Young Illegal Immigrants Get Two-year Ticket To Earn, Learn And Enjoy Self-respect

As a young mother on a tight budget, Natalia Crespin is often exhausted from cooking in a cramped Arlington apartment, keeping her baby quiet and her toddler entertained, lugging their strollers on and off public buses, and juggling bills on the modest pay the children’s father earns as a drywall hanger.

But as one of about 522,000 young illegal immigrants nationwide who have been granted a two-year amnesty, Crespin says she sleeps more soundly now than in the entire 12 years since she arrived in the United States. Her heart no longer pounds when a police patrol car slows or when someone knocks on the door at night.

Recently, she and an aunt were at a public laundry when a man who said he was a police officer started bothering them. “Before I had my papers, I would have kept quiet and walked away,” said Crespin, 23, a native of El Salvador. “Now I can stand up for myself. I told him to chill.” 
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