doing. And you say now, they're all like that. And that's not true by and far.

Cari Pastor: 13:40

The majority of asylum seekers are people actually fleeing persecution and whether we recognize it under the law or not, the type of persecution that they're feeling, they are still feeling that persecution, right, and there's trauma and all sorts of things that come along with that. So I think that, if you were to ask me, the most overlooked service is the mental health service because trauma and I see that every day when I have people come in and I'm interviewing them and you know it takes months to establish a connection with an asylum seeker where I'm getting the full story, sometimes even a year. I've had clients that have been my clients for one or two years and then all of a sudden the story actually comes out and they're crying in the tears because you know you want to forget. You want to put aside everything that's happened to you. That was bad. These are traumatized people who are trying to get their lives back together. They're doing the best they can.

Cari Pastor: 14:40

One of the biggest questions I get is when can I get my employment authorization? When can I get my employment authorization? When can I get my employment authorization? Because they want to work. They don't want to be robbing people. They don't want to be, you know, selling drugs or whatever it is. They honestly want to work. They want to better their lives.

Cari Pastor: 14:56

The ones that have children you know I want my kids to go to school. They really want to be good members of the American society. They appreciate what this government's doing in the past. It's a little different now, but you know they really want to be here, and what I see right now is a lot of questions as to why are we being detained when we're fleeing from being detained in our home countries and being tortured? And one story that I can remember was a woman from the Middle East and she came in to apply for asylum and they were going to detain her until they figured out her story. And she looked at me as they were taking her away and she said please don't let them put me in a dungeon and beat me, because that's what she had suffered back home. And here we are instead of protecting her, we're throwing her in a jail. That's not a dungeon and she's not going to be beaten, but the trauma is there and the trauma is regular.

Jill Singleton: 15:50

Yes, I mean, I've had people say I'm not a criminal. They're in detention and they're wearing a jumpsuit and they're saying I'm not a criminal. If anything, they're escaping violence, they're escaping persecution, they're escaping drug cartels. That's the last thing they want to be involved with here. Right, exactly, and I know, at the Lighthouse I am definitely seeing among current guests and former guests, highly increased levels of anxiety and you know just real fear about, you know, being out in public. I've had people tell me they're afraid to speak in public because they don't want people to hear their accent and then they would be identified as other. Are you seeing this? What kinds of things are you noting? You know changes in the past several months, so we're getting.

Cari Pastor: 16:52

I'm spending a lot more time on the phone than I was in the past, you know, as is all of my staff, my paralegals and everybody kind of dealing with people's anxieties. You know where in the past somebody would come in or call and you would say, okay, this is what needs to be done and whatever. Now we're dealing with the emotional consequences. You know, am I going to be arrested If I file something? Am I going to be detained? Will they come at my employer's place and, you know, will they be allowed in? Will they come to my home and pull me out in front of my children? So a lot of it right now is just having that empathy to listen and advise them as best as you can and to be there. And, like I said, you asylum application married to a US citizen. The immigration judge had given us time so that he could have his marriage interview to see if we can do the green card in court in addition to his asylum. And I get to Detroit to do my citizenship trial. And that very first day my associate had gone with him for the marriage interview with his wife and they pulled him and arrested him out of the marriage interview for no reason. No criminal record, nothing at all. So you can imagine I'm in trial, I can't get to them right away. My associate's trying to calm everybody down. When I'm done with the trial and I get to my office in Troy, michigan, the wife, the cousin, the in-laws, everybody's sitting there crying. You know, and what did I do? I had to jump into federal court and file a habeas to get him released because there was no reason for him to be detained.

Cari Pastor: 18:34

So that's what we're seeing right now. We're seeing families torn apart for no reason whatsoever. So that's a huge change, right? Because before you could go to a marriage interview, you didn't have to worry about it, and we hear stories about people being arrested at ICE checkingsins or an immigration court Same thing. You could do what you were supposed to do, which is check-in so they don't mark you as a fugitive.

Cari Pastor: 18:56

You go to court so you're not deported without being there and getting all the penalties that go along with that and not being able to get a green card when that happens. And instead of having your day in court or getting your USCIS interview, you can be arrested for no reason Because, unlike what we hear in the media that, oh, we're arresting the worst of the worst. It's not true. And we've seen both I think it's Thomas Holmes, I think is the ISAR and Secretary Noem say, oh, we're going after the worst of the worst, but then also adding well, if you're here without documentation or you entered illegally, then that's a crime. And so everybody's the worst of the worst, right, right, which goes back to what we started with with.

