WEBVTT - Braceros at Large 0:00:00.360 --> 0:00:03.840 Hi listeners, just a quick heads up out of the 0:00:03.840 --> 0:00:07.280 shadows tell stories of people fleeing and living in sometimes 0:00:07.400 --> 0:00:17.239 violent environments. I have an old family photo that reminds 0:00:17.239 --> 0:00:19.919 me of the Brady Bunch because it's a blended family 0:00:20.160 --> 0:00:24.160 standing outside an idyllic looking suburban home in nineteen seventy four. 0:00:25.760 --> 0:00:28.760 It's mostly a bunch of young, happy faces, and a 0:00:28.760 --> 0:00:32.720 lot of them are dressing their dopes seventies attire. There's 0:00:32.760 --> 0:00:35.640 Mattia Domingo sitting on the ground wearing what appears to 0:00:35.640 --> 0:00:38.599 be one of those long sleeve button down work shirts. 0:00:39.560 --> 0:00:45.640 Standing over him as wearing a smart, ruffled blazer. Mala 0:00:45.680 --> 0:00:48.200 Manuela while she's dressed like she grew up in the fifties, 0:00:48.200 --> 0:00:51.599 because she did. And then there's my Tia Madi with 0:00:51.640 --> 0:00:56.200 their feathered hair, and next to her dressed like a Mexican. 0:00:56.240 --> 0:01:00.280 Asked Peter Brady is my father with his leave eyes 0:01:00.400 --> 0:01:04.360 button up open and undone from like the stomach up 0:01:04.400 --> 0:01:08.959 to his full beard and afro. I've seen this family 0:01:09.000 --> 0:01:11.240 photo a lot because it's one of my favorites of 0:01:11.319 --> 0:01:15.840 my dad. He looks so fresh and young, and it's 0:01:15.880 --> 0:01:18.320 from his days before he had a family, when he 0:01:18.360 --> 0:01:21.840 spent life traveling back and forth between the US and Mexico. 0:01:23.200 --> 0:01:26.280 But I never really thought about something. My dad isn't 0:01:26.319 --> 0:01:29.920 documented in this photo, which means he was traveling back 0:01:29.959 --> 0:01:33.600 and forth without a green card or passport like whatever, 0:01:34.200 --> 0:01:38.840 Like it was no big deal. And the thing is 0:01:39.520 --> 0:01:43.120 he wasn't alone. It's hard to believe these days, but 0:01:43.160 --> 0:01:45.480 there was a time when the border was more fluid, 0:01:46.280 --> 0:01:49.520 when people like my dad would come to America, work 0:01:49.600 --> 0:01:52.000 for a few weeks, and go back home to Mexico, 0:01:52.880 --> 0:01:55.680 before millions of people like him began to plant roots here, 0:01:56.400 --> 0:01:59.000 before they had to choose between staying home and Mexico 0:01:59.240 --> 0:02:02.600 or having to create a new life in a new country, 0:02:02.640 --> 0:02:07.600 before the border became so dangerous to cross. So what 0:02:07.760 --> 0:02:11.320 changed after nineteen seventy four, when this Mexican Brady Bunch 0:02:11.360 --> 0:02:14.800 pick was snapped that led to my father and countless 0:02:14.840 --> 0:02:19.240 others finally deciding to cross the US for good, well 0:02:19.280 --> 0:02:22.679 for starters. In nineteen seventy five, this thing called the 0:02:22.800 --> 0:02:30.560 Vietnam War ended. I'm Patti Rodriguez and I'm Eric Glendo, 0:02:30.840 --> 0:02:33.120 and this is out of the shadows. Children of eighty 0:02:33.160 --> 0:02:35.760 six immigrants and their children have long lived in the 0:02:35.800 --> 0:02:38.959 shadows of America. Their destinies aren't just shaped by where 0:02:39.000 --> 0:02:42.480 they come from, but by their particular place in history. 0:02:42.840 --> 0:02:45.880 In six the lives of millions of immigrants and their 0:02:45.960 --> 0:02:48.399 children were changed by one lucky stroke of a pen 0:02:48.840 --> 0:02:53.680 by an unlikely ally, President Ronald Reagan. This podcast will 0:02:53.720 --> 0:02:55.920 examine the ripple effects the bill had on first generation 0:02:56.000 --> 0:03:00.639 kids of immigrants, who are navigating intergenerational mobility and transforming 0:03:00.680 --> 0:03:08.519 the cultural landscape. This is an untold story of luck, timing, triumph, opportunity, survival, 0:03:09.240 --> 0:03:37.120 and of course hope. One thing we don't really think about. 