The American Fabric: Voting our Values

So far on our miniseries The American Fabric, we’ve learned more about immigrants and why they come to this country. We’ve busted myths and decried disinformation. And we’ve heard immigrants tell their stories in their own words.

Today, on the final episode, we’re talking about why this year’s election is so important. We have the opportunity to choose leaders who understand that immigrants are a cornerstone of this country and want to find humane bipartisan solutions. Leaders who don’t demonize vulnerable people for their own political gain. The outcome in November is crucial.

The federal government hasn’t passed meaningful immigration reform since 1986. On today’s episode, we hear more from Congresswoman Delia Ramirez as well as our own Suburban Women Problem co-host Rep. Jasmine Clark about how Republicans are choosing their own political power over policies that would actually help people. 

Balancing America’s national security and humanitarian needs is far from simple, but extremists like Trump and JD Vance aren’t interested in solving problems. They want us to be a nation of hate. Kamala Harris, Tim Walz, and all of the incredible leaders on the state and local level want to lead us back to our ideals. We’re a nation of immigrants. A nation of hope and opportunity. 

So it’s up to us now. We have to talk to everyone we know and make sure they understand what’s on the line. Let’s make sure that on election day, hope and freedom triumph.

Thanks for listening to The American Fabric.

To learn more about our guests:
Lt. Colonel (retired) Alexander Vindman
Congresswoman Delia Ramirez
Dr. Andrea Bonior, psychologist and professor
Dr. Sara Sadhwani, professor of politics and immigration
Dr. Nancy MacLean, political historian and author

For a transcript of this episode, please email theswppod@redwine.blue.

You can learn more about us at www.redwine.blue or follow us on social media!

Twitter: @TheSWPpod and @RedWineBlueUSA

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Transcript

Narrator: Hi, I’m Rachel Vindman. Welcome to the final episode of The American Fabric, a special 3-episode series about immigration in the United States. We’ve already covered who immigrants are, why they come to this country, and corrected the record on some myths and misconceptions. 

Ultimately, it comes down to this: extremists are using fear to build their own power. It’s happened countless times in other countries, and it’s happening here too. But unlike many, we have a choice. We have a democracy where we can vote for leaders who represent our values. The outcome of this election is absolutely critical.

Extremists are trying to turn human beings into political footballs, and no one knows this better than my co-host of the Suburban Women Problem, Jasmine Clark. Jasmine’s a state representative in Georgia and says that she sees fear-mongering in the Statehouse all the time. Just a few months ago, Republicans passed House Bill 1105 - also known as The Georgia Criminal Alien Track and Report Act.

Jasmine: Republicans will tell you this is about keeping criminals off our street, as if immigrant and criminal are somehow synonymous, and this will keep our community safer.  But we actually have evidence, because House Bill 1105 in Georgia is basically the 287G policy, but now statewide, and 287G did the exact opposite of keeping communities safe. Because when people are afraid to call law enforcement when something is going wrong, that creates a dangerous situation for others in the community  when there is a distrust or mistrust between the community and law enforcement. That is very dangerous. So it does the opposite of what the GOP tries to claim that these types of bills try to do. 

And so what I think the GOP does is they use immigrants and immigration as a scapegoat to not do real policy. To not actually try to help people in our society. What we do know is that one of the drivers of crime is not your immigration status, but your socioeconomic status. And a lot of times poverty is what drives crime. People in desperate, desperate situations are more likely to try to get out of that desperate situation in a way that might not be legally sound. 

So, if that is the case, then why is the GOP not as adamant about making sure that people have their basic needs? Why are the GOP's policies not focused on adequate public education? Why is it not focused on feeding children? In fact, our governor has done the opposite and literally turned away the federal funds to feed children. Why are the GOP policies not focused on affordable housing and making sure people have a place to live? Why is it not focused on raising wages so people can afford to live in the communities that they work? Why are their policies just like, “we're just going to focus on a group of people that we can attack” instead of “Let's focus on the policies that we know, because there's actual data out there, that can actually reduce crime, reduce recidivism for those who have already committed crimes.” Like, why don't we focus on that? 

So when I think about immigration, I think about the richness and the diversity of my district and the contributions of the people who come from all over the world, while my counterparts on the other side of the aisle see an opportunity, a political opportunity to attack a certain group of people.

Narrator: Congresswoman Delia Ramirez sees similar dysfunction on the national level. And polls show that very few Americans, even Republicans, think politicians are doing the right thing.