Jill Singleton: 19:42

Are you really entering illegally when it is a legal process to seek your asylum here? Right, so exactly, and so it really. It gets so convoluted, so quickly, I think, and so difficult for people to keep track of. But I think it is true that we have been seeing people, as you've just said, who you know have have status, they're waiting for their day in court, right, and my feeling is, if we're going to give somebody their day in court, we need to protect them and make sure they can survive to get that day in court, right.

Jill Singleton: 20:16

But but now, so you have your day in court, you've already fled all this persecution. You've been re-traumatized entering here. We haven't even gotten into the dangers of the journey that many people face, right, and the traumas that they re-experience there, and now you're just trying to work, to put food on the table and take care of your children, and you're afraid that you might get arrested at work because you've heard of that happening, or you're afraid to go in and do your ICE check-in because you might get arrested there, and so in some ways, it's almost counterproductive, right. We want the people who are in the process to comply with the process 100%, and certainly you know that's so important to us at the Lighthouse. But it's just, it's hard to see this happen. So I guess my next question is you know what keeps you up at night?

Cari Pastor: 21:13

question is you know what keeps you up at night? So many things and yeah, I'm having a lot of trouble sleeping Lots of things keep me up at night right now. What's going to happen to my clients? Am I going to wake up tomorrow morning and get five calls that five of my clients have been arrested? Or, for example, what's been happening recently is I'm getting a lot of calls from spouses that their spouse has been detained when they've gone for a check-in or they've gone to court. What can I do? I don't know where that person is. You know how do I find them? Is there anything that can be done?

Cari Pastor: 21:41

Most recently, I had a call from a woman who lives in Houston and her husband was picked up by ICE just driving to work. Her husband was picked up by ICE just driving to work and when I looked into it, there is actually a federal order out there preventing people in his specific situation from being arrested. So ICE is violating the order. So you know, you have to jump in and deal with that, whether that's going to court and saying, hey, they're violating an order. You know I always try to call ICE first and say, hey, you know, but if I can't get anywhere, then court's the alternative, and the issue with that is it's very expensive and the nonprofits that are doing it are already, you know, up to their ears in work, so I think that you know that's. The issue, too is like the only way to protect people right now is going into court, and court's expensive representation in court and how much greater are their chances of receiving their asylum if they have representation versus not?

Jill Singleton: 22:57

Because in theory one can do it alone. Right, in theory one can fill out the asylum application and can just go through the process. But I really wonder about the win rates. You know the difference between those.

Cari Pastor: 23:12

So Syracuse University is very good at compiling statistics and data, not only for represented to unrepresented, for countries you know where people coming from that are getting asylum mostly, but for each individual judge immigration judge in each court, right? So I think, if I look, if I recall their study, I think it was like 18% that are unrepresented that actually get granted and if you're not represented you're going to get denied, right? So that's an issue. Like I said, the nonprofits have always traditionally even when I worked at a nonprofit we just can't handle the volume that comes in, unfortunately. And of course, there is no government paid right to a lawyer. You have a right to a lawyer as long as you pay for it yourself. So if you cannot get a nonprofit attorney and you have to hire a private one, it's going to cost several thousands of dollars to get good representation, right, because that's the other thing. You know you want good representation. You want you know somebody who's putting in the evidence, who's preparing you before you go to court, things like that, and that's time consuming and it's expensive. So that does limit the amount of people that can get representation. If we're talking about federal court, which of course, is much more expensive than immigration court.

Cari Pastor: 24:32

What I'd like to do is group people together so we can spread the cost around, right? Because instead of paying and I'm just you know10,000 for a federal case, but I have 10 people with the same kind of issue, that's $1,000 per person, which is much more manageable than $10,000 per person. So that's kind of what we're looking at right now, because that's kind of how we have to do it. We have to group people together to protect people's rights so that they can afford it, right.

Cari Pastor: 25:10

But I also I get up in the morning and I look at what the nonprofits are doing to see if there is an order that's already been, you know, or a group that's already challenging a specific thing. And you know, if somebody calls, or I have a client that can sit in there it's like, hey, go to this group, sign up, because you can be included in that lawsuit, you know. So why reinvent the wheel? Why pay? But again, you know, nonprofits only have a certain capacity. They do cost actions, which is, you know, more feasible, and there's just a certain capacity of how many of those they can take.

Jill Singleton: 25:44

Could you? You know anonymously, of course, but could you maybe just tell us about one asylum case you know, just so we can get a picture of you know what was the situation, what were the challenges. You know a successful outcome and then maybe an outcome that wasn't successful, just to give people an idea of you know what kinds of cases are actually winning asylum and what kinds of cases are getting weeded out in the process.

