WEBVTT - A New Hope 0:00:00.240 --> 0:00:04.240 Hi listeners, just a quick heads up out of the shadows, 0:00:04.280 --> 0:00:08.520 tell stories of people fleeing and living in sometimes violent environments. 0:00:14.160 --> 0:00:16.600 If there's one thing to know about Eric Allimo, it's 0:00:16.600 --> 0:00:18.919 that he's mellowed out since the wild days of his youth. 0:00:19.760 --> 0:00:22.360 Back then he was more interested in being a gangster 0:00:22.640 --> 0:00:26.040 than he was being a writer storyteller. He's always been smart, 0:00:26.760 --> 0:00:30.640 a hellic studious person, but contained the angst and anger 0:00:31.000 --> 0:00:38.320 of a young star aggressively emitting a gaseous light. Patty 0:00:38.400 --> 0:00:44.000 Rodriguez is a complete opposite. She was calm, observant, and ambitious, 0:00:44.040 --> 0:00:47.279 constantly dreaming of a life that she wanted. And all 0:00:47.320 --> 0:00:52.080 of that isn't one photo with Patty smiling bigger than 0:00:52.159 --> 0:00:55.320 anyone may have ever smiled in a row of mostly 0:00:55.400 --> 0:01:00.960 frowning co workers, and Eric smirking on his knees, flipping 0:01:00.960 --> 0:01:04.640 off the camera with both hands. Eric and Patty grew 0:01:04.720 --> 0:01:07.560 up in neighboring cities of southeast Los Angeles, but they 0:01:07.560 --> 0:01:11.480 didn't meet until they worked together selling Women Choose at J. C. 0:01:11.600 --> 0:01:14.840 Penny and Down. But just like all the stories in 0:01:14.840 --> 0:01:18.280 this podcast, Erica played a special role in their lives. 0:01:19.280 --> 0:01:27.760 It's actually the reason they met. I'm Patty Rodriguez and 0:01:27.760 --> 0:01:30.160 I'm Uric Glendo. And this is out of the shadows. 0:01:30.360 --> 0:01:33.520 Children of eighty six. Immigrants and their children have long 0:01:33.560 --> 0:01:36.480 lived in the shadows of America. Their destinies aren't just 0:01:36.480 --> 0:01:39.039 shaped by where they come from, but by their particular 0:01:39.080 --> 0:01:43.680 place in history. In the lives of millions of immigrants 0:01:43.720 --> 0:01:46.120 and their children were changed by one lucky stroke of 0:01:46.120 --> 0:01:51.040 a pen by an unlikely ally, President Ronald Regan. This 0:01:51.160 --> 0:01:53.360 podcast will examine the ripple effects the bill had on 0:01:53.440 --> 0:01:57.520 first generation kids of immigrants, who are navigating intergenerational mobility 0:01:57.880 --> 0:02:01.680 and transforming the cultural landscape. This is an untold story 0:02:01.840 --> 0:02:14.079 of luck, timing, triumph, opportunity, survival, and of course hope. Father. 0:02:21.080 --> 0:02:24.679 A few years ago, I was feeling fortunate and started 0:02:24.760 --> 0:02:27.960 to think about how I got here. I started to 0:02:28.000 --> 0:02:32.080 ask myself all those questions, how did I come to 0:02:32.120 --> 0:02:35.280 this position? How did I get to be part of 0:02:35.320 --> 0:02:41.880 a hit national radio show, a publisher of children's books. Well, 0:02:41.919 --> 0:02:44.360 as it turns out, it had to do with this 0:02:44.480 --> 0:02:49.720 one bill Urka, And this was history that we didn't 0:02:49.760 --> 0:02:56.440 even know. You know, six wasn't that long ago. You 0:02:56.560 --> 0:02:58.920 think that a thirty year old piece of legislation that 0:02:59.080 --> 0:03:01.679 changed so many migrant lives would be treated as a 0:03:01.760 --> 0:03:06.600 historic landmark. URCA was in part responsible for creating the 0:03:06.720 --> 0:03:11.160 Latino middle class. We're more essential than ever. It's why 0:03:11.240 --> 0:03:14.079 j Loo and Shakira are headlining the Super Bowl. It's 0:03:14.080 --> 0:03:20.760 why we have big Hollywood productions like Coco. It's why 0:03:20.800 --> 0:03:24.480 I started my own company, Little Liberos, because I want 0:03:24.520 --> 0:03:27.160 my kids to grow up proud of being themselves, of 0:03:27.280 --> 0:03:31.280 being Latino. If I had grown up with fear constantly 0:03:31.280 --> 0:03:35.200 on my mind thinking my parents wouldn't come home. Like 0:03:35.320 --> 0:03:39.200 little Marzella Sanchez who wrote the letter to Reagan, I 0:03:39.240 --> 0:03:43.080 don't think it would have been possible. And don't get 0:03:43.080 --> 0:03:45.920 