Rep. Ramirez: When you talk to people, you talk to Americans, you poll them, 70 percent of them say, “do something about immigration. Enough is enough. Give people the legal access to be in this country and continue to contribute to this country.” When it comes to Dreamers, over 70%, even Republicans, want to see a pathway, but their elected officials are not at, you know, they're not acting inconsistent with their own constituents. 

So we have to do something, but we actually have to be serious about addressing the issues. And of course, we have to be serious about addressing issues of security, security concerns at the border. And the humanitarian crisis has been manufactured by decades of political inaction. But we have to move beyond the border and we have to also talk about the root causes of migration. And that's going to take a Congress that wants to move from politicizing people to actually addressing issues of solutions. And dealing with the number one issue at the doors. It's not the border. It's the economy. And immigrants can strengthen this economy.

Narrator: This is hardly the first time that immigration has become a galvanizing issue for extremists.

Dr. Nancy: Yeah, that is such a deep vein in American history. I think partly because we were a creedal nation, you know, like we're, we stand for these values and commitments, but people are coming from all over and whenever people get anxious, they freak out.

Narrator: That’s Dr. Nancy MacLean, the author of “Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right's Stealth Plan for America.”

Dr. Nancy: So this goes back, like, to the 1840s, to the Know Nothings, you know, who were terrified about Catholic immigrants in particular and thought that they would just be the end of the Republic. They would destroy everything. That goes up through the 1890s. You know, very, very strong anti-Catholic organizations, but also groups who are against all the so-called new immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe. 

So my first book actually was on the Ku Klux Klan of the 1920s. It's actually coming out on the 30th year anniversary, since it's more relevant again, but it's coming out this summer. But basically, the Ku Klux Klan was the original, you could say, Christian nationalist movement in this country. And they brought together any hatred you could think of, just like MAGA in a lot of ways, right? I mean, I shouldn't be laughing, but it's so awful, you have to laugh. 

But one thing that's interesting about human beings, and I'm sure you see this in your work, because most people are basically decent, kind, and, you know, we like each other, and we don't want to cause each other trouble. And so it's very hard, actually, to make human beings aggressive, right, to turn them into hateful attackers. And the Ku Klux Klan in 1920s and in the, you know, 1870s for that matter, they really pioneered this way of treating the people you're attacking as threats. Because that licenses the aggression, right?

So they were actually attacking these Catholic immigrants, attacking Jewish immigrants, attacking African Americans, you know, attacking liberal clergy. But they were saying to their own members, just like Fox does all the time and right wing talk radio, that they are threatening you. Right? They're taking your jobs. They're taking your life. They're ruining your country. They're corrupting your children's morals, et cetera, et cetera. And the psychological power of that is again, most of us won't attack unprovoked, but if you make it look like it's self defense, then we will. So it's really, it's pretty diabolical, but the pattern, once you know the pattern from history you can see it.

Narrator: Anti-immigrant rhetoric has always gone hand in hand with authoritarianism. In the 1930s and 40s, Joseph Stalin deported over 3 million people in a project of ethnic cleansing - and around 40 percent of them died from hunger and disease. Around the same time, in Italy, dictator Benito Mussolini endorsed a manifesto that stated, quote, "it is time that Italians proclaim themselves to be openly racist."

And in the current day, Viktor Orban, the authoritarian leader of Hungary, is following suit. Orban has proudly implemented the strictest anti-immigration policies in all of Europe, and has said things like “Hungarians do not want to be a mixed race.” It’s important to note that Trump and JD Vance openly admire Orban, and his policies are the blueprint for Project 2025.

As Nancy said, it starts with dehumanizing people.

Trump: The 22 year old nursing student in Georgia who was barbarically murdered by an illegal alien animal, and the Democrats say, “please don't call them animals. They're humans.” I said, “no, they're not humans. They're not humans. They're animals.”

Narrator: It makes me sick to hear those words. Every person in this country, no matter the color of their skin or their country of origin, is a human being. It seems crazy to need to say that, but in this moment it’s necessary.

In fact, Trump has used some of the exact same language as Hitler when discussing immigrants. At a campaign rally in New Hampshire, he said that immigrants are “poisoning the blood of our country.” Hitler used that exact same rhetoric, speaking of, quote, “impure Jewish blood” “poisoning” Germany to justify the Holocaust.

