Video: 'John Lennon and wife Yoko search for Yoko's daughter in US'

(Friday, April 28, 1972, 10:30 a.m. EST) — Beatle star John Lennon and his wife, Yoko Ono, today appealed to the American people to support them in their efforts to remain in the United States, saying they loved America and believed in American justice.

Yoko, her voice breaking with emotion, told a press conference at the National Press Building in Washington that she will have to leave behind her daughter, eight-year-old Kyoko, if the immigration authorities succeed in deporting them.

“I still believe in America, in American justice, and the American people, and I really would like to stay here and look for my daughter,” she said. “If we are kicked out, we will lose her,” Lennon said.

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The Lennons’ entry visas expired on Feb. 29, 1972, and the U.S. Immigration Service in New York has set a hearing on their possible deportation for May 2, 1972.

The couple has been waging a lengthy court battle to secure custody of Yoko’s daughter by her first marriage and were granted custody by a Texas court. Yoko said, however, that they have been unable to locate her daughter and her former husband.

Yoko said the court order granting custody of the child specified that the child must be brought up within the United States.

The Lennons’ appeal here came hours after it was disclosed that New York Mayor John Lindsay had written to the commissioner of U. S. immigration service requesting that the couple be allowed to remain in America because, he said, of their unique contribution to music and art.