Cari Pastor: 26:14

I've had cases where I've said, oh, there's no way this case is going to win, Not because it's weak, but maybe we don't have a ton of evidence, which you know is normal in asylum. I always say the person who doesn't hand you a note saying, hey, I want to persecute you because you're, you know, Christian or you're Muslim or whatever, they don't do that, Right. So maybe they don't have. Or the client, even though they've been prepped, is not a great witness or whatever, and you think you're going to lose. And or you have a judge that has like a two percent grant rate, Right, and you're like that's it. But I've had, you know, those of one, that's it. But I've had, you know, those have won. And then there are others where I think, oh no, this is a surefire winner and they end up losing. So it's, you know, it's it's. There's no one thing that I could say you know, if they have this, that and the other thing, they're going to win, Right, and if they don't have this, that and the other, I think they're going to lose because there's a lot of different variants, Right. So we try to put the best case together, as much evidence as possible and things like that.

Cari Pastor: 27:21

A successful case that comes to mind is a case of a student who was from a Middle Eastern country and they came in for a competition in their area and they were medical congressmen in the state that they were in, and all of that, and held up the flag of resistance of that country as opposed to the country flag. So, of course, you know, they could not go back and they wanted to apply for asylum, but ICE detained them and so he was in jail at the time, and when I got the case, I, you know like you're not going to get out. You know bond was already denied. You're willing to fight your case. It's going to take several months and of course, yeah, because they knew darn well that if they went back to that home country they were going to be jailed, tortured and eventually killed just for holding the flag of the resistance group. So I thought this was going to be tough and I explained to him we're probably got a judge that isn't that great and we're probably going to have to peel it. So I'm just going to make the record for the appeal blah, blah, blah. And they were fine, they were willing to stay, you know. However, it took eight months if there's an appeal to a year.

Cari Pastor: 28:36

And we went to court, presented the evidence, they testified, we presented pictures of them holding up the flag and stuff and granted and released the very next day. So that was great and that process was again. They were detained so everything had to be done from the detention center go out there, fill out the asylum forms. They didn't have any family here, so that was tough, because a lot of times it's the family that we you know that we asked for the evidence. So they didn't have that, but they did have their pictures and they had their identity documents, which is very important to show who you are and where you're from.

Cari Pastor: 29:12

And we were able to put together a lot of articles about what was going on and what was happening to resistance members and things like that Get them for their testimony, you know what things are going to be asked and things like that, so that they're not nervous when they get in there. And that person did a wonderful job and we got it. So that was an awesome case because you know, you knew that they were not going to be put in jail, tortured and killed and they could stay here and continue with the studies that they were doing and live a good and safe life.

Jill Singleton: 29:46

Yeah, that's a wonderful story.

Cari Pastor: 29:49

Yes, one that I've lost.

Cari Pastor: 29:53

Domestic violence is one of the hardest asylum type cases to win, just because it's just hard to fit under the current state of the law.

Cari Pastor: 30:03

You have to fit them in a particular social group and a lot of judges don't see that particular social group as it is defined, which is a very tough definition to me. And so this person had been abused by her partner for years, managed to escape, had you know pictures of when she was beat up, had the children who were older testify of what they saw their mom go through and how they too were beaten, had some hospital reports and testified as best as they could given the trauma, did not go see a psychologist here, which I highly recommend. But again, part culture I highly recommend, but again, part culture part I don't want to relive it. So you know you get it. And it was one of those cases where you know you want to just cry listening to it and watching that person, have to repeat everything and at the end the judge said well, I believe that all that happened to you, but you just don't fit in the law so I'm going to deny it, and then sent her back to the abuser.

Jill Singleton: 31:14

Basically, that's really hard. I'm sure those are the ones that you don't get a good night's sleep after something like that, for sure.

Cari Pastor: 31:24

Right, and you never forget. I remember one I had in 1990 that involved children and a mom and that still haunts me to this day.

Jill Singleton: 31:31

Yeah, that's a whole other thing that I think people don't realize, that more than half of the asylum seekers are children. Right, this is really a world in which children are right at the center and really need to be protected, right.

Cari Pastor: 31:49

Whether it's from abusive. You know parents or gang recruitment or recruitment into. You know hostilities or wars or whatever all of that. You know how they're being treated in schools and the asylum system is not set up for children at all. You know, especially if they don't have their, they're unaccompanied right so they have no one to help them. They don't understand the system and I have not. I do not represent children because it's too taxing, I can't do it. Emotionally I can't handle it. So I have not looked at those statistics, but I'll bet you that even with representation, the unaccompanied children getting asylum is extremely low.

