{"id":715,"date":"2025-07-31T11:01:20","date_gmt":"2025-07-31T11:01:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.canoeinstructor.com\/?p=715"},"modified":"2025-07-31T12:17:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-31T12:17:09","slug":"krista-kafer-what-gabe-evans-got-wrong-about-his-grandfathers-immigration-he-can-still-make-right","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.canoeinstructor.com\/index.php\/2025\/07\/31\/krista-kafer-what-gabe-evans-got-wrong-about-his-grandfathers-immigration-he-can-still-make-right\/","title":{"rendered":"Krista Kafer: What Gabe Evans got wrong about his grandfather\u2019s immigration, he can still make right"},"content":{"rendered":"

No one in my family owned slaves, I used to say. It was a reasonable assumption based on family lore.<\/p>\n

It is with the humility that comes with having been mistaken that I view the controversy surrounding Rep. Gabe Evans\u2019 claims about his Mexican-born grandfather. On the campaign trail last year for Colorado’s 8th Congressional District, Evans described his abuelito, Cuauhtemoc Chavez, as a man who \u201cdid it the right way\u201d when he immigrated to America.<\/p>\n

The truth is more complex, an investigation by Colorado Newsline revealed<\/a>. Chavez came to the U.S. illegally as a young child. He was arrested as a teen and subject to deportation proceedings. At some point in his youth he was arrested but not convicted of attempted burglary. He later served in World War II and became a naturalized U.S. citizen. The article suggests that Chavez was granted citizenship, not because of his service to the nation as Evans has stated, but because a 1944 law made it so candidates for naturalization no longer had to show proof of lawful entry.<\/p>\n

Did Evans\u2019 grandfather become a citizen \u201cthe right way?\u201d The answer is not black and white. He came here illegally but was ultimately naturalized through a legal process that is no longer available to immigrants who first arrive illegally.<\/p>\n

As for my family, my dad\u2019s kin emigrated from Germany and the Russian Empire decades after the Civil War. My mom\u2019s family immigrated to Pennsylvania, one of the first states to abolish slavery, and Maryland from England and Central Europe beginning in the 17th century. My mom\u2019s great-great-grandfather, Joseph Lopez, born Joseph Getward, deserted from the Royal Navy to come to the U.S. He later joined the New York Volunteer Infantry, was captured, and ended up at Andersonville, the notorious Confederate prisoner-of-war camp. Adding all this up, odds seemed good that my family lacked a connection to the horrors of human bondage.<\/p>\n

That was until last weekend, when I learned that Joseph Lopez\u2019s daughter-in-law (my great-great-grandmother) had a great-great-grandfather who owned slaves and with one of them fathered a son, her great-grandfather, my great-great-great-great-great-grandfather. Guarding against the deeply racist attitudes of the day, my relatives of mixed ethnic heritage started a family rumor that their darker skin tone must have come from a Native American ancestor.<\/p>\n

Turns out my assumptions about my family were incorrect. The truth is far more complex; my family tree includes at least one slaveholder and at least one slave. If I weigh in on a political issue like racial reparations and choose to invoke my family history, I cannot simply say \u201cmy whole family did it right.\u201d In fact, if I searched further, I would find other slave owners and slaves even on my dad\u2019s side. Pre-Christian Germanic tribes practiced slavery, too. It was an abhorrent practice throughout human history. No one\u2019s family is a paragon of virtue.<\/p>\n