0:03:37.720 --> 0:03:40.120 One thing that gets lost in the arguments today about 0:03:40.120 --> 0:03:44.280 immigration is that the border wasn't always this political argument 0:03:44.400 --> 0:03:49.080 slash dangerous barrier. You know. The truth is that many 0:03:49.120 --> 0:03:51.440 of our parents came and went to the US in 0:03:51.480 --> 0:03:54.800 the sixties and seventies. Yeah, it's wild. I talked to 0:03:54.840 --> 0:03:56.880 my dad Manuel about this, and he said he would 0:03:56.880 --> 0:04:14.360 cross back and forth. Yeah, my dad says he would 0:04:14.360 --> 0:04:17.080 just drive across the border. Sometimes the border agents would 0:04:17.120 --> 0:04:20.040 ask for documentation, which my dad didn't have, so he'd 0:04:20.040 --> 0:04:22.400 be forced to go back. But most of the time 0:04:22.839 --> 0:04:25.880 the agents just waved him through and that's hard to 0:04:25.920 --> 0:04:32.719 believe now, but it was also common prior to there 0:04:32.760 --> 0:04:37.240 were really relatively few limits on immigration from south of 0:04:37.279 --> 0:04:41.919 the border. That's Charles Kalpasaki, author of Immigration reform The 0:04:42.000 --> 0:04:45.920 Corpse That Will Not Die. His book details the amnesty Bill, 0:04:46.120 --> 0:04:49.240 but also the circumstances that led to the migration patterns 0:04:49.279 --> 0:04:53.000 we saw at the time. There was a circular migration pattern, 0:04:53.400 --> 0:04:56.560 mainly in agriculture, but in other seasonal industries to right 0:04:56.640 --> 0:04:59.320 think construction, like where more people would go home for 0:04:59.360 --> 0:05:01.479 the holidays and they would stay home over the winter. 0:05:02.200 --> 0:05:05.719 The most famous instance of this circular migration pattern is 0:05:05.760 --> 0:05:09.159 probably the Settle program, and that started because of the draft. 0:05:09.960 --> 0:05:15.120 Our present program were eight hundred thousand additional men of 0:05:15.160 --> 0:05:19.239 this coming year and somewhat left the land men each 0:05:19.320 --> 0:05:23.320 year thereafter. The Settle Program started during World War Two 0:05:23.480 --> 0:05:27.480 as America's men, it's labor force was sent off to 0:05:27.560 --> 0:05:32.560 fight the war, while women and even children worked the factories. 0:05:33.160 --> 0:05:39.479 The farm jobs were abundant and labor was scarce. Again 0:05:39.600 --> 0:05:44.120 the urgently and again the Labor Department's contributions helped to 0:05:44.200 --> 0:05:48.560 set records of uninterrupted war production unequaled in the history 0:05:48.600 --> 0:05:52.560 of this or any other nation. And at that very 0:05:52.640 --> 0:05:57.800 same time, Mexico was suffering from high unemployment in the U. 0:05:57.960 --> 0:06:02.080 S needed workers to grow in harve star food, so 0:06:02.200 --> 0:06:04.440 Mexico in the US reaching agreement that would make it 0:06:04.480 --> 0:06:07.880 easier for people to cross the border for work. America 0:06:07.960 --> 0:06:11.040 stayed fed during the war, and all these people who 0:06:11.040 --> 0:06:14.520 didn't have jobs in Mexico found jobs here. All of 0:06:14.560 --> 0:06:18.880 the Wall America wars in Europe, Korean Vietnam, in almost 0:06:18.880 --> 0:06:23.680 two decades of unrelenting war, American farmers employed more than 0:06:23.760 --> 0:06:28.640 four point five million Mexican men. But I settled men 0:06:28.680 --> 0:06:32.080 who were here legally and exploited for their cheap labor 0:06:32.560 --> 0:06:35.760 with promises of a better life for their families back 0:06:35.800 --> 0:06:41.279 in Mexico. And all up until recently, I've come to 0:06:41.360 --> 0:06:47.400 learn that one of those men was my grandfather. The 0:06:47.480 --> 0:06:59.800 names in the temple, yeah, I even knew. In Ninetta, 0:07:00.080 --> 0:07:03.680 Miguel took a fourteen hour bus ride from Jalisco to 0:07:03.760 --> 0:07:08.800 the