this wrong. URCA wasn't a hand out. It's not like 0:03:45.960 --> 0:03:48.480 they gave our parents a million dollars and said go 0:03:48.640 --> 0:03:53.640 be American. But as Sonya Santos puts it, it's just 0:03:53.760 --> 0:04:00.360 tradmission to leave. If Sonia's family was for worse to 0:04:00.400 --> 0:04:03.760 live in the shadows, her son Barney wouldn't have started 0:04:03.800 --> 0:04:08.440 his own business. If my parents or Eric's parents hadn't 0:04:08.440 --> 0:04:12.560 gotten Irka, we probably wouldn't have met, let alone got 0:04:12.560 --> 0:04:15.800 into the work as storytellers. We are so passionate about 0:04:16.440 --> 0:04:21.880 Irka created a generation of immigrants who were fearless, created 0:04:21.920 --> 0:04:25.800 a generation of children of immigrants who dare to be 0:04:25.920 --> 0:04:32.800 themselves unapologetically. The course of my life, Barney's life, and 0:04:33.000 --> 0:04:37.160 Eric's life were all changed by a stack of papers. 0:04:38.160 --> 0:04:45.599 And that's American history. That's our history. There's a reason 0:04:45.680 --> 0:04:48.520 we start every episode of this podcast, what the Photo 0:04:48.600 --> 0:04:52.120 from Our Past, to show the ways that our history 0:04:52.360 --> 0:04:57.520 is still breathing. It's real and experienced by real people. 0:04:58.640 --> 0:05:01.919 It's not as far removed as it so often seems. 0:05:03.120 --> 0:05:06.760 So we created a sonic photo album, infusing life into 0:05:06.760 --> 0:05:10.120 still images, giving you a glimpse of that history through 0:05:10.160 --> 0:05:14.440 the eyes of the people who lived it. In nine six, 0:05:15.160 --> 0:05:18.039 even though Orca was meant to stop the flow of immigration, 0:05:19.040 --> 0:05:22.800 the numbers went way up. Immediately after it passed. The 0:05:22.800 --> 0:05:26.839 immigrant population went from about four million to about three 0:05:26.880 --> 0:05:33.320 times as many, to eleven million. Border patrol enforcement also 0:05:33.360 --> 0:05:37.360 went way up. The government spent close to a billion 0:05:37.440 --> 0:05:40.520 dollars on immigration enforcement at the time of Orca's passing 0:05:40.560 --> 0:05:45.600 in six By two thousand and twelve it ballooned up 0:05:45.640 --> 0:05:50.720 to twelve billion. That's the thing about history, It isn't 0:05:50.720 --> 0:05:56.840 always about triumph. And after Urka, immigration policy completely changed 0:05:57.440 --> 0:06:04.000 and not for the better. Out of the shadows. Will 0:06:04.040 --> 0:06:15.960 be right back now back to the show to catch 0:06:16.000 --> 0:06:19.320 you up on the immigration policy that has happened since Urka. 0:06:20.080 --> 0:06:24.520 We brought along our resident historian and lead writer, Caesar Hernandez. 0:06:25.560 --> 0:06:29.200 After six there were a series of immigration policies, So 0:06:29.240 --> 0:06:30.920 I'm gonna go through a few of them to bring us, 0:06:31.160 --> 0:06:37.719 as Doc Brown would say, back to the future. Okay. 0:06:38.080 --> 0:06:41.440 So four years after Ka, George H. W. Bush built 0:06:41.520 --> 0:06:46.240 on it with the Immigration Act, allowing spouses and children 0:06:46.320 --> 0:06:49.840 of emnacy recipients to apply for permission to stay in 0:06:49.880 --> 0:06:53.520 the US and receive work permits. It increased the cap 0:06:53.560 --> 0:06:57.640 to seven thousand, and granted Temporary Protected Status a k 0:06:58.279 --> 0:07:02.599 TPS to immigrants fleeing violence from countries and armed conflicts 0:07:02.760 --> 0:07:06.680 and natural disasters. The takeaway here is that immigration was 0:07:06.680 --> 0:07:12.080 still bipartisan effort and passed in Congress by a majority, 0:07:12.640 --> 0:07:16.320 but three events in the nineties solidified anti immigration sentiments. 