Immigration activists are rallying to halt the deportation of a student from Guatemala and urge action from the Senate.

Selvin Arevalo, 24, who has lived in Maine for the past 10 years, was close to receiving his high school diploma when he got into a car accident and was detained for deportation. The activists want the state's senators to intervene on Arevalo's behalf.

"Selvin is exactly the kind of person we want in this country," Lynn Tramonte of America's Voice, which supports a comprehensive immigration overhaul, said on a conference call with reporters.

The college-bound senior had been working to provide for his family back in Guatemala and was a volunteer through his local church.

Activists also used Arevalo's case to argue for the DREAM Act, a bill that would give young illegal immigrants a path to citizenship if they went to college or joined the military.

"Selvin's case is not very unique unfortunately," Marc Mutty of the Roman Catholic Diocese said. "They come to the United States out of desperation, seeking a better life."

The activists have been lobbying Congress to pass the DREAM Act this year, followed by a comprehensive law legalizing the nation's 12 million undocumented immigrants.

-- Ambreen Ali, Congress.org