contracting station in Impalmisa. Officials would sign up a 0:07:08.839 --> 0:07:12.480 thousand to two thousand braceros a day and load them 0:07:12.560 --> 0:07:17.520 up in busses to the States. The Brato program mostly 0:07:17.560 --> 0:07:22.360 targeted men with families, men like my grandfather with wives 0:07:22.360 --> 0:07:25.880 and children, because there was a higher chance. At one 0:07:26.600 --> 0:07:28.920 all the money earned by the braseros will be sent 0:07:28.960 --> 0:07:34.640 back to Mexico, benefiting the Mexican economy. And two, they themselves, 0:07:34.640 --> 0:07:38.280 so brasettos will returned back home to their families after 0:07:38.320 --> 0:07:43.720 their contracts expired, preventing overstates, which is exactly what the 0:07:43.800 --> 0:08:11.680 US wanted. Command Premier sent a bed I think, will 0:08:11.800 --> 0:08:15.160 leave my grandma and his daughter, my thea three months 0:08:15.200 --> 0:08:18.520 at a time to come to California, and every penny 0:08:18.560 --> 0:08:24.480 he'd make work in the fields was sent back home. Yeah. 0:08:37.840 --> 0:08:40.640 When I asked him how much he'd get paid, he laughed, 0:08:41.480 --> 0:08:44.880 not at my question, but at his own recognition of 0:08:45.040 --> 0:08:49.319 the many ways this country took advantage of them. On 0:08:49.440 --> 0:08:54.319 a good week, after working fifteen hour days, seven days 0:08:54.520 --> 0:08:59.200 a week under the scorching sun, me Papa Miguel would 0:08:59.240 --> 0:09:07.599 make sixty dollars a week. Sixty dollars a week. The 0:09:07.720 --> 0:09:12.640 promises made to these Mexican men guaranteed wages, cleaning, free housing, 0:09:13.080 --> 0:09:19.440 affordable meals. We're just that promises. Instead, they were treated 0:09:19.480 --> 0:09:23.280 like criminals, my grandfather recalled. So they were constantly harassed 0:09:23.280 --> 0:09:26.720 by the police. If the rats did not have their documents, 0:09:27.559 --> 0:09:40.520 the men would be immediately deported, no questions asked, Yes, yeah, 0:09:40.880 --> 0:09:57.480 that is what that is. Were also isolated from the world. 0:09:58.120 --> 0:10:00.240 When they were not working, they only had a each other. 0:10:00.880 --> 0:10:03.520 They had no social life outside of these camps. My 0:10:03.679 --> 0:10:07.960 first job was taking boys and barriers. That's Dr Rica 0:10:08.080 --> 0:10:12.520 figaroa a retired university professor who grew up in Modesto, California. 0:10:12.679 --> 0:10:15.680 During the sixties, the peak of the Bara setto program 0:10:16.200 --> 0:10:20.319 and I saw firsthand where the farm workers lived. I 0:10:20.480 --> 0:10:23.880 also lived there for the summer, so I had a 0:10:24.200 --> 0:10:26.880 pretty direct and intimate knowledge of what was going on. 0:10:27.840 --> 0:10:31.800 Dr Figaro says the barracks where the farmers lived house 0:10:31.960 --> 0:10:36.320 dozens of workers on hard bunks in tight quarters, kind 0:10:36.360 --> 0:10:38.920 of like the ones the soldiers were using off in Vietnam, 0:10:40.280 --> 0:10:44.079 and maybe just like the men in Southeast Asia. The 0:10:44.120 --> 0:10:47.480 Bara settles were worried about string too far from the barracks. 0:10:48.840 --> 0:10:52.280 Since Dr Figro was a natural born citizen, he became 0:10:52.360 --> 0:10:56.040 their conduit to the little luxuries. I was a beer 0:10:56.120 --> 0:10:59.400 runner on Saturday nights because workers were not They didn't 0:10:59.400 --> 0:11:03.000 want to go off because of papers or because of guards, 0:11:03.160 --> 0:11:06.679 or because of whatever. You heard that right, These farms 0:11:06.920 --> 0:11:11.480 had guards supposedly to protect the workers. They carried them 0:11:11.600 --> 0:11:14.679 sixteen and they were there at the ranch every day 0:11:14.760 --> 0:11:19.400 when there was harvesting going on. So the BT program 0:11:19.520 --> 0:11:23.040 was not exactly ideal, but it was sold as a 0:11:23.160 --> 0:11:27.640 better alternative