0:07:17.120 --> 0:07:19.360 The first was the bombing of the World Trade Center 0:07:19.800 --> 0:07:25.040 in The domestic terrorist attack was traced to Islamic fundamentalists 0:07:25.040 --> 0:07:28.560 as a backlash to American foreign policy and involvement in 0:07:28.600 --> 0:07:31.680 the Middle East. A number of innocent people lost their lives, 0:07:31.760 --> 0:07:34.320 hundreds were injured, and thousands were struck with fear in 0:07:34.360 --> 0:07:37.600 their hearts when an explosion rock debasement of the World 0:07:37.640 --> 0:07:41.800 Trade Center. A year after that, Prop one seven in 0:07:41.800 --> 0:07:46.320 California pass a piece of anti immigration legislation that tried 0:07:46.360 --> 0:07:50.960 to limit undocumented folks is access to social services like 0:07:51.080 --> 0:07:55.440 public education and healthcare. Governor Pete Wilson ran on a 0:07:55.480 --> 0:08:00.440 reelection platform of anti immigration and one they keep coming 0:08:00.720 --> 0:08:04.800 two million illegal immigrants in California. The federal government won't 0:08:04.840 --> 0:08:07.480 stop them at the border, yet requires us to pay 0:08:07.560 --> 0:08:12.120 billions to take care of them. Though these sentiments wouldn't 0:08:12.160 --> 0:08:16.880 last very long. The courts ruled it unconstitutional. It heightened 0:08:16.880 --> 0:08:24.160 tensions and made immigration policy even more contentious. Then the 0:08:24.200 --> 0:08:29.360 Oklahoma City bombing happened. The bombing in Oklahoma City was 0:08:29.400 --> 0:08:36.040 an attack on innocent children and defenseless citizens. It was 0:08:36.080 --> 0:08:42.880 an act of cowardice, and it was evil. The United 0:08:42.920 --> 0:08:47.640 States will not tolerate it, and I will not allow 0:08:47.720 --> 0:08:52.240 the people of this country to be intimidated by evil cowards. 0:08:53.040 --> 0:08:57.640 According to the Valie Times, these two attacks happening only 0:08:57.679 --> 0:09:01.920 a few years apart, quote heightened concerns about the nation's 0:09:02.000 --> 0:09:08.079 vulnerability two enemies here and abroad. All of that served 0:09:08.080 --> 0:09:13.800 as the context for passing Immigration Act. One of the 0:09:13.880 --> 0:09:18.960 consequences of IRKA was this backlash against immigration and immigrants. 0:09:19.440 --> 0:09:24.000 That's immigration and tension lawyer Arrifer Rasa. So you see 0:09:24.040 --> 0:09:30.400 this xenophobic and sometimes racist backlash towards immigrant communities, which 0:09:30.520 --> 0:09:35.600 ultimately lead to more restrictionist policies within immigration. So you know, 0:09:36.080 --> 0:09:39.280 ten years later from IRKA being passed, you have an 0:09:39.280 --> 0:09:44.599 Immigration Act of which basically expanded who could be detained, 0:09:44.600 --> 0:09:50.320 so mandatory detention, and expanded what constituted deportable crimes. So 0:09:50.760 --> 0:09:54.120 all that is to say, IRKA was great in the 0:09:54.160 --> 0:09:59.560 sense that it provided legalization, but it created this cultural 0:09:59.600 --> 0:10:04.960 back ash. By the dawn of the twenty one century, 0:10:06.000 --> 0:10:12.520 terrorism had replaced communism as America's national anxiety fever dream, 0:10:12.559 --> 0:10:15.640 and in many people's eyes, the line between immigrants and 0:10:15.840 --> 0:10:21.000 terrorists was blurry and basically defined by skin color. After 0:10:21.080 --> 0:10:24.760 nine eleven, two acts passed in two thousand two, one 0:10:24.840 --> 0:10:29.680 that increased border security budgets, staff, and power, and the 0:10:29.760 --> 0:10:33.880 Homeland Security Act which created the powerful, multi pronged Department 0:10:33.880 --> 0:10:37.880 of Homeland Security. In two thousand six, Congress passed the 0:10:37.920 --> 0:10:42.440 Secure Fence Act, which, as a name states expanded existing 0:10:42.480 --> 0:10:48.760 border walls, fences, and surveillance sound familiar. Listed together, these 0:10:48.760 --> 0:10:52.720 policies read like the Greatest Hits album three decades a 0:10:52.760 --> 0:10:59.880 whole generation's worth of congressional immigration policies. The umbrella of 0:11:00.120 --> 0:11:05.079 anti terror put a big damper on seeing immigrants with humanity. 