By Deborah Bloom

(Reuters) – Twice daily, Yuliya Day reaches out by phone from Los Angeles to see how her mother and aunt are doing in the attic they’ve rented in Warsaw. Following their escape from Kharkiv in Ukraine, the sisters (68-years old and 70 year old) crossed into Poland with just two cats, and only a few personal belongings.

Day calls her mother and aunt to re-evaluate her efforts over the months to move them from Europe into America. The Ukrainian-American special needs instructor, aged 42, spoke out to Reuters about her experience in navigating the confusing and difficult legal system of bringing their loved ones back from war.

Biden’s administration believes that the majority of Ukrainians, whose lives were disrupted by Russia’s invasion, will stay in Europe. It said that it could accept as many as 100,000 people using the existing legal channels in March. On April 25, a “Uniting for Ukraine” website went live allowing Ukrainians with American financial sponsors to apply to stay and work in the United States for up to two years under a humanitarian parole program that does not offer a path to citizenship.

According to U.S. Department of Homeland Security, approximately 14,500 Uniting for Ukraine Applications had been submitted as of the middle of last week. Citizenship and Immigration Services agency, (USCIS).

Potential sponsors will need to upload information about themselves and their assets. Before they are allowed to travel to America, applicants must clear security and identity checks.

Iryna Bashynskyy, Portland, Oregon has found hope through the program. Bashynskyy began looking for ways that Yana her niece could leave Ukraine in February. Bashynskyy has begun gathering documentation, including tax returns, bank statements, and other financial records.

“It’s a hustle,” Bashynskyy said. “But I’ll try to accomplish it.”

Yana requested that her name be kept anonymous due to safety reasons.

“It is necessary to somehow escape from here,” Yana, 23, said through a translator from her apartment in Kyiv. “I’m scared about my life, about my future. Because you don’t know where a bomb will drop, at what time, and what will happen.”

Marina Shepelsky, an attorney based in New York, received many calls from Ukrainian relatives. For the first month and-a-half of the Russian invasion, Shepelsky – a Ukrainian refugee herself whose family fled the Soviet Union in 1989 – was advising them to apply for tourist visas.

“Now I’m kind of discouraging it,” Shepelsky said, saying Uniting for Ukraine offers “a better status.”

U.S. State Department statistics show that nearly 3500 Ukrainians got temporary visas to the U.S. for business or tourism in March. That’s a significant increase from the 900 issued in February. According to a spokesperson for the State Department, tourist visas are only for temporary stay and not suitable for starting an immigration or refugee process. Although the spokesperson didn’t explain why there were more Ukrainians granted tourist visas than usual in March, he said that applications are assessed case by case.

MEXICO WATCHMEN – WAITING

Leonard Mogul seeks a spouse immigration visa to marry the woman he wed in an informal, non-denominational Zoom ceremony in March. Her wedding band was a ring he had bought her during a New Year’s vacation in Cancun. He tried to get a tourist visa earlier and was granted a visa interview in September.

“I didn’t want her to be alone in Europe by herself for that long,” said Mogul, who is pursuing the spousal visa and does not plan to apply for Uniting for Ukraine.

Artem Plakhotnyi is a Scottsdale-based dance instructor who had tried for several weeks to get an urgent visa appointment for his sister in law and their four-year old twins. He said that his cousin, and his cousin, died while trying to flee Kharkiv four days after Russian troops invaded Ukraine. He tried several times to flee to Warsaw, but he was unsuccessful. After that, he took a flight to Warsaw, and flew to Tijuana with relatives. There, a humanitarian parole was granted to him.

U.S. Department of Homeland Security stated that Ukrainians who were stopped at their southwest border with no valid visas, or authorization to travel through Uniting for Ukraine to the United States may be denied entry.

According to a Mexican source, around 530 Ukrainians were staying at a shelter in Mexico City last week looking for sponsorships in the United States. Many had flown to the United States by the Tijuana-based Mexican navy. Mexico’s navy confirmed the Ukrainians, among them almost 200 minors, were at the shelter.

Ilona Dauzhynska a Ukrainian activist in Mexico said that others from Ukraine have also traveled to Mexico City by themselves and are currently staying at hotels while they await immigration processing.

Day is back in Los Angeles working on Uniting for Ukraine. Day can also book accommodations remotely for her aunt, mother and to coordinate veterinary care for her cats.

“My mom and aunt don’t speak other languages” than Ukrainian, she said. “They’ve never left Ukraine. They’ve never even been on a plane.”

She said she’s considering flying to Poland.

“Honestly, I just want to be able to hug my mother and cry with her, and not being able to do this – they feel totally lost over there.”