Created to protect the vulnerable, the U-visa has transmogrified into a market where citizenship can be gamed and traded.
America’s immigration system was designed to embody the American social contract — a compact between the individual and the state, in which the government is impartial and bound by law. But when newcomers arrive from societies where government is degraded into barter, bribery, and patronage, they import with them a radically different conception of what citizenship and authority mean. That is the real danger revealed in Louisiana, where Chandrakant “Lala” Patel, an Indian-origin businessman, now faces a 62-count federal indictment for orchestrating a sweeping U-visa fraud.