to living in abject poverty in Mexico, promising 0:11:27.760 --> 0:11:31.720 Mexican men jobs that they would never find back home. 0:11:32.800 --> 0:11:37.360 That change when the Brassetto program ended in ninet Bras 0:11:37.400 --> 0:11:40.440 settles now found themselves without a job, so a quarter 0:11:40.559 --> 0:11:43.959 millions stay in northern Mexico ready to go back to work. 0:11:45.120 --> 0:11:48.760 Many even sent letters to government officials pleading to reinstate 0:11:48.840 --> 0:11:53.679 the program. My current situation is critical. Economic hardship is 0:11:53.720 --> 0:11:57.480 the biggest enemy in my home. I am contacting you 0:11:57.640 --> 0:12:02.640 for help. I'm not requesting money. Rather, I am attentively 0:12:02.720 --> 0:12:09.400 begging you for a job within the federal government. Out 0:12:09.440 --> 0:12:21.599 of the shadows. Will be right back now, back to 0:12:21.679 --> 0:12:29.760 the show. Historically, the Mexican government actually discouraged people from 0:12:29.840 --> 0:12:32.400 migrating to the US because they didn't want to lose 0:12:32.440 --> 0:12:35.719 their labor force. But in the seventies, Mexico had a 0:12:35.840 --> 0:12:39.920 surplus of workers and a growing population, and instead of 0:12:39.960 --> 0:12:45.720 addressing the issues, they started to fudge the numbers. See, 0:12:45.720 --> 0:12:47.680 the way unemployment works is there's a pull of people 0:12:47.800 --> 0:12:50.080 looking for jobs and not enough of them to go around. 0:12:51.040 --> 0:12:52.760 So what does the Mexican government do, in all its 0:12:52.760 --> 0:12:56.319 celestial wisdom. They basically clear the path for all these 0:12:56.360 --> 0:12:59.000 people to leave to the US, which means that the 0:12:59.040 --> 0:13:03.120 amount of Mexicans looking for work goes down, So unemployment 0:13:03.240 --> 0:13:07.559 technically goes down to Mexico. Secretary of Foreign Affairs Joe 0:13:08.640 --> 0:13:12.960 put it point blank, saying, quote, the United States will 0:13:13.000 --> 0:13:16.640 continue to be, to a greater or lesser extent, the 0:13:16.880 --> 0:13:21.679 safety valve for our surplus labor force. So while the 0:13:21.720 --> 0:13:24.520 Mexican government never really encouraged workers to cross the U. 0:13:24.679 --> 0:13:28.640 S Border illegally, it definitely turned a blind eye towards it. 0:13:29.720 --> 0:13:35.520 Like instead of shouting, hey, don't leave, they quietly whispered, oh, 0:13:36.000 --> 0:13:40.120 come on, no, don't leave. But if you do, make 0:13:40.160 --> 0:13:44.880 sure you wire us to cash Western Union. Please. And 0:13:44.960 --> 0:13:49.360 the US, despite the BRAT program ending in four, still 0:13:49.480 --> 0:13:52.640 benefited from the cheap labor that came from undocumented men 0:13:52.720 --> 0:13:56.959 and women. It too, turn a blind eye towards unauthorized entries, 0:13:57.080 --> 0:14:01.199 all wall spewing propaganda that it llegals we're taking jobs 0:14:01.240 --> 0:14:05.319 away from Americans. The US was all like, hey, don't come, 0:14:05.360 --> 0:14:08.160 we're taking our jobs. But if you do come, we 0:14:08.280 --> 0:14:14.360 have jobs for you. I mean, I'm joking, because this 0:14:14.520 --> 0:14:18.280 was actually a very serious and potentially dangerous move by 0:14:18.360 --> 0:14:23.480 both governments, fueled by politics and fear. With both countries 0:14:23.560 --> 0:14:27.680 benefiting from this unauthorized circular migration, it was more fluid 0:14:27.760 --> 0:14:30.440 for migrants to go back and forth across the border. 