And make no mistake, the dehumanization of immigrants is leading to tragedy right here in America too.

News clip: In Eagle Pass, Texas, rows of makeshift crosses mark the final resting place of unidentified migrants. The grave digger here tells Telemundo more than he's ever buried before. Among the bodies recovered, a five year old girl who was swept out of her mother's arms last month and drowned just across the border from El Paso.

Narrator: And those who survive are often treated like cargo, shipped to sanctuary states by Republican governors like Greg Abbott and Ron DeSantis. Again, we’re talking about dehumanizing people to score political points.

News clip: Many of these asylum seekers are from Venezuela and Cuba. They were processed by federal immigration officials in Texas, and now many are at local churches here in D. C. Texas Governor Abbott says he will continue sending migrants to sanctuary cities like D. C. until, in his words, quote, Biden and Harris do their jobs to secure the border.

Dr. Sara: Well, I think this issue gets weaponized, particularly in the presidential campaigns, by talking at length about this crisis at the border, in which, yes, there are, there are issues at the border. Is it the number one issue impacting the United States? I'm not so sure about that. And do we not already have solutions that yes, need to be improved upon, but you know, but that could ultimately be helpful in these scenarios. 

Narrator: This again is Dr. Sara Sadhwani, professor of politics and immigration at Pomona College.

Dr. Sara: I think we are most certainly seeing the weaponization of immigrants at the presidential level, and of course at the state level as well. I think for Texas and Florida that began shipping immigrants to other places, it was a very interesting strategy.

First, it's incredibly inhumane. I mean, these are people and oftentimes families with children who are getting dropped off in random places. They had no idea oftentimes even where they were being dropped off. We had several bus loads come here in Los Angeles and other parts of California. 

But I also think at the same time, it highlighted how, how the border issues disproportionately impact border states as well. What we saw in response to immigrants being taken to places like New York City and Massachusetts was a bit of a response saying, “Hey, we already are handling a whole large number of people who are experiencing homelessness to now have to house immigrants who have come across the border is problematic. And there are not necessarily enough resources to go around.” And that was one of the things that we saw. Democrats from some of these states responding and calling on, on President Biden to do more at the border. 

So yes, I think the treatment of immigrants was horrific, to put them onto buses and ship them off as if their lives didn't matter. And to leave them in places sometimes in the cold. But at the same time, I think what we saw was also Democratic governors coming out and saying, “you're right, this is a problem and we can't handle it either. And we do need to have additional resources for managing this program and these migrants who are coming in.”

Narrator: Just crossing the border is a scary and dehumanizing experience. In the first episode of this series we met Nuvia, a young woman from Honduras who fled to the United States with her mother. Nuvia had no idea how dangerous the journey would be, and how making it to the border was just the beginning.

Nuvia: So when we made it to the U. S. border, I thought that, oh, we made it. We were safe. But then they started to kind of, kind of asking to get on our knees, to put our hands up. Just like, I felt like they were treating me like if I was carrying something or maybe like a criminal. And I felt scared because it was hard because I saw this police officer with their trucks and all their, their, they were armed and, and, you know, like they had all their suits on. And so it was kind of like scary. It's like, is something going to happen or what? 

And so they were really strict. Then they put us into a van. I don't know. Then we kind of like, made a stop on the wall, I don't know, like a metal wall that you see sometimes in between Mexico and Texas. And then they, they started asking us questions like, “Where do you come from? Why are you here?” All those kinds of questions. And I remember I was carrying my little stuffy, it was kind of like a bunny stuffy, that one of my friends gave me. And they asked me for that. And I said, but I want to hold on to it. Like it's valuable to me. But they said, “I don't mind, like, you know, I don't care. I need to have it. I need to check it. I cannot just kind of like give it back to you.”

Narrator: That’s right. They took a child’s stuffed animal, one of the only things she was able to bring with her on the long journey to America. They also confiscated all of their medications, including Nuvia’s asthma inhaler.

Nuvia: Yeah, they, they, they took our medications or things and they threw it in the trash, which we didn't even know why because they didn't even tell us if it was expired or not. And so we tried to talk to them about our medicines and they didn't give us any answers.

