Help Ukrainian Family Achieve Refugee Status

Please meet my friends, the Tomilovych Family. Shortly after the Ukraine war broke out, they bought tickets to escape their homeland and fly to the United States. They were greeted with a week in a concrete holding cell and had all their documentation taken away.

They were a week early.

Because the United States government had not yet opened its doors to asylum seekers when they arrived, they are in a nomad's land needing to escape their homeland yet legally not allowed any assistance from refugee resources.

Maria and Roman aren’t whiners. They quickly got to work finding any way possible to support their four darling children. Roman is a master craftsman with incredible talent. Maria and her sister Natalia clean houses while the little ones are at school; Natalia works at Chick-fil-a in the evenings to make the best use of every waking moment.

I visited their apartment, and while they only have a single cooking spoon, a pot, and enough seats around the table to sit half of her family, Maria refuses to ask for anything other than work. “I want to work, and I do not need anything in my hands,” she said to me with her hands cupped open in front of her. “I only want to find a way to pay for the lawyer so we can get our papers back and open a bank account.”

I would ask if you would be willing to donate any amount towards the funds they need to hire a lawyer to represent them in their case to seek legal asylum and open them up to the many resources our country has available. Funds will also be used to help pay their rent and hopefully fly her parents out of Ukraine, where the war continues.

I am also setting up a signup genius for those who want to contribute to their basic household needs. But for them to come out of this net they are caught in, affording an immigration attorney and rent is their number one goal. Within our community, we found an immigration attorney willing to drop his fees to his lowest possible cost rate of $8,000 and another Ukrainian attorney ready to represent them for $10,000.