0:11:05.320 --> 0:11:08.000 I believe a lot of that has been fueled by 0:11:08.040 --> 0:11:12.160 the politics of race um so that as the country's 0:11:12.280 --> 0:11:18.079 demography has changed UH, people on the anti immigrants side 0:11:18.120 --> 0:11:23.360 of the spectrum have become even um more hardened in 0:11:23.400 --> 0:11:27.160 their views. That's Charles Kamasaki, who wrote a book about 0:11:27.280 --> 0:11:31.200 URKA called Immigration Reform The Corps that Will Not Die. 0:11:31.600 --> 0:11:35.520 There were pro immigrants Democrats and anti immigrant Democrats, and 0:11:35.559 --> 0:11:40.960 pro immigrant Republicans and anti immigrant Republicans. That's largely gone. 0:11:41.600 --> 0:11:45.440 From that point on, immigration remained of partisan issue, and 0:11:45.480 --> 0:11:49.720 reforms reached a congressional stalemate. Even when things started to move, 0:11:50.280 --> 0:11:54.280 they moved slowly and are basically dead on arrival, and 0:11:54.360 --> 0:11:58.480 Kamasaki says a lot of that is by design. This 0:11:58.600 --> 0:12:02.240 really began in the gang At era, where instead of 0:12:03.280 --> 0:12:06.319 letting committees kind of work out what their bills would 0:12:06.320 --> 0:12:09.720 be like increasingly in the Gingrich era and under every 0:12:09.720 --> 0:12:12.160 speaker of the House since, and the same as happened 0:12:12.160 --> 0:12:16.400 on the Senate side, decisions increasingly were made by the 0:12:16.520 --> 0:12:21.840 leadership in both houses. No congressional legislation on immigration has 0:12:21.840 --> 0:12:27.240 made it through since, only executive orders offering temporary solutions 0:12:27.760 --> 0:12:30.840 and further division on the issue. Had a chance to 0:12:30.880 --> 0:12:34.160 talk to these six young people, or the young dreamers 0:12:34.200 --> 0:12:39.200 all across the country who wouldn't find it in their 0:12:39.200 --> 0:12:44.520 heart to say, these kids are American, dislike us, and 0:12:45.520 --> 0:12:48.839 they belong here, and we want to do right by them, 0:12:49.120 --> 0:12:53.240 and so often in this immigration debate it's an abstraction. 0:12:54.440 --> 0:12:58.079 In two thousand twelve, Obama issues an executive order known 0:12:58.200 --> 0:13:01.800 as DHAKA, or that the Eard Action for Childhood Arrivals, 0:13:02.440 --> 0:13:06.880 that differs deportation and gave temporary work permits to undocumented 0:13:06.880 --> 0:13:10.880 immigrants who were here since two thousand seven. He expanded 0:13:10.920 --> 0:13:14.320 that order with DAPPA, which extended those protections to the 0:13:14.360 --> 0:13:18.280 parents of naturalized immigrants or permanent residents. For me, DOCTA 0:13:18.480 --> 0:13:21.120 is it was a temporary effects. It was not resolving 0:13:21.160 --> 0:13:25.720 the issue. Messilea Verta was one of those doctor recipients 0:13:25.760 --> 0:13:27.840 which is bigger than that, which is like a path 0:13:28.280 --> 0:13:31.960 to citizenship, to humanization, to shoot our people like human beings, 0:13:32.000 --> 0:13:35.160 because every two years we have to justify who we are. 0:13:35.280 --> 0:13:37.880 And I think myself as a present, I am bigger 0:13:37.880 --> 0:13:40.280 than a piece of paper, a piece of plastic. Growing 0:13:40.360 --> 0:13:44.840 up undocumented created an identity crisis for Messy, So I 0:13:44.880 --> 0:13:49.920 think for a minute, I forgot of what my identity was. 0:13:50.480 --> 0:13:53.000 As as when you come to the US, there's this 0:13:53.120 --> 0:13:56.120 idea of like you need to assimilate. You won't need 0:13:56.160 --> 0:13:59.120 to speak English, you need to be surrounded by this 0:13:59.320 --> 0:14:01.480 certain type of folks so you can get better access 0:14:01.559 --> 0:14:05.679 to certain things. Right, I lost who I was when 0:14:05.720 --> 0:14:08.199 I was a child and a teenager. The worst of 0:14:08.280 --> 0:14:11.240 it came when he went to college and joined the 0:14:11.320 --> 0:14:14.079 tennis team. But once I got to college, I experienced 0:14:14.120 --> 0:14:18.439 something that I thought I never experienced, which was my 0:14:18.720 --> 0:14:22.920 tennis coach questioning my status for being land Next, I 0:14:23.120 --> 0:14:24.800 was like, why are you questioning who I am? Right? 0:14:25.640 --> 0:14:28.600 And he started questioning a lot of students and we 0:14:28.680 --> 0:14:31.760 were very, very scared and not leave me to get very, 0:14:31.880 --> 0:14:35.240 very involved with the movement and realize who I am 0:14:35.320 --> 0:14:37.560 as I'm talking a bit a bit, and do join today. 