0:14:31.560 --> 0:14:35.000 Mexico Secretary of Foreign Affairs even requested that Mexicans not 0:14:35.120 --> 0:14:38.960 be returned to Mexico. They told their consulates to stop 0:14:39.040 --> 0:14:42.200 the official process of helping folks who wanted to go 0:14:42.280 --> 0:14:46.480 back home to Mexico. Author Anna Raquel Minion tells some 0:14:46.600 --> 0:14:51.200 of those stories in her book Undocumented Lives Could as 0:14:51.720 --> 0:14:55.080 a Mexican migrant in Los Angeles who dedicated his life 0:14:55.160 --> 0:14:59.640 to helping Mexican communities recalled that consoles did absolutely nothing 0:15:00.240 --> 0:15:02.920 if somebody came to the consulate and wished to return 0:15:03.000 --> 0:15:07.760 to his homeland, for instance, they gave him nothing surplus 0:15:07.960 --> 0:15:12.160 to the Mexican government and illegal in the US these 0:15:12.240 --> 0:15:16.160 migrant workers no longer had a home. Those who came 0:15:16.200 --> 0:15:19.600 to the States out of necessity to survive were shipped 0:15:19.600 --> 0:15:25.800 out of luck. The circular pattern jammed workers from overpopulated 0:15:25.920 --> 0:15:30.200 Central Mexican regions left their homes, many never to return. 0:15:31.760 --> 0:15:36.400 Migrating north became a lucrative trade in Mexico. Everyone was 0:15:36.520 --> 0:15:40.160 making money every step of the way. Coultas would raken 0:15:40.240 --> 0:15:44.160 thousands of dollars a night. Contractors found work, finally building 0:15:44.200 --> 0:15:46.640 Abolita's home on top of it that animal she had 0:15:46.680 --> 0:15:50.560 owned for years. Mexicans working in the US since stacks 0:15:50.640 --> 0:15:53.880 of cash back to the rancho for food on the table, 0:15:54.200 --> 0:15:59.040 to build homes, churches, and paved roads. Mexico was in 0:15:59.200 --> 0:16:03.760 no hurry to shut that pipeline down. Men who would 0:16:03.760 --> 0:16:06.200 go back to the ranchos with stories about the land 0:16:06.320 --> 0:16:10.720 of jobs and opportunities, stories that would inspire many more 0:16:10.800 --> 0:16:13.520 Mexicans to go to the US because it was a 0:16:13.720 --> 0:16:21.200 goal rush and in north. And one of them was 0:16:21.240 --> 0:16:25.600 a nineteen year old kid from Carbone, Jalisco. My dad, 0:16:26.080 --> 0:16:31.000 that's what you mean. I mean, my mom hostels the 0:16:31.720 --> 0:16:38.760 sas from one of yeah, my dad's neighbors and even 0:16:38.880 --> 0:16:42.120 cousins would come back to my dad's rancho with nice 0:16:42.280 --> 0:16:56.120 cars and cash to spend. My dad was seeing how 0:16:56.200 --> 0:16:59.880 quickly families around his neighborhood were changing when money was 0:17:00.000 --> 0:17:03.800 sent back from the US. They would dress better, eat better. 0:17:04.520 --> 0:17:08.560 And for my dad, who many times only had it 0:17:08.640 --> 0:17:14.520 to eat, these changes were beyond his wildest dreams. So 0:17:14.680 --> 0:17:17.320 he left for the US when he was just nineteen 0:17:17.359 --> 0:17:20.879 years old, hoping to send money back to his family 0:17:20.960 --> 0:17:36.080 in Mexico. At the beginning of this podcast, I told 0:17:36.119 --> 0:17:37.840 myself that I was not going to ask my dad 0:17:38.040 --> 0:17:40.720 to tell me the story of why he came, and 0:17:40.800 --> 0:17:42.720 I was even more sure that I wasn't gonna do 0:17:42.800 --> 0:17:46.760 it after talking to my mom. I was scared, actually, 0:17:46.840 --> 0:17:50.960 no more like selfish. I did not want to hear 0:17:51.040 --> 0:17:53.560 his story because I knew how painful it would be 0:17:53.880 --> 0:17:56.159 for me to hear my dad reflect on such a 0:17:56.240 --> 0:17:59.880 vulnerable moment in his life. But I found the courage 0:18:01.000 --> 0:18:05.040 to ask him a question I never dared to ask. 0:18:06.280 --> 0:18:12.880 He then yes, um, uh, who are you? We'll see 0:18:12.920 --> 0:18:17.000 you the aske renuons, as the answus say, or something 0:18:18.000 --> 0:18:27.280 the only don't know we are. You can hear how 0:18:27.400 --> 0:18:30.520 difficult it was from me asking my dad I growing 0:18:30.640 --> 0:18:33.960 up he had dreams of his own, And when he 0:18:34.080 --> 0:18:37.240 answered that he dreamed of going to school and getting 0:18:37.240 --> 0:18:55.919 an education, you can hear my heart break the sim 0:18:56.680 --> 0:19:03.399 the netflce. Okay, let me fast, take you know your 