{"id":119659,"date":"2021-11-17T10:30:50","date_gmt":"2021-11-17T15:30:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=119659"},"modified":"2021-11-17T10:30:50","modified_gmt":"2021-11-17T15:30:50","slug":"vietnam-veteran-brothers-facing-deportation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=119659","title":{"rendered":"Vietnam Veteran brothers facing deportation"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_119660\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-119660\" style=\"width: 500px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/211110-valenzuela-brothers-se-505p-1295bf.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-119660\" src=\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/211110-valenzuela-brothers-se-505p-1295bf-500x333.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"333\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/211110-valenzuela-brothers-se-505p-1295bf-500x333.jpg 500w, https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/211110-valenzuela-brothers-se-505p-1295bf-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/211110-valenzuela-brothers-se-505p-1295bf-768x511.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/211110-valenzuela-brothers-se-505p-1295bf.jpg 2000w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-119660\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Valenzuela Brothers (Manuel, left and Valente, right)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Last night PBS aired a film title\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/americanexilefilm.com\/filmmakers\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em>&#8220;American Exile&#8221;<\/em><\/a> about the two men pictured above. They are the Valenzuela brothers, Manuel and Valente, who claim to be Vietnam Veterans and who were\/are facing deportation. Valente has self-exiled (i.e. self-deported) to Mexico while Manuel is still here and working the activist angle. NBC News refers to their story as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/news\/latino\/shameful-america-two-latino-vietnam-veterans-fight-deportation-rcna5140\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">&#8220;Shameful for America&#8221;<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>We have no records of their service in hand, so we only have the Valenzuelas&#8217; statements and the images they present of themselves. The above photo isn&#8217;t just related to the film. <a href=\"https:\/\/valenzuelabrothers.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">This is on their website and even plastered on the side of a motorhome.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n<p>From what they&#8217;re wearing, I immediately have questions. Manuel claims to have been a combat Marine in Vietnam. With this in mind, I notice some issues with his uniform;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>His awards and decorations don&#8217;t support combat service, since he&#8217;s not wearing a Combat Action Ribbon.<\/li>\n<li>The lack of campaign stars on his Vietnam Service Medal is also suspicious, but not impossible.<\/li>\n<li>He&#8217;s a lance corporal wearing the belt buckle of an NCO<\/li>\n<li>He&#8217;s got a nametag on.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>At least the medals Manuel is wearing are in the correct order. As for Valente. His uniform is displaying some incongruities as well;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Most glaringly, he&#8217;s got a star on his Combat Infantryman Badge, which indicates a second award. None of his awards, decorations, or claims indicate combat service during multiple eligibility periods.<\/li>\n<li>As with his brother, Valente&#8217;s Vietnam Service Medal is without campaign stars. Again this is odd, but not impossible.<\/li>\n<li>It&#8217;s also interesting he&#8217;s wearing a Navy Commendation Medal. US Army members did receive naval awards, but it was unusual.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The brothers&#8217; story first came out during the stepped up deportation conducted during the Obama-Biden Administration around 2009 and for the next few years. In 2012, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.latimes.com\/archives\/la-xpm-2012-feb-18-la-me-deported-veteran-20120218-story.html#:~:text=The%20Valenzuelas'%20criminal%20records%2C%20according,10%20years%20ago%2C%20they%20said.\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">LA Times<\/a> discussed the case;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Brothers Manuel and Valente Valenzuela still don their dress blue military uniforms with the ramrod-straight posture from their Vietnam War days. Manuel, a former Marine, carried out rescue missions. Valente, an Army soldier, was wounded and received a Bronze Star. <em>[Editor&#8217;s note: Valente is\u00a0not\u00a0wearing a Purple Heart in any photos I can find that wound indicate or support a claim of being wounded in combat.]<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The brothers, both in their 60s, are now waging a legal battle against an unexpected foe: the U.S. government. They are trying to stop the country they served from deporting them to Mexico.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Dig far enough down though, and the Times gets to the crux of their problem;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The Valenzuela brothers, both of whom were born in Chihuahua, Mexico, and brought into the country as children by their U.S.-born mother, said they gave little thought to their legal status as the years passed and that nothing prevented them from getting work or receiving their veterans\u2019 benefits.