Speaker 1: Most people think that the origins of President Obama's twenty
Speaker 1: twelve executive ordered DACA, or the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals,
Speaker 1: started with the Dream Act and the Dreamer, and it did.
Speaker 1: But in many ways, the seeds for DACA were planted
Speaker 1: way back. Picture this. It's nineteen seventy two and there's
Speaker 1: this guy, let's call him John, nervously walking down the
Speaker 1: streets of New York with this lady and they each
Speaker 1: got one eye over their shoulders, hair annoid. See. John's
Speaker 1: in trouble. He's got a big mouth, a drug possession charge,
Speaker 1: and normally it would be okay, especially in nineteen seventy two,
Speaker 1: for a white dude to run his mouth and smoke
Speaker 1: a little weed. But this saint no ordinary white dude.
Speaker 1: John's an immigrant with no legal status, and he's afraid
Speaker 1: that the nineteen seventy two equivalent of ICE is going
Speaker 1: to scoop him up and deport him. John and his
Speaker 1: lady get to their destination and knock on the door.
Speaker 1: They're a few minutes late and it's locked, so John
Speaker 1: knocks again, louder, looking over his shoulder one more time
Speaker 1: as the door opened. Finally, this big shot immigration lawyer
Speaker 1: is upset that John is late. Take it easy, man,
Speaker 1: I'm under enough pressure as it is. The lawyer, a
Speaker 1: guy named Leon Wilde, apologizes. They don't know it yet,
Speaker 1: but these two white dudes are about to get into
Speaker 1: a big fight with the US government that will change
Speaker 1: the course of history for a bunch of black, brown
Speaker 1: immigrants decades later, because Leon and John are gonna fight
Speaker 1: for John's right to stay in this country using deferred action,
Speaker 1: just like the Daka kids, the precedent that probably paved
Speaker 1: the way for Obama's executive action to save the Dreamers
Speaker 1: from deportation. And there's something oddly poetic about that, because
Speaker 1: maybe you've never heard of Leon Wilds, John's lawyer, but
Speaker 1: you've probably heard of John.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: You may say that I'm a dreamer, but I'm not
Speaker 1: the only one. Yeah that John, as in the Beatles,
Speaker 1: John Lennon, that fool was a dreamer in more ways
Speaker 1: than his often quoted lyrics on imagine would lead us
Speaker 1: to believe. John Lennon and his lawyer, Leon fought hard
Speaker 1: in the courts and won using a secret program Leon
Speaker 1: found called prosecutorial discretion, which basically says that immigration officials
Speaker 1: could prioritize certain cases. John Lennon's deportation was paused indefinitely,
Speaker 1: and that case became the basis for DACA. But as
Speaker 1: inspiring as that story is, this is in John Lennon's story.
Speaker 1: John Lennon uses fame and fortune to hire lawyers to
Speaker 1: beat the system. The undocumented immigrant dreamers from my generation
Speaker 1: had to become lawyers and publicists and pr agencies themselves
Speaker 1: to fight the system. And not just lawyers, but undocumented lawyers,
Speaker 1: fighting the very system that's trying to kill their dreams
Speaker 1: and deport them from the only home they know. Two
Speaker 1: lawyers in particular played a pivotal role in daca's formation
Speaker 1: and survival. Being an undocumented lawyer gave them intimate knowledge
Speaker 1: to help and serve their clients. They knew how to
Speaker 1: help those who were to because they themselves were once detained.
Speaker 1: These two and the larger collective of undocumented folk fought
Speaker 1: and are fighting still so that the generation after them
Speaker 1: doesn't inherit their struggle. They do well Lenin didn't with
Speaker 1: all his millions in fame. They fight collectively so that
Speaker 1: even someone more famous than Jesus won't be deported. This
Speaker 1: is their story I America, Lindo.
Speaker 2: And dom Patti Rodriguez. This is Out of the Shadows,
Speaker 2: a podcast about America's tangled history of immigration. Last season,
Speaker 2: we tackled Ronald Reagan's nineteen eighty six Amnesty Act. This season,
Speaker 2: we're tracing the origins of DACA, or Deferred Action for
Speaker 2: Childhood Arrivals, a contentious executive order to protect undocumentedy young
Speaker 2: people from being.
