By April Drew

AS the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform (ILIR) gears up to take their campaign across the Atlantic with a meeting set for this Saturday, April 14, at Jurys Hotel in Ballsbridge, Dublin, family and friends of the undocumented are putting the work in place to ensure that Jury’s will have a full house.

Tracey Bradley from Donegal has two undocumented sisters living in the U.S. and several cousins, and she has put her heart and soul into informing her local community about the importance of the meeting in Dublin.

Bradley, 32 hails from Inch Island in Co. Donegal. She, her husband Declan and their daughter Joanne, 3, like so many other families, have had to make the 3,000 mile trek to the U.S. to visit her siblings because Joanne aunties can’t visit her.

“We’ve visited them twice since Joanne was born but they’ve never been to our new home in Buncrana,” said Bradley sadly.

Her sisters (who asked to remain anonymous) live in New York and Boston and were forced to return home to Ireland in May 2002 when their father tragically died.

“Dad suddenly died from a massive heart attack, so the girls had to risk coming home for the funeral,” Bradley said.

Since 2002 the sisters have been forced to catch up on their daily lives via the telephone and the Bradley’s infrequent trips. She describes not being able to have her sisters come freely back as a “jail sentence.”

“My daughter has to learn of her aunties through photos and telephone conversations. But she’ll never really know them for the great persons they are.”

Like any sisters, Bradley is very close to hers, and now that she is due her second baby she said she would love to have them come to visit her and be part of the whole process.

“I visit as often as I can but now with another baby on the way it won’t be easy to travel with a young infant and a toddler,” she said.

It was this desperation and the pleas from her family here in the U.S. that got Bradley, a restaurant manager, involved in the “fight for the Irish,” as she calls it.

“Life can be way too short, you only get one chance at it and family for me is the biggest part of my life,” she says.

Bradley feels that the Irish are doing the right thing in the U.S., and she sees them wanting to declare their presence here as a positive move. “My sisters have all grown to love and know the U.S. as their home now,” she says.

When Bradley heard that ILIR was planning to hold an information meeting for family and friends of the undocumented in Dublin she immediately rolled up her sleeves and got moving on getting people to Dublin for the day.

“It’s been a mad rush now to get people to the rally,” says Bradley, who has already got 50 people signed up for a coach she has booked.

Bradley is now a regular on her local radio station, Highland Radio, which goes out all over the northeast and some southern parts of Ireland. The morning presenter, Sean Doherty, spoke to Bradley extensively about the meeting in Dublin and how difficult the situation is for those undocumented in the U.S.

Doherty mentions the meeting every day on his radio station and encourages people to “get on the bus to Dublin.” Bradley has also spoken comprehensively to local newspapers about the situation her sisters are in here in the U.S.

“We’re hoping that we will fill our bus, and who knows we might even get a second one on the road. Ireland may be small but when we pull together we’re a pretty big nation with a loud voice,” she said.

Bradley not only feels the meeting is imperative for her sisters here in the U.S., but she also says she thinks it’s important for those in Ireland who aspire to work in the U.S. in the future.

“Let’s hope that the room will be filled on the day,” said Bradley mentioning that her young daughter, along with several members of her family, will be there with her. “Anyone that has any Irish blood in my family will be there,” she laughs.