0:19:05.560 --> 0:19:08.359 My dad was seeing how his Rancho was changing and 0:19:08.480 --> 0:19:12.800 he wanted that too for his family. Houses were being built, 0:19:13.640 --> 0:19:18.800 people were wearing shoes, and he wanted that too. He 0:19:18.960 --> 0:19:21.520 was the oldest and the responsibility weighed heavy on him. 0:19:22.760 --> 0:19:25.080 Coming to the US. Seemed to be working for everyone 0:19:25.160 --> 0:19:27.960 else around him. Why couldn't he have a piece of 0:19:28.000 --> 0:19:32.680 it too. As soon as my dad arrived, he began 0:19:32.800 --> 0:19:35.800 building my abilite those a home. With the money he 0:19:35.920 --> 0:19:39.680 was sending back. His entire family went from living in 0:19:39.760 --> 0:19:42.879 a shack, everyone sleeping on the floor, to having a 0:19:43.040 --> 0:19:49.320 house of their own with walls and doors. And my 0:19:49.480 --> 0:19:54.000 dad did that for his family. Many young Mexican men 0:19:55.040 --> 0:19:59.840 did just that. But it wasn't just men who came 0:19:59.880 --> 0:20:02.320 to the US looking for work on the farms. My 0:20:02.520 --> 0:20:06.080 mom tells me that she was pregnant and working in 0:20:06.280 --> 0:20:10.640 Washington picking apples. That's Wendy Salasar born in a farmtown 0:20:10.680 --> 0:20:14.200 in Washington State, where both her undocumented parents worked the 0:20:14.240 --> 0:20:17.680 apple harvest. They worked together, so my dad would help 0:20:17.760 --> 0:20:19.720 her out and say, you picked the ones at the 0:20:19.800 --> 0:20:22.080 bottom so you don't have to climb up the ladder 0:20:22.160 --> 0:20:26.800 and be stretching. So I believe at the time she 0:20:27.000 --> 0:20:30.240 was pretty far along in her pregnancy, probably about five 0:20:30.560 --> 0:20:34.840 months or more when she was doing this. I can't 0:20:34.840 --> 0:20:39.520 even imagine having to pick apples well pregnant. But most 0:20:39.600 --> 0:20:43.760 of these people migrated in a circular pattern. They came 0:20:43.800 --> 0:20:48.639 to the chambard then went back home. That's what my 0:20:48.720 --> 0:20:51.119 dad did, but he didn't work on the farms. He 0:20:51.200 --> 0:20:53.440 just kind of hung out and visited his family and 0:20:53.520 --> 0:20:57.359 sometimes would work in a warehouse in southeast Los Angeles. Yeah, 0:21:00.280 --> 0:21:12.960 more were less, but our wow him. My dad says 0:21:13.000 --> 0:21:17.800 he made chairs for theaters stadiums all while undocumented, and 0:21:17.880 --> 0:21:20.080 after two weeks of working he would go back home 0:21:20.160 --> 0:21:23.560 to Sinaloa. Since crossing the border was so easy, he 0:21:23.600 --> 0:21:27.040 didn't even think twice about going back and forth, and 0:21:27.160 --> 0:21:29.320 since some of the employers looking for cheap labor here 0:21:29.359 --> 0:21:32.119 in the US were even asking for legal status, he 0:21:32.240 --> 0:21:34.000 knew he could just keep working until there was no 0:21:34.119 --> 0:21:39.080 more work, and then something else happened thousands of miles away. 0:21:39.440 --> 0:21:54.480 That would change everything. The fall of Saigon. Out of 0:21:54.520 --> 0:22:06.720 the shadows will be right back now, back to the show. 0:22:11.359 --> 0:22:15.440 According to article on the Intercept, the idea of weaponizing 0:22:15.480 --> 0:22:19.240 the border quote reaches back to at least the nineteen seventies, 0:22:19.680 --> 0:22:22.800 to the presidency of Jimmy Carter, when the US began 0:22:22.880 --> 0:22:26.840 to turn its attention away from Vietnam toward its southern border. 0:22:27.800 --> 0:22:32.560 Within this last decade, the problem of undocumented aliens or 0:22:32.600 --> 0:22:39.200 illegal aliens or undocumented workers has become increasingly severe. Yep, 0:22:39.720 --> 0:22:44.080 Jimmy Carter, the Democrat liberal saint, requested and got approval 0:22:44.200 --> 0:22:46.960 for about five million dollars to build defense along the 0:22:47.119 --> 0:22:51.439 US southern border. And my dad said, it was simple economics. 