Speaker 1: Deported issued by former President Obama in twenty twelve. DACA
Speaker 1: was meant to be a temporary stop gap on a
Speaker 1: broken immigration system.
Speaker 2: It was like.
Speaker 1: Putting a bucket under a leaky roof. But with multiple
Speaker 1: Supreme Court challenges and looming presidential elections, the root feels
Speaker 1: like it can collapse at any moment, impacting the US economy,
Speaker 1: American culture as we know it. Meanwhile, the future of
Speaker 1: millions of lives hang in the balance.
Speaker 2: Welcome to Out of the Shadows Dreamers. Hi, Eric, Hey,
Speaker 2: I haven't seen you since yesterday. We're back.
Speaker 1: That's right.
Speaker 2: Hello everyone. This is season two of Out of the Shadows,
Speaker 2: and as you know, season one we talked about the
Speaker 2: children of eighty six, our families, our parents who in
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty six, received amnesty after President Ronald Reagan signed
Speaker 2: a bill that allowed us to come out of the Shadows,
Speaker 2: giving hope and opportunity to millions of our parents, millennials us,
Speaker 2: giving us the opportunity to go after our dreams, raise
Speaker 2: families without fear of deportation that for many years our
Speaker 2: parents carried. And that's quite a privilege, absolutely, and that
Speaker 2: is why we're here today to do season two of
Speaker 2: Out of the Shadows. Because the immigration system was not
Speaker 2: fixed in nineteen eighty six, there's still so much to
Speaker 2: be done. For years, families have escaped war, poverty, violence,
Speaker 2: and many times traveling with their children. And those children
Speaker 2: are now adults who have made this country home, just
Speaker 2: like you and I living in limbo in this country.
Speaker 2: And for the last twenty years, they've been fighting to
Speaker 2: stay in discuss try as they should because this is
Speaker 2: their home. And for those listening, we know them as dreamers,
Speaker 2: and we're here to tell their story.
Speaker 1: Yes, the dreamers DACA. If you don't know what DOCA is,
Speaker 1: it's basically a piece of paper that allows you to
Speaker 1: work and if you are a model citizen, they won't
Speaker 1: deport you. But you're still undocumented. It's a very weird
Speaker 1: in between ambivalent status that is constantly at risk of
Speaker 1: going away and.
Speaker 2: Eric, we've talked about the survivor's guilt. Maybe that's the
Speaker 2: right word. If that pen hadn't touched that paper in
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty six, we would still more than likely be
Speaker 2: living in the shadows. But that wasn't our fate. We're
Speaker 2: both aware that this immigration system is still very much broken,
Speaker 2: and we have a responsibility to give our community. I
Speaker 2: don't want to say the voiceless, because we're not voiceless,
Speaker 2: give our community the platform to share their stories and
Speaker 2: to understand that while there's more to us than immigration,
Speaker 2: immigration is very much part of our community and we
Speaker 2: can't ignore it because there's millions of undocumented individuals in
Speaker 2: this country that make this country so beautiful. Yet they
Speaker 2: don't have the privileges that you and I have because
Speaker 2: of a freaking piece of paper.
Speaker 1: Yes, that is correct, I agree one hundred percent. You know,
Speaker 1: last season, those stories were told by the people that
Speaker 1: lived them, and I think it's important for the story
Speaker 1: of Daca to be told by the people that live them,
Speaker 1: and so that's what we're going to do this season.
Speaker 1: We're going to tell the history of DACA as it's
Speaker 1: unfolded and it continues to unfold, because, like I said,
Speaker 1: it's a moving target. So we're going to tell that
Speaker 1: history on this season. You ready, I'm ready, and go ahead,
Speaker 1: let's go.
