Is it that we can only relate to
someone's existence or experience only if we lived it ourselves? If
that is the only way we can relate to people's problems--people who
come to us for help--then we are in a very sorry state. Most of us who serve in the Senate are only one or two generations
removed from immigrant status or immigrant backgrounds. I, myself, am
an immigrant. I was not born in this country. I came here with a single
mother. I know what it is like to come to a new country where you don't
speak the language and where you have to learn, where you have to
adjust. All my mother asked for was a chance to attain the American
dream. It really bothers me that at the time when we were talking about
passing comprehensive immigration reform, Member after Member came to
the floor of the Senate and talked about their immigrant backgrounds. Yet too many of them were perfectly happy to shut the door on
immigrants in this country--over 11 million undocumented persons--to
shut the door in their faces; forgetting that most of us come from
immigrant backgrounds; forgetting that this country, apart from the
original people who were here, American Indians, we are all immigrants. So let's put ourselves in the shoes of our Dreamers. Let's open our
hearts to them.
Keywords matched
immigration immigrants undocumented immigrant