Jill Singleton: 32:40

And the ones that we lose in the process, you know, in one way or another, is, I'm sure, very high. Speaking of children, you know we all remember the time when children were separated from their parents at the border and records were not kept in all cases. I understand there are still many children who have never been reunited with their parents from that time period.

Cari Pastor: 33:08

That's what I've heard also.

Jill Singleton: 33:10

Is that something that we could face again?

Cari Pastor: 33:12

Yes, yes, I think we can face it again. I unfortunately see this administration as having very little empathy for asylum seekers or keeping families together. So, yes, I think that could happen again. And whenever you separate children from parents and put them into a big system like that, I though they are, you know, understaffed it's still a lot bigger than the unaccompanied minor program that the Office of Refugee Resettlement they run that has for the capability to track them.

Jill Singleton: 33:55

So, yes, I see that coming up again a magic wand and change one part of the system as it stands and let's talk about for asylum seekers, because that's really what we're talking about today. What would that change be, and why?

Cari Pastor: 34:14

There are so many things, it's hard to pick one right. I mean, first, I make sure that unaccompanied children had the right to counsel, paid by the government, because you can't expect kids to get money to do this. You know, five-year-olds are not. You know, despite what Border Patrol has said in the past, five-year-olds do not come to the United States to work, so you know. So that's, I think that would be one thing. The other is the particular social group definition in the asylum laws. That's almost impossible to meet. We don't require in any of the other groups things like social visibility, nexus or anything like that. So to the standard, we do require nexus, but not to the standard that we require a particular social group. So, to the standard, we do require nexus, but not to the standard that we require a particular social group. So I would change the particular social group definition to be more in line with the rest of the categories and, like I said, there's so many. When you ask that question, my head is just spinning with so many things.

Jill Singleton: 35:20

So those are the two that just popped out in front. No-transcript. So I you know I kind of resist conversations where people want to paint it as you know one side's problem or you know things happened under this administration and paint it like it was all great before. I think it's been really difficult and I think, as you say, it's a huge system. I think it's been really difficult and I think, as you say, it's a huge system and you know, to be able to manage just the volume of people and the complexity of issues but from a humanitarian standpoint is an incredibly tall order.

Cari Pastor: 36:18

And I think you can look at any administration from you know I think it's 1947 or 49 when we did the first immigration set of laws and ever since then, and point to something that that administration could have done better, shouldn't have done, could have done. I mean there isn't one administration that you could say, oh yeah, under that, that was a great administration, Because every administration has done bad things and good things. Right, you know, even the current one, there are. I mean, I know people are going to disagree with me, but there are good things that they've done in terms of immigration, but there's a lot of bad things that they've done, you know, and the bad is always going to outweigh the good when you're dealing with humanitarian issues. Yeah, that is always going to outweigh the good when you're dealing with humanitarian issues.

Jill Singleton: 37:03

Yeah. So, Cari, I know that you are a person of great faith. You know we've had that conversation in the past, and you, of course, know that the Lighthouse is a ministry of the Episcopal Church, and so I guess my question for you is what role does your faith play in the work that you do? How do you draw on that, if at all? How does it inform your work in any way?

Cari Pastor: 37:31

I draw that on all the time. I am a lawyer, thanks to God. I mean, my family had no money. They came with nothing from Cuba, even though my mom was from a very poor family in Cuba and she did come here with a work visa.

Cari Pastor: 37:44

But you know, back in those days it was different. She didn't come to work as head of GM or something you know. She came to work in a factory and my dad, of course, came with nothing, being an asylum seeker, and I got to go to NYU on a full scholarship and that would have never happened. I couldn't have paid for law school and I wouldn't have taken out a loan, because that just wasn't something my family permitted or I would have done. I just wasn't raised that way. So I'm a lawyer, through the grace of God that I was able to get that opportunity to go to a great school and not pay a penny. So that's how it all started right, and every time that I have a hearing, an immigration hearing or federal court, I look towards God and try to say what do I need to do here? And just let him guide me.

Jill Singleton: 38:36

Wow. So God and the Holy Spirit is definitely at the heart of your work. It sounds like.

Cari Pastor: 38:44

Oh, yes, very much so.

Jill Singleton: 38:46

So, Cari, anytime we put the news on today, there's any number of just challenging, horrible, scary, cruel things that are happening. I think it's very easy for someone to tune out. I've heard many people say I just don't listen to the news anymore. I've heard many people say I just don't listen to the news anymore.