And then they put us into a kind of like a room. It was one, it was closed, it was only one door. We were mixed with men, women, children, and we only had one toilet in a place where to drink water from, like a water fountain. We started talking to people in there and apparently there were people that were in there for more than us. Probably like three weeks or maybe they didn't know because they couldn't even see daylight or anything. Just like a criminal would be. I mean in our minds we weren't doing something really bad or illegal. I mean, at that point, that's what I thought. I was like, “I'm just running for my life here. I'm not coming to do any damage or anything like that. I just want the opportunity to live a normal life where I don't have to hide and run.”

Narrator: After that, she and her mother were separated.

Nuvia: The minors, I think, if they were maybe like 12 and older until 17, they were going into a separate cage. I call them cages because it's just like cages for humans. And then my mom was separated into another cage for other parents that had children, like teenage children, teenagers, and, and, and then or they were there with their parents if they were, you know, 12 and under.

We didn't know if it was day. We didn't know if it was night. We only saw people coming in and people going. Just going out. The officers too. It was just, it was just like so bad because then I started to feel like my energy was going down and the only thing I wanted to do is, when is it going to end? Where are we going to leave? When am I going to see my mom? So all of those questions just kind of like in my mind. It was tough. Not a good experience.

Dr. Sara: We hear these campaigns talking about getting tough on immigration and pushing for a crackdown on immigration. The fact of the matter is that in most polling data, more than 60 percent of Americans actually support humane immigration policies. Those images of immigrant families, women, children being locked in cages, children being separated from their parents. That doesn't sit well with most Americans. 

And yes, we need some solutions. But they need to be humane. And so while we hear all this talk of being tough on immigration, it's not exactly what it is that the American people want. And I think that's an important one is a balanced approach that yes, will incorporate border management, but also pathways to citizenship and opportunities for the immigrants who do come and are participating in our neighborhoods and our communities and in our economy as well.

Narrator: So what can we actually do, politically? Can we find a bipartisan solution? 

Not as long as we keep electing politicians who care more about their own political power than they do about finding actual solutions. In May of this year, Republicans in the Senate killed a bipartisan immigration bill.

Here’s what Chris Murphy, a Democratic Senator from Connecticut, had to say about it on the Senate floor.

Senator Murphy: Republicans said that fixing the border was their top priority. They appointed a hardline conservative, my friend, Senator James Lankford, to come up with a bipartisan bill to fix the border. They said if Lankford can get the deal, they'd support it. We got that deal. But within hours of the bill's release, Republicans killed it. When it came to the floor, only four Republicans voted for the bill they asked for. 

Because Republicans do not want to fix the border. Secret's out. For Republicans, the border is a money making grievance machine. And if we passed our border bill, and fixed the problem, Republicans literally wouldn't know what to do with their days. Donald Trump does not see the border as a problem that needs to be fixed. Donald Trump sees the border as a problem to be exploited. He openly brags about instructing his followers here in the United States Senate to kill the bipartisan border bill because its passage would have been good for Joe Biden and the country.

Rep. Ramirez: We haven't done anything substantial around immigration since 1986. I was three years old. I'm 41. My parents are US citizens today because a Republican, Reagan, gave them amnesty. We haven't done anything since then that has been substantial to deal with the issue of immigration because every time we start talking about immigration, we start going into the border and then we bundle it all together and do nothing around it.

And that has been really devastating because you have people in this country who, like my uncle Tio Chilano, who has been here for 35 years, put four boys through college, his wife just became a U.S. citizen on August 8th, and he has no pathway because of something that was wrongfully put in his record in 1980. And there are millions of people who came after 1981, came in 1987, 1988, 1989, who missed the amnesty period who have no pathway because they entered through the southern border. And in some cases, they married a US citizen, but they have some form of bar that precludes them from US citizenship. 

So look, we've tried to pass comprehensive immigration reform in this country a number of times. Just a few years ago, we almost passed comprehensive immigration reform. And then in the Senate, it was at a standstill. Senator Warren reminded me of this, if that bill would have passed four or five years ago, it would have extended social security by four decades. And yet, it didn't pass.

We passed the Promise and Dream Act, which is a pathway to citizenship for dreamers two years ago in the House. It never went anywhere in the Senate. I mean, think about just how bad it is that kids that came here when they were three and four, they didn't come here from their own will. They were babies. They don't even know anyone back in Mexico or in Guatemala or in Costa Rica, wherever they came from. We can't even pass legislation to give them a pathway to citizenship. Yet about a third of them were the healthcare workers that kept us alive during the pandemic. It's horrifying, right?

Narrator: What does Dr. Sara think should be done in terms of policies around immigration?

