How a deported Wharton student's struggle to return to Philly changed U.S. immigration law.

Yahya Jalil's resumé paints a picture of a 1990s-era global citizen. Born in Lahore, Pakistan, in 1973, he came to the United States to enroll as an undergraduate at Stanford University in 1992. At Stanford, he majored in electrical engineering and spent his junior year studying abroad at Oxford University in England. After graduating from Stanford in 1996, he left the sun-drenched Silicon Valley campus for the office towers of Manhattan, working for an investment banking firm so multinational even its name is in two languages: Credit Suisse First Boston. Then, it was on to the financial arm of General Electric, one of the world's largest corporations, where he went from senior analyst to assistant vice president in less than three years. After his five-year stint on Wall Street, Jalil entered the Wharton business school at the University of Pennsylvania, one of the most prestigious MBA programs in the world.

But if the 1990s ended on Sept. 11, 2001, they did not end for Jalil until March 12, 2003. That was the day he and his wife returned from a job-hunting trip to London. With the weak global economy, even students like Jalil, who was near the top of his Wharton class, faced difficulties finding work after graduation. Soon, though, finding his next paycheck would be the least of Jalil's problems.

Going through immigration upon his return to Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey (the "Liberty" was added after 9/11), Jalil was told his student visa had been revoked for not properly registering with federal authorities before his international flight -- a requirement for Pakistani males since the terrorist attacks.

Jalil was not the first Muslim man to have his visa revoked since the attacks in New York and Washington, but his case ultimately led to a relaxation of post-9/11 visa regulations.

It would be comforting to think that Jalil's case was simply so extreme -- that he so clearly posed no threat to national security -- that the feds decided to change the rules. But it appears that without the efforts of Jalil's uncle, a politically connected New Orleans-area businessman who lobbied politicians whose campaigns he helped bankroll, the changes never would have been made.

"When I first came to the U.S. in 1992 at Stanford University, I can remember the exhilaration I felt at international students orientation, where there was a real sense that this was a free country with lots of personal and other freedoms," muses Jalil, via e-mail from Pakistan. "I can't help but feel that it's a very different United States than the country I first landed in 11 years ago."

It's not entirely different today, though. Despite tight regulations on foreign visitors, money still talks inside the Beltway.In the wake of 9/11, the federal government began requiring visitors from 24 countries with large Muslim populations to register with immigration officials. The program, called the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System, or NSEERS (pronounced "EN-sears"), is the reason Jalil remains stranded overseas today. According to a government-published NSEERS guide, "In light of the attacks against the United States of Sept. 11, 2001 the Attorney General has determined that certain nonimmigrant aliens require closer monitoring when national security or law enforcement interests are raised."

Jalil says he understands the need for heightened security but still takes issue with the scope of these new registration requirements. "As someone who has always known and loved the U.S. as the epitome of freedom, the thought of having to continually inform the INS of my travels, both domestically and internationally, of my intentions to move or buy a house, to be fingerprinted monthly and to allow tracking of all my purchases through registration of credit cards does give me pause," writes Jalil who, despite his reservations, dutifully registered with the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services (BCIS), formerly the INS.

While Jalil and more than 80,000 other men from Muslim countries were registering, civil libertarians were already challenging the new regulations. Their battles were waged both in federal courts and in the court of public opinion. "It seems the system is designed to deport as many people as possible whether they present a danger to the U.S. or not," says Pennsylvania ACLU Executive Director David DiSabatino.

Jalil's most recent BCIS check-in came on Feb. 11, about a month before he headed to London. Looking back, he says he wasn't informed then -- or ever before -- that he'd have to re-register if he left the country. But according to a five-page government guide to NSEERS regulations, "If you leave the United States you must notify INS on the date of your departure and leave through a designated port. If you do not report your departure, you may be denied admission to the United States at a later date."

Still, judging by the number of people who've had trouble with NSEERS, critics believe it's needlessly complex. "If people who are as sophisticated and well-educated as [Jalil] can't figure out how to comply with the rules, how is an ordinary person supposed to?" DiSabatino asks rhetorically.

On March 8, Yahya and Hifza, his wife of three years and a Drexel University business student originally from the United Arab Emirates, arrived at the United Airlines counter in the Newark airport. Yahya, concerned that there might be special procedures to go through as a Pakistani male, claims he double-checked with the ticket agent.

United Airlines spokesperson Jeff Green disputes this claim and says, additionally, that it is not the airline's responsibility to answer immigration questions. The airline is simply charged with transmitting immigration forms from passengers to BCIS authorities.