Speaker 2: In twenty twelve, President Obama issued the DOCA Executive Order,
Speaker 2: changing the lives, at least for now, of close to
Speaker 2: one million young undocumented individuals. It granted a two year
Speaker 2: protection from deportation and a work permit. And while DOCA
Speaker 2: has its flaws, which we'll definitely get into, it has
Speaker 2: been around for over a decade. It has transformed millions
Speaker 2: of people's lives. DOCTA recipients are our neighbors, your doctors,
Speaker 2: your classmates, your co workers, your children's teachers, your lawyers. Currently,
Speaker 2: DOCA is in very serious jeopardy. That's immigration lawyer Luis
Speaker 2: Cortez Romero. I think the realistic probability is that the
Speaker 2: doc is going to be oversea. Louise knows a lot
Speaker 2: about DOCCA, since he's one of the people fighting to
Speaker 2: save it again. See, over the course of its life
Speaker 2: has been killed and brought back to life. And he's right,
Speaker 2: DOCA is in constant danger. There are a bunch of
Speaker 2: states suing the government to end it. Like right now
Speaker 2: as we're recording this podcast, DOACA could end at any
Speaker 2: minute because DOCA is not really in action. It's a pause,
Speaker 2: and pauses usually get on paused. But in the decade
Speaker 2: that DOCA has paused deportation for countless dreamers, they've become
Speaker 2: an integral part of our communities, our economies, and our
Speaker 2: very way of life. In other words, DOACA is a
Speaker 2: pause that's kind of too big to fail.
Speaker 1: In some ways, DOCA is a direct result of the
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty six amnesty bill known as ERCA that we
Speaker 1: covered in Season one of Out of the Shadows. But
Speaker 1: that was a story about a bill that would not die.
Speaker 1: The story of DACA is about a generation of dreamers
Speaker 1: that refuse to be ignored, people who refused to hide
Speaker 1: in the shadows and fought a very public fight to
Speaker 1: be recognized. But it's also because of a path opened
Speaker 1: up by the nineteen eighty six law that gave our
Speaker 1: parents a path toward a better life in the United States,
Speaker 1: a path that opened up the American promise of upward
Speaker 1: mobility to millions of immigrant families and that included a
Speaker 1: bunch of kids who wanted nothing more than to get
Speaker 1: a fair shot at an education. It's honestly hard to
Speaker 1: pinpoint the exact beginning of DACA, but there's a couple
Speaker 1: of places to start. One is the Dream Act, where
Speaker 1: education became the most visible way to see immigration and
Speaker 1: as unbelievable as it sounds. Another starting point is that
Speaker 1: John lennoncase, and we'll get into it after the break.
Speaker 1: Even though daca's story is in John Lennon's story, the
Speaker 1: case we told you about at the top of the
Speaker 1: show was influential in doca's creation as a law When my.
Speaker 3: Dad met with John and you have to get his
Speaker 3: book to believe this, and this is the liturgy in
Speaker 3: my family.
Speaker 1: That's Michael Wilds. His father is Leon Wilds, John Lennon's
Speaker 1: lawyer we told you about.
Speaker 3: He had no idea who John was. He came home
Speaker 3: to my mom. My mom said, who were the heavyweights
Speaker 3: he met with tonight? Leon, And he said, some actor
Speaker 3: or singer, Jack Lennon and his wife Yoko Moto. You
Speaker 3: have no idea how naive dad was.
Speaker 1: Leon may have not known who John Lennon was, but
Speaker 1: a lot of people did, including the president at the time,
Speaker 1: Richard Nixon.
Speaker 3: Lennon was placed in deportation proceedings by the Nixon administration.
Speaker 3: The reason for the urgency to remove him at the
Speaker 3: time was at nineteen seventy two, again, eighteen to twenty
Speaker 3: one year olds were first enabled to vote in national elections.
Speaker 3: Lennon was advocating that we get out of the Vietnam War,
Speaker 3: and a great number of young people were listening. John
Speaker 3: and Yoko were looking for a child that Yoko had
Speaker 3: that was absconded by a prior husband, and the Beatle
Speaker 3: wanted to live in the United States and exercise a
Speaker 3: prosecutoral discretion. Was discovered when my dad sued the government
Speaker 3: under the Freedom of Information Act and discovered this whole program.
Speaker 3: It was like an iceberg. Most of it had been
Speaker 3: hidden at the time.
