By Carolina Garcia –

As a teenager, Concepcion Covarrubias, a Los Angeles native, was forcibly sent to Mexico as part of the U.S. repatriation campaign of the 1930’s.  According to California’s Apology Act for the 1930’s Repatriation, passed in 2005, it is estimated that between one and two million people shared her fate. Of that number, 60 percent were U.S. born citizens or legal residents.

It wasn’t until age 83 that Concepcion was finally able to return to U.S. soil.

His grandmother’s story inspired television journalist Vicente Serrano to produce a documentary titled, “A Forgotten Injustice.”

“I want people to realize that there are more important things beyond a law that sees black and white.. that there are families, that there are feelings, that there are human beings,” he said.

He said his grandmother always wanted to return to the United States.

“I remember that my grandmother would cry for the simple reason of wanting to be able to cry at her mother’s grave,” he said. “She had never done it. For more than seven decades she always wanted to be able to return to where her mother had been buried.”

Nearly 80 years later, the situation hasn’t changed much.

Giselle Stern Hernandez never suspected she would have to choose between her life as a U.S. citizen and her marriage when she walked into the Chicago immigration office in April of 2001. Just half an hour after speaking to an immigration official, Roberto, her husband, was handcuffed and taken into custody.

Shortly after, Giselle sees him in a prison uniform, behind bulletproof glass.

“I felt like I had walked him into a trap,” she said.

Roberto was deported the following day, and Giselle stayed at his side.

A report by the Associated Press states that there are 55 confirmed recent cases of deported U.S. citizens, but immigrant rights groups claim that there are hundreds more.  These figures don’t include cases in which U.S. citizens or legal residents must leave the country in order to remain with family members who are undocumented.

Carolina Garcia is reporter for Radio Arte. Listen to this story in Spanish.

For more coverage on the May Day march in Chicago go here.