\u201cWe\u2019re not naive, we know that all our problems aren\u2019t going to be solved once we move out to New Zealand, but it\u2019s difficult to stay in a country that doesn\u2019t seem like it wants you here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gregory and Ashley Rivara got engaged in New Zealand when they travelled here over ten years ago. Photo \/ Ashley Rivara<\/p>\n
The Trump administration ordered extensive immigration raids in October last year, detaining and removing many immigrants of Hispanic and Latino descent.<\/p>\n
Gregory also said the more relaxed lifestyle in New Zealand was very appealling.<\/p>\n
\u201cNew Zealand culture prioritises work-life balance and from a kid who grew up in a single-parent household that\u2019s grinded for the past 30 years, I can\u2019t wait for a nice work-life balance.\u201d<\/p>\n
In another video, Ashley said she had been wanting to leave the US for more than 10 years.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe fell in love with the land and the country and the people and I was like the dumb tourist on vacation that was like, \u2018we should live here. Should we move? Should we just never go back?\u2019 And that feeling has just really never left me.\u201d<\/p>\n
With three children, aged 7, 5, and 3, her fears about the safety risks of sending her children to school in the US galvanised her to rethink continuing with their education there.<\/p>\n
\u201cI mean, living through school shooting after school shooting and our Government doing absolutely nothing, as a mother, it\u2019s hard to feel any sense of peace. I mean I worry every single day that that might be the last day I see my child,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cNobody should ever have to live like that or have to think that in their brain.\u201d<\/p>\n
The family are in preparation mode for the move and have been looking for work throughout the country since having their visas approved two weeks ago.<\/p>\n
Working with local recruitment agencies, they hope Gregory\u2019s engineering experience will set him up with a job soon after their impending arrival.<\/p>\n
Ashley said they have been \u201chumbled\u201d by the support and plan to continue sharing their journey through the rest of the immigration process.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cWe\u2019re not naive, we know that all our problems aren\u2019t going to be solved once we move out…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":280988,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[8239,95,10709,22857,2109,28164,2082,2845,117,111,43,139,69,6379,1523,42120,13975,6302,25135,9939,8229,9938,3040,80],"class_list":["post-280987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-american","tag-and","tag-concerns","tag-escape","tag-family","tag-fears","tag-for","tag-leaving","tag-new","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-ongoing","tag-over","tag-racism","tag-relocating","tag-safety","tag-stability","tag-states","tag-they","tag-united","tag-us","tag-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=280987"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280987\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/280988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=280987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=280987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=280987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}