Speaker 1: Basically, what that means is that immigration officials could decide
Speaker 1: whether or not to remove immigrants. Mike's father, Leon was ecstatic.
Speaker 3: My father used the word jubilation is now ninety when
Speaker 3: eighteen hundred and forty three such a proof. Cases of drugsters, mobsters, burglars,
Speaker 3: people who had done bad things were often led by
Speaker 3: immigration to the ions in those days as a discussionary
Speaker 3: tool to avoid removal for deportable aliens who had been
Speaker 3: who had some special humanitarian reasons for remaining.
Speaker 1: Michael believes that President Obama used that quote unquote Lenin
Speaker 1: doctrine half a century later, and there.
Speaker 3: Was a president forty five years later. It's now fifty
Speaker 3: years but then forty five years later, President Obama rested
Speaker 3: his hat on the hook that was placed by a
Speaker 3: dreamer and a scholar, by John Lennon and my father,
Speaker 3: Leon Wilds, because of that discovery in that case, there
Speaker 3: are about a million people in the United States that
Speaker 3: have the right to be here. You can say I'm
Speaker 3: a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. That's a
Speaker 3: famous stanza in the imagined song.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he truly wasn't the only one. Because maybe the
Speaker 1: Lenin case created the seeds for a deferred action plan
Speaker 1: that was able to grow and help propel the hopes
Speaker 1: of a bunch of undocumented kids who wanted to go
Speaker 1: to college. They were called the dreamers.
Speaker 2: But not everyone agrees that the Lenin story is where
Speaker 2: the story of Daka starts. Here's legendary journalist hor He ramos.
Speaker 4: I tend to see it separately. I mean, even though
Speaker 4: they have many influences, and we can spend hours and
Speaker 4: hours talking about the influences for the Dreamers, I wouldn't.
Speaker 2: Go back that far.
Speaker 4: I mean I would go back to twenty ten, to
Speaker 4: the walk that three Dreamers and another immigrant made from
Speaker 4: Miami to Washington, d C. I think that was incredibly important.
Speaker 2: Ramos is referring to what's known as the Trail of Dreams.
Speaker 2: Were Felippe Matos, Gai Pacheco, Carlos ro and Juandrodriguez, who
Speaker 2: were college students in Miami Dade County the fifteen hundred
Speaker 2: miles to Washington, d C. To raise awareness and support
Speaker 2: for the Dream Act.
Speaker 4: From my point of view, everything started with that walk,
Speaker 4: and then everything every single day. I still remember we
Speaker 4: were reporting about them and they were still here, and
Speaker 4: then the next day and they were still here, and
Speaker 4: they were getting closer to DC and they were still
Speaker 4: here and they were not deported. So actually they were,
Speaker 4: I believe, testing the system. They were testing the waters,
Speaker 4: they were testing the political system to see how far
Speaker 4: they were willing to go. And I think they found
Speaker 4: this new energy and new strategy that showed them that
Speaker 4: things could change, and they were absolutely right.
Speaker 2: Lizbeth Matteo came to the States when she was fourteen
Speaker 2: years old and had the hope of being an attorney
Speaker 2: one day.
Speaker 5: That was very naive, thinking that it would be easy
Speaker 5: because counting and they hear her a couple of years
Speaker 5: and go to school for a couple of years and
Speaker 5: then go back to all have that and continue my
Speaker 5: life and my dream will becoming an attorney.
Speaker 2: In many ways, Lizabeth's stream of being a lawyer is
Speaker 2: like everyone's stream of doing something big. A lot of
Speaker 2: her classmates wanted to be doctors and lawyers, but she
Speaker 2: wasn't like a lot of her classmates.
Speaker 5: And once I finish high school, the role was I'm
Speaker 5: going to go to college here.
Speaker 2: But dad dream seemed to vanish in an instant when
Speaker 2: she went to apply to universities.
Speaker 5: And I remember my that try and telling me I'm
Speaker 5: so sorry. It took me a second to realize why
Speaker 5: he was saying sorry to me, and he said I'm
Speaker 5: sorry that I brought you to this country and that
Speaker 5: you'ren't documented.
Speaker 2: But Lizabeth was determined.