According to Jalil, the agent told him that he had completed all the needed paperwork, so the young couple flew to London. Upon their return four days later, Jalil was stopped at Newark's immigration office and was given two options: go to jail or leave the country. According to Jalil, immigration officials in Newark assured him that he could get an emergency visa issued immediately back in London. Once he agreed to leave, Jalil's passport was stamped "Application Withdrawn" and the word "canceled" was inked across his visa. "The Application Withdrawn' stamp indicates that I voluntarily' withdrew my application for entry

into the U.S. (as opposed to an exclusion or deportation)," Jalil writes. "In reality, I was advised by the inspecting INS officer to withdraw my application for entry, and wasn't really given any alternative."

Hifza ended up with the luggage. (Her return was a routine matter, since NSEERS regulations only apply to men over age 16.) Yahya ended up with the ATM card, which he used to purchase a set of clothes in London, charge his first night in a hotel and pay for phone calls to immigration lawyers. United paid for the flight back to London. (The government requires airlines that fly in inadmissible people to return them to their point of origin.)

Once in the U.K., Jalil learned that it would take at least two months for national security agencies in Washington to run his name through a series of terrorist-watch list databases. Getting a new visa, he was told, could take up to eight months. Jalil spent the next nine days living with friends in London, and then returned to Pakistan at his own expense, getting a round-trip ticket on short notice that cost nearly $1,000. Jalil says all told the ordeal has cost him around $4,000. Meanwhile, he was scheduled to graduate Wharton on May 18. It was a ceremony he'd be forced to miss.

When Jalil arrived in Pakistan, American diplomats there already knew NSEERS was creating bureaucratic nightmares.

Terry White, the press attache at the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad, wouldn't discuss Jalil's specific case during a recent phone call. He did, however, concede that he'd heard of a number of similar instances. According to White, one of the embassy's own local staffers, a Pakistani national, had trouble

checking out after a trip to the U.S. -- and this man is a U.S. government employee.

While he says he was sympathetic to Jalil's plight, White maintains he has no power to help people caught in the bureaucratic net. "The regulations are decided in Washington," White says. "We're foot soldiers. We salute and carry out the orders."

Back in the States, Jalil's friends kept abreast of the situation and ultimately took action to help him. Wharton student Jeremy Korst, a close friend of Jalil's who chairs Penn's Graduate and Professional Student Assembly, drew up an online petition asking the government to re-admit Jalil "at the earliest possible time." Korst sent out 70 e-mails notifying people about the petition. By the end of the day, there were 1,000 signatures. By the end of Jalil's ordeal two months later, the number approached 3,500.

Before enrolling in Wharton, Korst had worked as a congressional staffer on Capitol Hill. Knowing how the system worked, he urged university administrators to contact their elected representatives, which they did.

When the state ACLU heard of Jalil's plight, they took an aggressive approach. Rather than simply trying to free Jalil, they pressured the feds to change the NSEERS regulations entirely. As legal director Stefan Presser wrote to his ACLU colleagues nationwide, "Guided by our Immigrants' Rights Project, the decision was made to try to resolve this problem legislatively."

Calls from the university started coming into the Washington offices of Sen. Rick Santorum and U.S. Rep. Chaka Fattah, who holds a degree from Penn. (Fattah's district also includes the Ivy League campus.) Press secretaries for both said the politicians then contacted administration officials.

Erica Clayton Wright, a Santorum spokesperson, says calls were placed to both Immigration and the Department of State. "We assisted in any way possible," Wright says.

Debra Anderson, Fattah's legislative director, says her office also placed calls to those agencies. She thinks the pressure made a difference. "In terms of Yahya it was the phone calls more than anything -- the official inquiry -- along with those of other members of the House and the Senate who were asking questions that probably got them moving," she says.

While Philadelphia and Pennsylvania representatives were calling for an official inquiry, U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., personally took the matter to Homeland Security bigwigs. But why was a Louisiana senator getting involved in a Pennsylvania resident's immigration mess? Because Jalil's uncle, Rahman Bhatti, is a major supporter of Louisiana Democrats in general, and Landrieu in particular.

An emigrant from Pakistan, Bhatti runs a civil engineering firm outside New Orleans. Talking about Landrieu and her senatorial colleague, John Breaux, D-La., Bhatti says, "I am a bigtime supporter for both. They are personal friends and I support them politically [and] financially."

Since entering public life, Landrieu has counted on the generosity of Bhatti, his family and others connected with his firm, Rahman and Associates, which designs highways, bridges and roads.

According to the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington, D.C. nonprofit that tracks political contributions, Bhatti's family has donated more than $8,000 to Landrieu's campaigns over the years, many in $1,000 increments, the maximum allowable under the law per election cycle. (Under the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform law signed last year, the limit for an individual has been raised to $2,000 per candidate.)