0:23:00.000 --> 0:23:04.360 The economy was bad and soldiers were coming home anticipating jobs, 0:23:04.880 --> 0:23:07.400 while at the same time, more and more people were 0:23:07.480 --> 0:23:11.359 fleeing a recession in Mexico. So President Carter and the 0:23:11.440 --> 0:23:15.000 I n S started cracking down. Suddenly the cheap labor 0:23:15.080 --> 0:23:18.560 that both Mexico and the US benefited from that basically 0:23:18.600 --> 0:23:20.720 made it okay for our parents to come back and 0:23:20.880 --> 0:23:23.440 forth to make a quick buck and live a better life. 0:23:24.240 --> 0:23:28.080 Became the problem. Suddenly, our parents became the people that 0:23:28.240 --> 0:23:36.840 nobody wanted. Now picture this. It's a cold and foggy 0:23:36.960 --> 0:23:40.479 night in south San Diego. Waiting in the fog are 0:23:40.640 --> 0:23:44.919 hundreds of Mexican migrants. They're being chased by Mexican police 0:23:44.960 --> 0:23:48.320 from the south and hunted by border patrol in the north. 0:23:49.359 --> 0:23:53.120 The coyotes strategy is to throw rocks at the border patrol, 0:23:53.680 --> 0:23:57.600 creating a diversion so the migrants could cross, But on 0:23:57.720 --> 0:24:01.879 this night, it's a setup. As the coyotes looked for 0:24:01.920 --> 0:24:04.680 the right moment to cast their stones, out of the 0:24:04.760 --> 0:24:11.280 thin fog come three ram chargers rushing at them. Panicky 0:24:11.640 --> 0:24:14.520 fearing for their lives, the migrants turned and start running 0:24:14.560 --> 0:24:19.119 back south. But there's another surprise waiting for them. Police 0:24:19.160 --> 0:24:25.280 officers from Tijuana there to arrest them. All. Suddenly surrounded, 0:24:25.800 --> 0:24:28.639 the migrants are forced back north to the border, this 0:24:28.760 --> 0:24:32.399 time against their will, leading them right into the border patrol. 0:24:33.840 --> 0:24:39.040 The migrants are apprehended, charged, convicted, and incarcerated before being 0:24:39.160 --> 0:24:46.920 sent back to Mexico. This story, told by author and 0:24:47.160 --> 0:24:51.520 Rakiminian in her book Undocumented Lives, captures a sentiment of 0:24:51.600 --> 0:24:56.199 those in power in both the US and Mexico by 0:24:56.240 --> 0:25:00.320 the late seventies and early eighties, migrant workers were people 0:25:00.400 --> 0:25:05.440 without a place. In their presence, their mere existence could 0:25:05.480 --> 0:25:08.800 be denied by those in power in both nations. These 0:25:08.840 --> 0:25:11.719 people were cornered and caught hiding in the fog between 0:25:11.760 --> 0:25:16.120 two countries that didn't want them. Their entrapment was part 0:25:16.160 --> 0:25:19.960 of a larger trend happening that may sound familiar. People 0:25:20.040 --> 0:25:24.800 without a home, without community, unwanted by the nation they 0:25:24.880 --> 0:25:29.680 came from. In the place they we're going, they belonged nowhere. 0:25:30.840 --> 0:25:41.040 Nidia key, Nidia, Yeah, living in the shadows. So from 0:25:41.080 --> 0:25:43.920 that unhappy picture, we come back to the Mexican Brady 0:25:43.960 --> 0:25:46.960 Bunch photo at the top of the show. That was 0:25:47.000 --> 0:25:49.359 one of the last times my dad crossed as an 0:25:49.440 --> 0:25:53.280 undocumented Peter Brady into the US, just by driving here 0:25:54.040 --> 0:25:57.119 in the early part of the seventies before the crackdown. 0:25:58.960 --> 0:26:02.399 Then in December of nineteen seventy nine, on a rainy night, 0:26:03.320 --> 0:26:06.680 my father put on some rain boots, some levies and 0:26:06.880 --> 0:26:11.200 crossed the hills under helicopter searchlights, being chased by border 0:26:11.280 --> 0:26:15.000 patrol agents and crossed into a much different version of 0:26:15.080 --> 0:26:17.879 the America. He used to come visit for weeks at 0:26:17.880 --> 0:26:23.359 a time. My dad and millions of others planted roots 0:26:23.400 --> 0:26:26.560 here in the US, just as much of the country 0:26:26.680 --> 0:26:31.040 had decided people like him or the problem plaguing the nation. 