Dr. Sara: You know, I teach a course on immigration politics and policy. And so I ask this of my students as well. And honestly, they spend the entire semester kind of contemplating like, well, what, what would fix it? And essentially, for the last several decades, we've used a policy of deterrence, of trying to stop people from coming through the border, as opposed to trying to stop the reasons why they are coming in the first place.

We have a very large number of people today, more so from Central America, but before that also from Mexico, crossing, attempting to cross the border. They attempt to cross because the situation is bad in their home countries. And if we look historically to places like El Salvador and other, and other places, the U.S. played a role historically in, in why those countries continue to be volatile and violent to, towards, towards their residents. So I think taking a more comprehensive look at what's happening south of our border in those countries. 

And that's not to suggest that we go and interfere in their, in their, in their policies, but perhaps there's investments that can be made in some of our neighbors, neighboring countries that could help improve the lives of people so that perhaps they don't have such a strong need to come and attempt to cross this border. 

That's a long term solution, obviously but this policy of building walls and just trying to deter people from coming isn't working. We've tried that. So what's the broader approach, right? And we certainly are willing to invest billions of dollars in other countries that are facing violence and attack. Somehow we are not willing to do that for our neighbors.

Narrator: That’s something that Kamala Harris has already been working on. Republicans have been calling her the “border czar” –

Trump: Joe Biden made her the border czar, and that’s when it really got bad.

Narrator: But that’s not a title or a job she ever actually held. What President Biden did was put her in charge of diplomatic efforts to improve conditions in Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador, in the hopes that people like Nuvia and her mother won’t need to leave their home in the first place. That’s one of the approaches that Professor Sara Sadhwani suggested, but it’s about long-term investments, not quick fixes.

Harris has also pledged to strengthen border security and pass the bipartisan border deal. Not everyone agrees with that bill - like Representative Ramirez, who’s criticized it for not going far enough to protect immigrants and asylum seekers. But balancing humanitarian needs with national security is far from simple, and the Democratic Party is a big tent where we all can have a voice.

Here’s what VP Harris said about it at the Democratic National Convention.

Kamala: After decades in law enforcement, I know the importance of safety and security, especially at our border. Last year, Joe and I brought together Democrats and conservative Republicans to write the strongest border bill in decades. The Border Patrol endorsed it. But Donald Trump believes a border deal would hurt his campaign.

So he ordered his allies in Congress to kill the deal. Well, I refuse to play politics with our security. And here is my pledge to you. As president, I will bring back the bipartisan border security bill that he killed, and I will sign it into law. I know - I know we can live up to that. To our proud heritage as a nation of immigrants and reform our broken immigration system. We can create an earned pathway to citizenship and secure our border.

Narrator: The choice is clear. Would we rather have a President and a Congress who want to find bipartisan solutions? Or would we rather have someone who calls immigrants “animals” and “a poison”?  If we want real change, we need to elect Democrats… not just into the White House, but up and down the ballot. And just voting isn’t enough. We need to talk to everyone we know. 

No one knows the power of conversations better than Katie Paris, the founder of Red Wine & Blue.

Katie Paris: So the heart of what we do at Red Wine and Blue is called relational organizing. It just means friend to friend, family member to family member, folks in your social circles, the people that you know. it's really as old as time, you know, like whenever you want to get something done, right, you reach out to the people you know, to talk about what you care about and what you might be able to do about it together.

In modern sort of politics, we have shifted to the more traditional campaign tactics where volunteers enlist with a campaign and then they reach out to strangers through texting and door knocking and postcards and letters and all those ways. And what we know is that if any form of communication is actually exchanged between people who already know each other, It's a whole lot more effective, which sounds pretty intuitive, right? I mean, because it is. But it's just become more and more true in a day and age in which people are far less trusting of new sources and just sort of institutions and folks in positions of authority. We trust the people we know, kind of like, full stop. So at Red Wine & Blue that’s what we're focused on.

And this, I think, is really important for suburban women, because we are all about our networks and our communities, right? Whether that is - I mean, look, I'm a soccer mom. I'll like, you know, own up to the stereotype. And it's a really strong network. Who was I partying with on New Year's Eve? My soccer mom friends, right? So, these are really powerful networks, because we are tied together in our communities through our kids and other things that we care about. And so our goal is in getting women to feel confident to talk about things like voting and elections and issues with the people that they know.