Speaker 5: I connected with other undocumented students and realized organizing is
Speaker 5: an option. Here and maybe the only option to actually
Speaker 5: changing things and realize we have to get involved to
Speaker 5: actually change laws. Back when I first heard about the dream.
Speaker 2: At the Dream Act is how you guessed it. The
Speaker 2: Dreamers get their name, And again it's not John Lennon's
Speaker 2: song that gave birth to the Dream Act. It actually
Speaker 2: started with a nondocumented person of color named Teresa Lee.
Speaker 2: Out of the Shadows, We'll be right back. Teresa Lee
Speaker 2: was born in Brazil to South Korean immigrants, before she
Speaker 2: and her family landed in Chicago, where little Teresa Lee
Speaker 2: began to attend American schools, make American friends, and dream
Speaker 2: of who she would become when she grew up. But then,
Speaker 2: when she was seven years old, her dad called her
Speaker 2: and her brother into the living room were a very
Speaker 2: important family meeting. He said, I have a secret to
Speaker 2: tell you. Teresa was undocumented. Her status created a sharp
Speaker 2: sense of fear and anxiety. She'd have nightmares about immigration
Speaker 2: officials raiding her home and deporting her family. That fear
Speaker 2: isolated her from others, and the only thing that calmed
Speaker 2: her nerves was a piano. It brought her joy and purpose,
Speaker 2: and she was really good at it. She was awarded
Speaker 2: a scholarship to study music. She won a competition and
Speaker 2: let a concert with the Chicago Symphony. Once it was
Speaker 2: time to apply for college, she always told teachers and
Speaker 2: mentors as she wouldn't apply, but one teacher insisted she
Speaker 2: at least fill out some applications, and she did, except
Speaker 2: she purposely left one box blank, the social security When
Speaker 2: the teacher noticed a gap of information and brought up
Speaker 2: to Teresa, she burst into tears. She had never told
Speaker 2: anyone outside of her family her secret, her family secret.
Speaker 2: This teacher helped her and led Teresa to the office
Speaker 2: of a local politician who could help, Senator Dick Durbin.
Speaker 6: This all started the stream Act all started with this
Speaker 6: young lady, Theresa Lee Korean, brought to the United States
Speaker 6: the age of two, grew up in a poor family
Speaker 6: in Chicago, and had an amazing musical talent. Was accepted
Speaker 6: at the Manhattan Conservatory Music and the Juilliard School of Music,
Speaker 6: and because she was undocumented, had no place to go.
Speaker 2: After hearing Teresa's story in the stories of other undocumented students,
Speaker 2: Senator Durbin drafted a bill named the Development, Relief and
Speaker 2: Education for Alien Miners Act, also known as a Dream Act,
Speaker 2: bill would grant temporary residency, a work permit, and a
Speaker 2: pathway to citizenship. It had the potential to be one
Speaker 2: of the biggest immigration reforms since ERCA. The only problem
Speaker 2: was that the Dream Act was introduced in two thousand
Speaker 2: and one, the year that everything about the America Teresa
Speaker 2: Lee knew changed Today. We've had a national tragedy.
Speaker 4: Two airplanes have crashed into the World Trade Center, and
Speaker 4: an apparent terrorist attack on our.
Speaker 2: Country nine eleven quickly changed the trajectory of how people
Speaker 2: saw and treated immigrants, especially the undocumented ones. The public
Speaker 2: was afraid of anyone perceived as an outsider, and after
Speaker 2: the attacks on the Twin Towers, any foreign born person
Speaker 2: could potentially be a terrorist. Tragically, the Dream Act failed
Speaker 2: to pass, but activism continued.
Speaker 7: Today to ensure that this country continues to march towards
Speaker 7: human rights for all. We are here today to say
Speaker 7: that there must be a limit to how working people
Speaker 7: are treated in this country. See say blood It, see
Speaker 7: say plood it.