0:26:31.600 --> 0:26:35.240 At the end of a socially and economically turbulent decade, 0:26:37.040 --> 0:26:42.840 and in the unlikely hero of our story gets elected President. 0:26:45.040 --> 0:26:50.840 President mcgans courageous and talented leader. He's making admirable progress 0:26:51.600 --> 0:26:54.800 in the difficult task of moving El Salvador toward democracy. 0:26:55.080 --> 0:26:59.080 I let my preoccupation with the hostages intrude into areas 0:26:59.119 --> 0:27:03.040 where it didn't belong. She used eighty names, thirty addresses, 0:27:03.440 --> 0:27:08.159 fifteen telephone numbers to collect food stamp social security for 0:27:08.240 --> 0:27:10.760 The key to our anti drug strategy is to call 0:27:10.840 --> 0:27:14.840 instead for the national crusade against drugs. And we could 0:27:14.880 --> 0:27:17.760 have a very hostile and strange neighbor on our border. 0:27:18.320 --> 0:27:21.440 Rather than making them for talking about putting up offense, 0:27:22.080 --> 0:27:25.560 Why don't we work out some recognition of our mutual problems. 0:27:26.040 --> 0:27:28.119 Make it possible for them to come here legally with 0:27:28.200 --> 0:27:30.639 the work per myth, and then while they're working and 0:27:30.800 --> 0:27:34.840 earning here, they pay taxes here like the migrants and 0:27:34.880 --> 0:27:39.560 the fog our parents were trapped between two forces, the 0:27:39.680 --> 0:27:43.399 businesses who were exploiting them for their cheap labor, in 0:27:43.480 --> 0:27:48.040 a growing conservative movement that wanted a crackdown at the border. 0:27:50.400 --> 0:27:59.120 Something needed to be done. What's come in next time 0:27:59.200 --> 0:28:01.480 on Out of the Shows the story of a six 0:28:01.520 --> 0:28:04.960 foot giant, the grandson of an immigrant and author of Urka, 0:28:05.359 --> 0:28:08.440 the bill that ended up changing the course of this generation. 0:28:08.920 --> 0:28:11.720 So we had to do something. Character third inuit of 0:28:11.800 --> 0:28:19.720 doing Nothing. Out of the Shadows is written by Caesar Hernandez. 0:28:20.400 --> 0:28:24.480 It's also written, edited, hosted, an executive produced by Patti 0:28:24.560 --> 0:28:29.520 Rodriguez and Eric Galindo. It's produced by Bets Cardanas, Karen 0:28:29.560 --> 0:28:33.840 Lopez and Gabby Watts. It's sound design, mixed and mastered 0:28:34.000 --> 0:28:38.760 by Jesse nice Longer. Our studio engineer is Clay Hillenburg. 0:28:39.760 --> 0:28:43.960 Karen Garcia That's Me is our announcer. Out of the 0:28:44.040 --> 0:28:47.480 Shadows is the production of Seeing Me, Other Productions and 0:28:47.600 --> 0:28:51.280 School of Humans in partnership with My Heart's Michael Tura 0:28:51.440 --> 0:28:57.120 podcast Network. The podcast is also executive produced by Giselle Banzes, 0:28:57.640 --> 0:29:02.720 Virginian Prescott, Brandon Barr, and Chad Crowley. Our marketing and 0:29:02.800 --> 0:29:06.680 our team is led by Jasmine Mahia, original music by 0:29:06.760 --> 0:29:10.680 a Arenas, and if you loved his cover of Los 0:29:10.720 --> 0:29:14.280 Caminos La Vida, this podcast theme song, you can listen 0:29:14.360 --> 0:29:18.520 to it on all music platforms. Historical audio for Out 0:29:18.560 --> 0:29:22.040 of the Shadows comes from the Reagan Presidential Library and 0:29:22.120 --> 0:29:28.840 the National Archives. Special thanks to Ian Vargas, Alex and Ali, 0:29:29.560 --> 0:29:37.880 Caitlin Becker, gob Chabran, Daisy Church, Angel Lopez Glendo, Julianna Gamiz, 0:29:38.760 --> 0:29:47.000 Ryan Gordon, Brian Matheson, Claudia Marty Corina, Oscar Ramidez, John Rodriguez, 0:29:47.440 --> 0:29:55.120 Juan Rodriguez, Joshua Sandoval, Eric Sclar, Tony Sorrentino, and Megan Tan. 0:29:57.160 --> 0:30:00.160 For more podcasts, visit the I Heart Radio app or 0:30:00.200 --> 0:30:02.040 wherever you listen to your favorite shows.