That's called relational organizing. That's relational voter outreach. Just talking to the people that you know, and getting them to, maybe if they already vote, getting them to care a little bit more. So maybe they talk to 5 friends too. And getting past the assumption that, “oh, everybody I know votes.” Well, guess what? Just look at the stats in America or any community, any suburb anywhere. There are huge percentages of people not voting. So, guess what? That means it means that you and I have a whole lot of power to impact the outcome of these elections. If we can just dig deep and find some confidence to have these conversations.

Rep. Ramirez: I often tell people we have to stop asking people to get civically engaged out of fear and instead out of joy and out of hope. We have to make sure that when people are asked to go out and vote, that we are asking them to go vote concretely for things that matter for them, their ability to purchase a home, especially because 25 percent of millennials believe they will never be able to buy a home, not with the economy that we live in right now, the ability to be able to retire with dignity. When you think about so many people who can't even imagine having to be taken care of by their children, or the fear of not being able to have home care. The reality is that so many young people have to live in the fear that their parents might get deported depending on who becomes president.

But it goes further than that, right? Because they're also hopeful that not only will they end up being able to elect someone who won't deport their parents, but they're hopeful that it will mean that they will be able to elect people that will actually vote for immigration reform that will bring stability to our communities.

And so, what I'm asking people today, as we talk about immigration, as we talk about the southern border, as we talk about families, let's come back to our own immigration story. Let's come back to our own family story. And let's come back to the possibility that if people organize, that if people hold their elected officials accountable, and if people remind us of where we come from and what we say we stand for, then we'll be giving people something to vote for.

And then after we elect whoever it is that we're electing, hopefully people that are going to stand on policies of solution, that we are also going to hold us accountable to stop making excuses and actually get to the solutions that create stability in every single neighborhood in this country.

And for this little girl, this daughter of Guatemalan immigrants, you have made it possible for me to become the first of many Latinas, many women to represent us in Congress, not just in the Midwest, but throughout. But it only happens when people get civically engaged, support, and also hold us accountable because you are calling us to do the work that we campaign on, and it is our responsibility to honor those promises.

Narrator: I asked my husband Alex if he had any final thoughts and he had something similar to say.

Rachel: What do you wish people knew about immigration? If you could say one thing that you wish people knew, what would it be?

Alex: That immigrants and immigration add to America's strength. And if you are a true patriot, you should think about what's good for the nation and that it's critical that we continue to welcome immigrants. And I think, you know, to me, it's abundantly clear that immigrants are the way we solve problems here going forward.

Narrator: Alex is right - immigrants are not a problem. They’re a solution. They strengthen our economy, our military, and our diversity. And nothing speaks to the promise of America more than a naturalization ceremony.

Rep. Ramirez: I tell you, just last week, I went to a naturalization ceremony. 981 people from 97 countries showed up to Wrigley Field where the Cubs play, with their family members, wearing their Sunday's best. In some cases, some folks purchased clothes that they will never wear again for this very special moment.

So many of them, like my Aunt Corina, who showed up, who for decades have waited for this moment to finally become a naturalized U. S. citizen. Many of them didn't sleep the night before, in anxiety, waiting for that moment. And as the judge swore them in, they made pledges to this country that most U.S. citizens have never made, who were born here. And you saw their face as they raised her hand and as they put their hand on their chest, committing a pledge of allegiance to this country. A country that for them is a country of liberation and freedom and equality for all. And a reminder that these beautiful faces is what makes this country the possibility of a great country.

Narrator: In 1883, Emma Lazarus wrote a poem she titled “The New Colossus,” which is inscribed on the Statue of Liberty:

“Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she

With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Our nation has always been a nation made up of a patchwork of people from all over the world who come to our shores to find safe harbor and opportunity. Our diversity is our strength, and it is my hope you will listen to this series and be reminded of all the ways immigrants add to our communities, our economy, and our culture.

The values of America are on the line in November. It is absolutely critical that we vote and that we make sure that everyone we know votes too. 

Who we elect this year will determine more than just our policies - they will redefine the soul of our nation. Extremists like Donald Trump want us to be a nation of hate. Kamala Harris, Tim Walz, and all of the incredible leaders on the state and local level want to lead us back to our ideals. We’re a nation of immigrants. A nation of hope and opportunity. 

So it’s up to us now. Let’s make sure that on election day, freedom and hope triumph. I’m Rachel Vindman, and this has been The American Fabric.