0:14:38.280 --> 0:14:41.400 My saye works with doctor students and reminds them of 0:14:41.480 --> 0:14:46.000 their humanity every day, and I think myself as a president, 0:14:46.000 --> 0:14:47.680 I am bigger than a piece of paper, a piece 0:14:47.680 --> 0:14:50.120 of plastic, and that's what I remind my students every 0:14:50.160 --> 0:14:57.040 single day. The irony surrounding Doctor is that Obama's praise 0:14:57.120 --> 0:15:01.760 for the executive order, but his administration was notorious for deportation. 0:15:02.400 --> 0:15:06.360 Here's Professor Regina Langott from UC Santa Cruz. It's important 0:15:06.400 --> 0:15:09.280 that we remember that Obama deported more people from the 0:15:09.400 --> 0:15:13.080 interior of the US than anyone before him. Even as 0:15:13.120 --> 0:15:15.480 we are a nation of immigrants, were also a nation 0:15:15.520 --> 0:15:20.400 of laws. Undocumented workers broke our immigration laws, and I 0:15:20.480 --> 0:15:23.960 believe that they must be held accountable, especially those who 0:15:24.040 --> 0:15:27.400 may be dangerous. Do you hear that? Right there? Obama 0:15:27.520 --> 0:15:31.800 was following in a line of presidents, almost echoing verbatim. 0:15:32.520 --> 0:15:35.360 We are a nation of immigrants, but we are also 0:15:35.480 --> 0:15:39.200 a nation of laws. We're a nation of laws, and 0:15:39.320 --> 0:15:43.480 we must enforce our laws. We're also a nation of immigrants. 0:15:44.160 --> 0:15:47.840 So even though immigration was increasingly partisan, the talking points 0:15:47.880 --> 0:15:51.040 and policies started to bleed into each other. But there 0:15:51.120 --> 0:15:55.680 was one motherfucker who was particularly evil. When Mexico sends 0:15:55.720 --> 0:16:01.040 his people, they're not sending you is kidding. We're not 0:16:01.080 --> 0:16:05.280 going to play that stupid as food on here. The 0:16:05.360 --> 0:16:08.720 man ran on a platform of anti immigration and racism, 0:16:09.360 --> 0:16:13.000 demonizing most non white people, and promising a law if 0:16:13.040 --> 0:16:16.920 he was elected. The Trump administration worked to undue the 0:16:17.000 --> 0:16:21.280 progress of Urica and previous policies. Early in his tenure, 0:16:21.640 --> 0:16:25.040 he tried to ban Muslims from entering the country, regressing 0:16:25.120 --> 0:16:28.160 to the era of is homophobia reminiscent of the days 0:16:28.320 --> 0:16:34.080 after not eleven. But one of his most notorious immigration 0:16:34.120 --> 0:16:39.920 policies was zero tolerance at the borders. As early as seventeen, 0:16:40.440 --> 0:16:44.120 there are reports that Trump administration officials were separating young 0:16:44.240 --> 0:16:48.960 children from their families. The following year, kids were putting 0:16:49.040 --> 0:16:53.520 shelters where they were putting metal cages. Many of those 0:16:53.640 --> 0:16:58.920 children came from Central America. In the following years, reports 0:16:58.960 --> 0:17:03.400 from media outlets estimate that over five thousand families were 0:17:03.560 --> 0:17:10.400 ripped apart. Fast forward, the Biden administration started a task 0:17:10.480 --> 0:17:15.200 force addressing immigration issues. After Trump's presidency, They've worked to 0:17:15.240 --> 0:17:18.240 reunite some of the families, but there's still thousands who 0:17:18.320 --> 0:17:22.200 have yet to be That doesn't even get into the 0:17:22.240 --> 0:17:30.720 psychological scars and physical trauma these kids endured. Earlier this year, 0:17:31.000 --> 0:17:34.400 the National Immigrant Justice Center reported that families are still 0:17:34.520 --> 0:17:39.000 being separated and their claims for financial restitution are being dismissed. 0:17:39.920 --> 0:17:42.040 This is what Professor Langott has to say on the 0:17:42.080 --> 0:17:46.639 subject forced family separation and deportation. That's the context that 0:17:46.760 --> 0:17:49.280 we're looking under and that we need to to hold 0:17:49.320 --> 0:17:53.280 on to and remember. So in terms of the families, 0:17:53.680 --> 0:17:56.639 we know that when people are deported from the interior 0:17:56.960 --> 0:18:00.639 of the US, it's mostly men who are deported, and 0:18:01.320 --> 0:18:06.960 that this has pretty negative effects on children, be those physical, psychological, 0:18:07.320 --> 0:18:12.560 or academic. So we're back to the future. Thanks for 