Speaker 1: C rights activists have long wielded public attention like a
Speaker 1: blunt object. In the nineteen sixties, black civil rights organizers
Speaker 1: use mass media to get their messages out and images
Speaker 1: of violence against the black community were often held up
Speaker 1: as a mirror showing America's ugly racism. There was power
Speaker 1: in making a struggle visible, but if you're an un
Speaker 1: documented immigrant, visibility means danger. Most immigrants are told to
Speaker 1: hide their identity from the world like a shameful curse.
Speaker 1: The shadows were dark, but they were safer than being seen.
Speaker 1: Back in the late eighties, ERCA applicants were terrified to
Speaker 1: apply because they would have to admit to La Migra
Speaker 1: that they were living in the US illegally. But the
Speaker 1: next generation of undocumented immigrants in the late two thousands
Speaker 1: were astonishingly brave. They risked being seen by the world
Speaker 1: and put themselves in danger of deportation to fight for
Speaker 1: their humanity. The Dreamer movement is where undocumented peoples in
Speaker 1: this country demanded in a very public way to be
Speaker 1: recognized and given rights, forcing this country to see another
Speaker 1: ugly side of itself.
Speaker 2: One of those at the heart of the Dreamer movement
Speaker 2: was Lisbeth. Despite her status, she became more involved, participating
Speaker 2: incidents and various protests. She put herself at risk because
Speaker 2: she felt like she had no other choice, and this
Speaker 2: put a tunne of st and her father.
Speaker 5: I remember telling me that, don't ever say that, because
Speaker 5: it's not your fault, like you and my mom made
Speaker 5: a decision to bring this year because he wanted to
Speaker 5: give a better life, and we're going to get that
Speaker 5: life right now. It's just, you know, we have to
Speaker 5: work to make things better so that we get to
Speaker 5: a point where we can actually fly. Yes, we're survival
Speaker 5: more right now, but we're going to thrive someday.
Speaker 1: Daca was born out of the Dream Act, and that
Speaker 1: wouldn't have happened without Lizabeth Thereca, ly and countless other
Speaker 1: people's willingness to come out of the shadows and declare
Speaker 1: to the world I am undocumented and I deserve a
Speaker 1: path to citizenship because, like the civil rights marches before them,
Speaker 1: even like Lenin's immigration battles, the fight to create and
Speaker 1: save Daca was a result of people who are supposed
Speaker 1: to be the victims being the heroes of their own stories.
Speaker 1: And this season and out of the Shadows, we're going
Speaker 1: to tell you how it all went down, why the
Speaker 1: situation remains a constant battle in the courts, and how
Speaker 1: this generation of undocumented Americans are just built different.
Speaker 5: We get in kind of McCain's office, and we will
Speaker 5: use to leave under something will change. And so we
Speaker 5: were arrested as a results, not.
Speaker 8: Just because it was like Obama all of a sudden deciding, Oh,
Speaker 8: should I need some brownie points? Let me give this
Speaker 8: leaders like a couple of work permits. It's like no,
Speaker 8: this fool was pushed against the wall to make this decision.
Speaker 2: I realized that I wasn't going to be able to
Speaker 2: practice law.
Speaker 9: And I think that's where it gets dangerous, because I
Speaker 9: feel like the whole notion of a dreamer, of like
Speaker 9: who deserves, you know, to be granted, you know, permanent
Speaker 9: status and whatnot, is always very much attached to this
Speaker 9: idea that the dreamer is a perfect immigrant.
Speaker 2: This piece of paper really will change your life. Out
Speaker 2: of the Shadows Dreamers is a se Medo production in
Speaker 2: partnership with Iheart'smichael Duda podcast Network. It's created, hosted, and
Speaker 2: executive produced by me Patti Rodriguez, and Eric Galindo. This
Speaker 2: show is written by Sessa Hernandez and executive produced by
Speaker 2: Jaselle Bancis. Our supervising producer is Arlene Santana's produced and
Speaker 2: edited by Brianna Flores. Our associate producer is Claudia Marti Gorena,
Speaker 2: sound design, mixing and mastering by Jessica Cranchich, and a
Speaker 2: special thanks to all Our Dreamers. Remember to subscribe to
Speaker 2: the podcast and share it. For more Michael Duda Podcast,
Speaker 2: listen to the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
Speaker 2: listen to your favorite shows.