WASHINGTON (AP) – Sen. John Kerry on Wednesday urged U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials not to deport the wife of a Massachusetts soldier missing in Iraq, calling it a “test of our government’s compassion” for service members and their families.

“It just strikes me as unbelievably inappropriate and indecent for the wife of a current, second-tour Purple Heart winner who is now missing in action to be living under this kind of cloud,” Kerry, D-Mass., said in a conference call with reporters.

Army Spec. Alex Jimenez of Lawrence, who has been missing since his unit was attacked by insurgents in Iraq on May 12, had petitioned for a green card for his wife, Yaderlin, whom he married in 2004, Boston television station WBZ-TV reported on Tuesday. The soldier’s wife is living with family members in Pennsylvania, the station reported.

Kerry wrote a letter asking Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff not to take any further steps in Yaderlin Jimenez’s case until her husband is found.

“I do not believe that Yaderlin should have her stress and grief compounded by additional worries about her own immigration status,” Kerry wrote.

A DHS spokeswoman said the deportation case was closed in May 2006, and there are no plans to reopen it.

“There is no move to deport her,” said Jamie Zuieback, a DHS spokeswoman. “We, like all Americans, hope for Specialist Jimenez’s safe return.”

Matthew Kolken, the attorney for Jimenez and his wife, said Wednesday that he is worried that if Jimenez does not make it back from Iraq, his wife could face deportation proceedings at a later date.

She illegally entered the United States from the Dominican Republic in 2001, Kolken told WBZ. Her husband’s request for a green card and legal residence status for her alerted authorities to her situation.

The attorney said his client would not be eligible for a green card under normal circumstances, but he is seeking a hardship waiver for her. If she were to have to leave the U.S., she would have to wait 10 years before reapplying.

“I can’t imagine a bigger injustice than that, to be deporting someone’s wife who is fighting and possibly dying for our country,” Kolken told the station.

U.S. forces continue to search for Jimenez, 25, and a comrade, Pvt. Brian Fouty, 19, of Waterford, Mich.

The soldiers’ identification cards were found in an al-Qaida safe house north of Baghdad, along with video production equipment, computers and weapons, the U.S. military said Saturday. An al-Qaida front group claimed in a video posted on the Internet earlier this month that the soldiers were killed and buried, and showed images of the ID’s. The video offered no proof of their fates.

The body of a third soldier taken in the attack on their 10th Mountain Division unit was found floating in the Euphrates River. Four other U.S. soldiers and an Iraqi translator were killed in the ambush.

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Information from: WBZ-TV, http://www.wbz4.com

AP-ES-06-20-07 1646EDT