0:18:12.640 --> 0:18:16.119 breaking that down for a caesar. After the break, I'm 0:18:16.160 --> 0:18:17.840 going to talk to one of the few people in 0:18:17.920 --> 0:18:21.879 this country with the same kind of power former Senator 0:18:22.080 --> 0:18:25.080 Alan Ka Simpson had when he helped get Erica passed 0:18:25.160 --> 0:18:30.360 in I'm gonna ask current United States Senator Alex Baia, 0:18:30.960 --> 0:18:33.200 who's been fighting in one way or another to get 0:18:33.280 --> 0:18:38.240 comprehensive immigration reform passed his entire career. Where we are today, 0:18:42.400 --> 0:18:51.080 out of the shadows, will be right back now, back 0:18:51.160 --> 0:18:55.400 to the show. Alright, alright, can you hear me? Okay? 0:18:55.800 --> 0:19:01.360 You do look like that's me talking to another son 0:19:01.440 --> 0:19:05.160 of immigrants, another Mexican American l a kid who grew 0:19:05.280 --> 0:19:08.439 up taking full advantage of his parents obtaining green cards 0:19:08.920 --> 0:19:11.760 to build a better life, not just for himself and 0:19:11.880 --> 0:19:15.720 his family, but for many others in this country. Senator 0:19:15.760 --> 0:19:19.040 Alex Babia and I spoke over Zoom on the tenure 0:19:19.080 --> 0:19:23.000 anniversary of daca's passage and just a few days after 0:19:23.080 --> 0:19:26.919 California voters sent him to a full term in the U. S. Senate, 0:19:27.840 --> 0:19:30.040 And the very first bill I introduced that I chose 0:19:30.080 --> 0:19:34.639 to introduce was my Citizenship for Essential Workers Act. Like 0:19:34.760 --> 0:19:39.280 I've been a vocal advocate for immigration reform protections for 0:19:39.440 --> 0:19:43.159 dreamers and farm workers and others for many years, so 0:19:43.280 --> 0:19:45.320 I was very cognizant that I wasn't the first to 0:19:45.400 --> 0:19:49.440 introduce an immigration reform built in recent years. Been part 0:19:49.520 --> 0:19:51.960 of advocating for some of the more comprehensive bills that 0:19:52.000 --> 0:19:54.920 had passed in recent years. One House or the other, 0:19:55.040 --> 0:19:58.119 but not quite making it to the President's desk. And 0:19:58.240 --> 0:19:59.840 so when I came in and figured, how can I 0:20:00.200 --> 0:20:02.960 to this conversation and to the strategy, And I was 0:20:03.040 --> 0:20:06.200 inspired frankly by the experience we've all had through the 0:20:06.320 --> 0:20:10.240 COVID nineteen pandemic. You know, it was a tough, brutal 0:20:10.800 --> 0:20:13.720 couple of years and it's still lingering. We saw the 0:20:13.760 --> 0:20:16.920 early days of the pandemic, with the case rates and 0:20:17.040 --> 0:20:22.159 the deaths frankly disproportionately impacting communities of color and immigrant communities, 0:20:22.720 --> 0:20:25.960 frontline workers, people without the option of zooming it in 0:20:26.080 --> 0:20:28.560 from home right, people who work in the fields, people 0:20:28.600 --> 0:20:31.159 who work in meat processing plants, people who work in 0:20:31.560 --> 0:20:35.760 construction and transportation, and obviously in the healthcare industry. And 0:20:35.920 --> 0:20:41.720 to learn that more than five million federally recognized essential 0:20:41.920 --> 0:20:46.040 workers are not just immigrants, they're undocumented immigrants. And to 0:20:46.760 --> 0:20:50.520 watch how they sacrifice and expose themselves, risk their health, 0:20:50.600 --> 0:20:53.040 out of their families to try to protect the rest 0:20:53.080 --> 0:20:55.879 of us and keep the economy moving. I mean, in 0:20:56.000 --> 0:20:59.080 my opinion, they earned a pathway that citizenship long before 0:20:59.480 --> 0:21:04.760 the COVID nineteen pandemic, but especially during the pandemic. They've 0:21:04.840 --> 0:21:06.840 earned it, and that's what my bills ought to do. 0:21:07.359 --> 0:21:11.200 Recognize them as one big group and legalize their status 0:21:11.440 --> 0:21:14.280 and put them on the pathway to citizenship because they 0:21:14.320 --> 0:21:17.440 have absolutely earned it. Well, what is the status of 0:21:17.520 --> 0:21:20.280 that bill now? So the status of the bill is uh, 0:21:20.640 --> 0:21:22.960 you know, we're still stuck in the In the Senate, 0:21:24.320 --> 0:21:28.040 the House of Representatives