Because of limits on individual donations, major political backers often host dinners and receptions hoping to drum up donations from friends and business associates. Last October, when Landrieu was in a tight fight to hold her seat, Bhatti did just that, helping organize a Pakistani-American community fundraising reception at the Fairmount Hotel in New Orleans. Bhatti introduced the senator at the function, the first of its kind in the Big Easy's Pakistani community.

On May 3, the State Department issued new regulations governing visas for all diplomatic and consular posts worldwide. In keeping with the State Department's generals-in-D.C.-foot-soldiers-in-the-field modus operandi, the memo didn't explain why the new regulations had been established, but in reading them, one section seems a direct result of Jalil's ordeal.

Today, people in Jalil's situation can have the visa-reissuing process expedited if they have "a credible explanation for past failure to comply, based on something other than convenience. Reasons for non-compliance that could constitute good cause can include credible claims that the applicant was given confusing or wrong instructions."

It is a very unusual change of policy by an administration for which post-9/11 security considerations have consistently trumped individual rights. Reacting to the decision, Pennsylvania ACLU legal director Stefan Presser wrote, "It is a rare day that one can report a softening of any of [the Bush administration's] draconian measures, yet I am happy to be able to do so."

"Visa regulations are confidential," says State Department spokesperson Kelly Shannon with the Bureau of Consular Affairs, adding that, "we've worked closely with Homeland Security in terms of overseas visitors."

According to Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spokesperson Dennis Murphy, the regulations were changed by the State Department due to a number of similar cases, not simply because of Jalil's. "It was a collection of several of these types of cases that led the [State Department] to reconsider the policy," Murphy says.

shares border-control responsibilities with the State Department, and in speaking with officials at both departments, it was apparent that they were not always sure which department handled what. With the new alphabet soup of homeland security agencies in Washington, one immigration bureau spokesperson admitted he wasn't even sure what the acronym NSEERS stood for.

Neither DHS nor State spokespeople would discuss the internal negotiations that resulted in new regulations, but one source familiar with the negotiations said the State Department drafted the relaxed visa regulations months ago. But with DHS wanting to err on the strict side of things, they'd been held up.

According to the source, Jalil's situation provided the ideal test case. Under pressure from Sen. Landrieu, which included a personal phone call to Ridge's right-hand man, Asa Hutchinson, who serves as the DHS undersecretary for border and transportation security, department officials conducted a review that revealed a number of similar cases in Pakistan and other Muslim countries. Acknowledging the problem, DHS acceded to the change.

Though not privy to the D.C. discussions, Bhatti credits Landrieu with solving Jalil's problems with a call to Hutchinson and a letter she'd written to Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge. "I think that was the turning point, in my humble judgment," Bhatti says.

Jalil also credits Landrieu, but reserves appreciation for his uncle's efforts as well. "[My uncle] was incredibly thoughtful through the entire process and persisted with pursuing my case with Sen. Landrieu's office," he says.

Landrieu's press secretary, Maria Purdy, eschews the role of hero. "I can tell you in general that she helped draw attention to a breakdown in the process. She was pleased to play a role in facilitating this young man's particular circumstances. She felt no student should miss out on the opportunity of a lifetime because of a paperwork glitch. She took the matter seriously and was pleased to play a role in the process of helping to work this out."

With the regulations modified, Jalil has obtained a new visa and will re-enter the United States later this summer. While he took most of his final exams by fax, he has one outstanding credit to complete before receiving his MBA.

Jalil's student visa covers him for up to one year of post-graduate work experience. He hopes to find a finance job when he gets back to the area, but doesn't know how easy that will be. "I would obviously first need to find an employer who would take me for the one-year period, and am certainly far behind in the process on account of having missed a significant part of the recruiting cycle," he says.

Ever the overachiever, Jalil is making the most of his unexpected sojourn in Pakistan by taking an introductory German language course. Perhaps because his story has a happy ending, Jalil's idealism about the United States has actually been bolstered by his ordeal.

"The experience reminded me that one person who takes a principled stand can make a difference despite seemingly insurmountable odds," he wrote in a recent e-mail. "It is obviously very heartening to know that despite the tense geopolitical atmosphere that we are in, there are politicians like Sen. Landrieu and individuals like Jeremy Korst who are ready to take a stand in defense of people who have fallen victim to unfortunate circumstances and have an enduring commitment to uphold the American traditions of justice and fair play."

But is the story of Yahya Jalil really a testament to the American traditions of justice and fair play, or an example of the right things happening for the wrong reasons? After entangling in their widely cast net thousands of Muslim men, many of them poor or unable to speak English, the feds snared an articulate man with an uncle who had payed to play in D.C. politics. The system got fixed, but in Washington, it appears the fix is still in.