<\/p>\n<p>The brothers, who both live in Colorado, argue that they believed citizenship was granted to them when they took their oath of induction before heading off to war. \u201cWhen we rose that hand, we figured we were American citizens,\u201d Manuel said. \u201cWe pledged our allegiance to the U.S. and we still have that within ourselves.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>That&#8217;s a very misguided belief, because it&#8217;s never been automatic to get citizenship once you take the oath of enlistment. They&#8217;re facing deportation because of their criminal conduct after their time in the service;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The Valenzuelas\u2019 criminal records, according to the brothers and their attorney, Dennis Hartley, include only misdemeanors: Manuel for disorderly conduct and resisting arrest; Valente for domestic violence. The offenses were committed more than 10 years ago, they said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.mysanantonio.com\/news\/local\/article\/Vietnam-veterans-at-risk-of-being-deported-4855055.php\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">My San Antonio<\/a> recounted a similar story in 2013, in which the men are photographed again in their uniforms <em>exactly\u00a0<\/em>as worn in the photo above;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Manuel, 61, is a former Marine who carried out rescue missions, and Valente, 65, was an Army soldier who was wounded in combat and received a Bronze Star. Both were born to a mother who was a native of New Mexico but were erroneously listed as resident aliens on their birth certificate. They said the military told them would make sure they were given citizenship after serving.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Personally, if I was not listed as a citizen by birth, I&#8217;d double check that that got fixed. I certainly wouldn&#8217;t trust some nameless, faceless bureaucracy to fix it. It&#8217;s best to be your own advocate on this stuff. I&#8217;d expect an NCO to know this.<\/p>\n<p>I return now to the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/news\/latino\/shameful-america-two-latino-vietnam-veterans-fight-deportation-rcna5140\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">NBC piece<\/a> published yesterday. Regular readers here will immediately have their ears perk up at the claims made about their service;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>During the Vietnam War, one of Valente Valenzuela\u2019s grim tasks in the Army was collecting body parts from the battlefield, and then taking them to the dump. The young soldier experienced unimaginable horrors during his tour of duty. Once, to save his own life, he was forced to decapitate a violent terror suspect.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>It&#8217;s reported that Manuel &#8220;carried out rescue missions&#8221;. That&#8217;s a vague enough statement it could mean literally anything. While it conjures images of Operation Eagle Claw, the Son Tay Prison Raid, or the rescue of Private Lynch, it could equally mean his platoon once came to the relief of another platoon engaged with the enemy.<\/p>\n<p>Around these parts we certainly believe that non-citizens who serve honorable in the military deserve citizenship. Personally, I could see a major benefit to creating an American Foreign Legion modeled after the French system. Serve your time and you get the reward. They should have gotten their issues fixed when they were offered the help from their chain of command.<\/p>\n<p>We also tend to think around here that non-citizens pleading or being found guilty of a crime, especially ones like domestic violence or fighting with police, are rightfully placed on the outbound list. Military service (and the resulting PTSD from such) do not negate criminal conduct later in life. We get fancy license plates, a discount at Lowe&#8217;s, and some free meals on 11 November. We don&#8217;t get a &#8220;Commit some misdemeanors for free&#8221; pass as vets.<\/p>\n<p>With NPRC backed up, we might never get any results to a FOIA request. Since we have no records in hand, we can&#8217;t refute any of their claims, but there are enough holes in the story we have questions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last night PBS aired a film title\u00a0&#8220;American Exile&#8221; about the two men pictured above. They are &hellip; <a title=\"Vietnam Veteran brothers facing deportation\" class=\"hm-read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=119659\"><span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Vietnam Veteran brothers facing deportation<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":664,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[185,226,446],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-119659","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-crime","category-veterans-in-the-news","category-vietnam"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119659","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/664"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=119659"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119659\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":119663,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119659\/revisions\/119663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=119659"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=119659"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=119659"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}