Cari Pastor: 39:04

I've heard that too.

Jill Singleton: 39:05

Yeah, and you know, no matter where you go, you're getting one extreme or the other, and you know people feel like they're no longer getting just the news, but they're getting sort of one team's sort of sensationalized view of what's happening. So I guess my question is for people who really want to know the truth number one but, more importantly, also want to do something, want to feel that they have something that they can do other than sit, stand by and feel helpless. I mean, what do you recommend that somebody? What can they do in this environment at this time, with the reality being what it is?

Cari Pastor: 39:46

Well, first thing is to be there for our neighbors, to listen, to empathize with the anxiety that they're going through. I think that's super important. The second is joining peaceful demonstrations and holding our officials accountable. Peaceful demonstrations and holding our officials accountable. Once a year, through the Federal Bar Association, I do lobbying and we call it a Capitol Hill Day and we go around and we talk to senators and congressmen about the issues that are going on. Now those are not necessarily immigration issues, different organizations, but when I was there I was surprised to see a lot of different groups that I never even knew existed. Lobbying, and I think that's important and you don't have to be with any group. You can go by yourself, but of course numbers is better. But get a group of concerned people together and go in and explain to your senators and your representatives at the federal level what's going on the federal level what's going on?

Cari Pastor: 40:45

Because a lot of times they don't know what's going on down. You know, in Jersey City or in Edison, you know they, just they are not. They're either watching some of the news or having somebody scream for them and, as we know, the news is going to bring up the sensationalism. Right. What is actually going on in the ground? Is I standing at an urgent care clinic? Because we've had that happen in the past, right Years ago. They didn't know anything about it, but you bring the pictures, you talk to them and what you're seeing, give them a picture of what one individual person is going through and how that's affecting other people and how that one individual, what they're going through, isn't an isolated incident. It's happening a lot. I think that's important. And then again, holding our officials accountable. So to me, I think those are the three important things Empathy, peaceful protest, holding our officials accountable. Important things Empathy, peaceful protests, holding our officials accountable.

Jill Singleton: 41:45

If only more people were doing that instead of shouting into the echo chamber you know, fears and their frustrations. So thank you so much. I'll ask just before we leave if there's anything else that you think people need to know that I haven't asked about. That would be good for us to know, given this context.

Cari Pastor: 42:06

So what I always say is don't lose hope. And it's easier said than done, especially when you're detained or you have a family member detained. But you know, fight, fight for your rights, especially if you're detained. Don't give up. I know it's difficult. It breaks my heart whenever I go visit a client in jail. You know, to see adults crying. You know it's tough, but don't give up, because there is a light at the end of the tunnel and if we all stick together we can accomplish great things. So don't lose hope. That would be the big one.

Jill Singleton: 42:45

I love it. I think that's really important. I try to live my life that way and I know doing this work gives me great hope, actually. So I have great hope for humanity and, despite the situation that we're in, maybe it's a good thing we're going through. Maybe it will expose some of the areas that really need to be reformed and where we need to be more intentional and where we really need to make sure that we are taking care of our neighbor and loving our neighbor as we're supposed to, so as we're called to.

Jill Singleton: 43:17

Well, thank you so much for your time today, Cari. Thank you for the amazing work that you do. You know representing those who are really vulnerable and who have been marginalized and who really need a great advocate like you by their side. And thank you for all the support you give to the Lighthouse as well. It's been just so great having you in to do a Know your Rights training with our guests and to be able to have our questions answered when we need them, so I can't thank you enough for being such a wonderful friend to the Lighthouse and to so many.

Cari Pastor: 43:51

Well, thank you. The Lighthouse does tremendous work and it would be great to see it grow and expand and continue the great work that it's doing and the support it's providing for the vulnerable people. Thank you again for having me here. I've enjoyed this and I appreciate the opportunity.

Jill Singleton: 44:08

Okay thank you so much and God bless you. Thank you, thanks for listening to the Crossing Voices from the Lighthouse Today. Attorney Cari Pastor reminded us that asylum seekers are not criminals or statistics. They are people fleeing persecution who want nothing more than to work, raise their children and live in safety. Cari spoke of the people to listen, to stand alongside, to hold leaders accountable and to refuse to look away. For every listener who wonders what can I possibly do? Start small, offer empathy, learn the truth, stand with a neighbor, trust that even these simple acts matter. I'm Deacon Jill Singleton. We'll be back soon with more voices and more stories. In the meantime, please share this podcast with friends and consider leaving a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify To learn more about the Lighthouse. Visit lighthousenjorg. Until next time, peace be with you.