has passed a number of immigration 0:21:28.280 --> 0:21:32.159 reform bills, sort of piecemeal Dreamers and Promise Acts, so 0:21:32.280 --> 0:21:36.240 that addresses DOCTA, other dreamers and TPS holders. Uh, there's 0:21:36.280 --> 0:21:39.640 a separate form Workforce Modernization Act that's also been acted upon. 0:21:40.600 --> 0:21:43.680 But we're trying to grind through the reality of the 0:21:43.760 --> 0:21:46.480 United States Senate. But we're also dealing with literally a 0:21:46.600 --> 0:21:50.200 fifty fifty split Senate, so doing anything is hard right now. 0:21:50.600 --> 0:21:52.520 It's been a good chunk of it last year trying 0:21:52.520 --> 0:21:55.960 to find common ground or trying to convince frankly, a 0:21:56.040 --> 0:21:58.560 lot of my Republican colleagues, because we don't just need 0:21:58.640 --> 0:22:01.520 fifty one votes, we need six votes to get things 0:22:01.600 --> 0:22:03.920 done in the Senate. You know, earlier this year we 0:22:04.000 --> 0:22:06.960 started reaching back out, not just by myself, with my 0:22:07.040 --> 0:22:10.760 colleagues in the Senate Center, Menendez Center, Cortes, Masto, Louhan, 0:22:10.840 --> 0:22:14.200 and others to implore the White House President Biden to 0:22:14.320 --> 0:22:18.199 use his executive authorities to maybe strengthen docuted, even expand 0:22:18.280 --> 0:22:21.520 DOCTA protections among other things. That's expand the number of 0:22:21.600 --> 0:22:26.120 countries that can benefit from TPS protections, etcetera. And we're 0:22:26.160 --> 0:22:29.400 still pushing them, but more recently, I'm not saying it's 0:22:29.400 --> 0:22:32.119 going to be easy, but I've have renewed hope in 0:22:32.880 --> 0:22:36.040 the lettuce d of process. You know, among the committees 0:22:36.080 --> 0:22:39.720 I sit on is the Judiciary Committee, and I chair 0:22:40.080 --> 0:22:43.680 the Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration, and we had a hearing 0:22:43.720 --> 0:22:47.760 a couple of months ago on a specific category of 0:22:48.400 --> 0:22:52.639 documented dreamers. And in this hearing, I started hearing from 0:22:52.680 --> 0:22:54.879 my Republican colleagues, well, this is a no brainer. We 0:22:55.000 --> 0:22:57.040 got to fix this. We should be able to agree 0:22:57.080 --> 0:22:59.320 to that. And so that sort of reopened the door 0:22:59.400 --> 0:23:03.600 to conversation Asians and negotiations about some of these will 0:23:03.680 --> 0:23:08.920 OVERDOE UH provisions to update and modernize our I innovation 0:23:09.040 --> 0:23:12.320 laws they keep wanting pointing back to. But President has 0:23:12.320 --> 0:23:14.720 to get the border under control first. So you know, 0:23:14.880 --> 0:23:17.959 it's used as a text way too often as an 0:23:18.000 --> 0:23:20.240 excuse to to not get to yes. But we're trying 0:23:20.240 --> 0:23:22.359 to work through it. Well, what do you what do 0:23:22.440 --> 0:23:28.760 you think is like the the ideal scenario, Like what 0:23:29.040 --> 0:23:34.200 what would be the best outcome for the country and 0:23:34.320 --> 0:23:38.400 also for the dreamers, for the doctor recipients, for TPS recipients. 0:23:38.400 --> 0:23:40.720 I mean, there's just so many subcategories at this point 0:23:40.800 --> 0:23:42.520 that it's it's hard to really to keep track of. 0:23:42.680 --> 0:23:46.359 But I'm wondering, like as a as a person who's 0:23:46.560 --> 0:23:50.280 who's fought for this for so long, and a person 0:23:50.440 --> 0:23:53.480 who is, you know, writing the laws of this country, Like, 0:23:53.800 --> 0:23:57.399 what is the the ideal scenario that you would hope for? 0:23:58.400 --> 0:24:00.560 This is personal for me, right, I'm a proud son 0:24:00.640 --> 0:24:03.840 of immigrants from Mexico. My father came from the state 0:24:03.880 --> 0:24:06.760 of Jalisco. My mom came from the state of Chihuahua. 