500,000 illegal immigrants defy deportation

Coming out of shadows
Living Nine years later, they are still living in the United States. But they avoid going out in public and refuse to drive for fear of getting pulled over by police.

"It's really painful to wonder if, tomorrow, somebody will knock on your door and everything will be over," Juan said.

But he said that is better than going back to Bolivia, where their financial prospects are bleak.

"For me, the best chance is to provide education to my children, and that's something that I can do for them here," said Juan, a 38-year-old construction worker in Maryland who supports two older daughters in Bolivia. He asked that only his first name be used to protect his family.

Advocates say many immigrants defy deportation orders because they have lived in the United States for years, married, had children and put down roots in their communities.

"Is it worth going around with that feeling that you might be discovered? Or packing up your entire family now and settling all your obligations in the United States, buying airplane tickets for your family, moving back to a country where you haven't lived for many years, where you are worried about you are going to find a job? There's another whole set of uncertainties," said Maureen O'Sullivan, a Boston immigration lawyer.

Onyango's fate
It is not clear when Onyango, the 56-year-old half-sister of Obama's late Kenyan-born father, first came to the United States. But she moved into a state-subsidized public housing project in Boston in 2003.

After it was reported days before the election that she was in the country illegally, Onyango left Boston and went to Cleveland, where she hired an immigration attorney to fight her deportation order. She is staying with relatives in Cleveland, said her new attorney, Margaret Wong.

The Obama camp has said the candidate did not know about his aunt's status. "If she is violating laws, those laws have to be obeyed," Obama said just before the Nov. 4 election.

Advocates say the only way to reduce the number of illegal immigrants is to overhaul the nation's immigration laws.

"I ask the new president, I implore the new president to provide legislation that would allow us to become legal, to have papers," Juan said. "I don't mind paying fees, but I want to come out of the shadows."

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