0:24:06.800 --> 0:24:09.600 In the nineteen sixties, they met, they fell in love, 0:24:09.960 --> 0:24:12.400 they decided to get married, and they applied for green 0:24:12.440 --> 0:24:15.159 cards in that order, and uh, you know, we were 0:24:15.240 --> 0:24:17.280 one of the lucky ones. Back then. It wasn't as 0:24:17.480 --> 0:24:21.000 uh as as random luck of the draw as it 0:24:21.160 --> 0:24:23.200 is today. You know, at a later and as we 0:24:23.320 --> 0:24:26.040 say in Spanish. They settled into the San Fernando Valley 0:24:26.440 --> 0:24:28.920 and started a family, and I have an older sister 0:24:29.000 --> 0:24:31.880 and a younger brother. And for my parents, who worked 0:24:31.920 --> 0:24:35.280 hard to provide us better opportunity, right, they didn't get 0:24:35.280 --> 0:24:38.240 a really a chance to get a good education in Mexico. 0:24:38.320 --> 0:24:40.520 They didn't. They just didn't have that chance. My dad 0:24:40.600 --> 0:24:43.320 worked for forty years as a short order cook, clipped 0:24:43.320 --> 0:24:45.160 a lot of pancakes and scrambled a lot of eggs 0:24:45.200 --> 0:24:47.480 in his life. Uh And at the same forty years 0:24:47.520 --> 0:24:50.920 my mom were cleaning houses. So because of their experience, 0:24:51.520 --> 0:24:53.760 they insisted that my brother and my sister and I 0:24:53.920 --> 0:24:56.639 do well in school and get a college education. So 0:24:57.160 --> 0:24:59.840 I know how blessed importunate I am. I believe every 0:25:00.240 --> 0:25:03.840 hard working family, immigrant family in pursuit of their American 0:25:03.920 --> 0:25:06.720 dream deserves the same chance. So that's why I'm finding 0:25:06.800 --> 0:25:09.119 so hard, you know, to answer your question, what's the 0:25:09.240 --> 0:25:12.080 ideal way forward? Will they deal way forward to this 0:25:12.240 --> 0:25:16.320 comprehensive reform that we know that we need. It's been 0:25:16.359 --> 0:25:19.840 passed recently in Congress, you know, as recently as two 0:25:19.840 --> 0:25:22.679 an thirteen, the United States passed on an overwhelming by 0:25:22.720 --> 0:25:26.440 partisan vote at the time, the House of Representatives didn't 0:25:26.440 --> 0:25:28.679 take it up. There's been other measures that have passed 0:25:28.680 --> 0:25:30.240 the House but have been tougher to pass in the 0:25:30.359 --> 0:25:34.320 Senate as the majority swings from Republican to Democrat. I mean, 0:25:34.400 --> 0:25:38.600 and and sadly, what's the consequences. Millions of young people, 0:25:39.440 --> 0:25:42.400 millions and millions of families across the country are left 0:25:42.440 --> 0:25:44.359 in this limbo. And and it's not just like the 0:25:44.520 --> 0:25:49.640 moral imperative. Uh, you know, every economist, every business leader 0:25:50.040 --> 0:25:54.240 is saying that we have work force shortage in America today. Well, surprise, 0:25:54.280 --> 0:25:58.080 surprise you. Immigration is way down because of the prior administration. 0:25:58.160 --> 0:26:00.520 Now we're not doing much to help. You know, people 0:26:00.560 --> 0:26:03.080 who are here working, pay taxes, you know, come out 0:26:03.080 --> 0:26:05.840 of the shadows to do a legalized status. So we're 0:26:05.840 --> 0:26:08.920 doing it to ourselves. So trying to make the case 0:26:09.000 --> 0:26:11.600 to my Republican colleagues to do the right thing by 0:26:11.720 --> 0:26:15.000 policy and the economy, you know, even if your your 0:26:15.040 --> 0:26:19.080 your moral heartstrings aren't convincing you. And so the other 0:26:19.119 --> 0:26:21.879 option is what can we negotiate at least some piecemeal 0:26:22.320 --> 0:26:26.760 wins here. I think we can't be smarter about you know, 0:26:26.880 --> 0:26:31.000 border safety I think we do need to certainly modernize 0:26:31.040 --> 0:26:35.480 our asylum seeking process. I remind everybody it's people coming 0:26:35.520 --> 0:26:38.600 to the southern border, individuals or whole families seeking asylum 0:26:38.640 --> 0:26:41.840 in the United States. That is a legal right based 0:26:41.920 --> 0:26:45.320 on our federal law and international law. But it needs 0:26:45.359 --> 0:26:47.000 to be better. It needs to be more efficient, needs 0:26:47.000 --> 0:26:50.959 to be more humane. Um. And but we can't let 0:26:51.080 --> 0:26:53.280 that hold the stuff from doing right by the millions 0:26:53.320 --> 0:26:55.359 and millions of immigrants that have been here for years 0:26:56.080 --> 0:26:59.520 helping make our country strong. I mean, sometimes, you know, 0:26:59.600 --> 0:27:01.040 we talked a lot of people. Some of them feel 0:27:01.119 --> 0:27:04.119