A 'Dreamer' Goes to Washington

Refusing to change out of her turtleneck on a sweltering day in Pasadena and being captivated by swaying palm trees.

That’s most of what Miriam Tellez Sorrosa remembers about arriving in the United States from Mexico when she was 7.

“I had not seen palm trees in my life,” she said. “I thought they were going to fall.”

Tellez Sorrosa is now 22 and a “Dreamer” — she’s among the roughly 700,000 young immigrants brought into the United States as children, who were shielded from deportation under the Obama-era program known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals.

She’s getting ready to graduate from Cal State University Fullerton, where she’s worked extensively with other students in the country illegally through the school’s Titan Dreamers Resource Center.

And on Tuesday, at the invitation of Rep. Gil Cisneros, D-Calif., she was in the chambers of the U.S. House of Representatives as President Donald Trump delivered his State of the Union address.

Cisneros, who represents the 39th District, which includes parts of Los Angeles, Orange and San Bernardino counties, said he wanted the president to see that students like Tellez Sorrosa are assets to the country.

“This is her home; this is where she wants to make a difference, and we need to be embracing that,” he said.

While Trump has consistently used dire language about immigrants who come into the country illegally, his position on DACA recipients has shifted.

In 2017, he moved to end DACA, then in January, he offered to extend protections for DACA recipients in exchange for border wall funding.

In the State of the Union, he returned to describing a crisis on the border.

I talked to Tellez Sorrosa on Wednesday about visiting Washington and listening to the president. Here’s our conversation, edited for length and clarity.

Q: What did being at the State of the Union represent for you?

A: I think the biggest thing for me was just understanding the history of it, to think the place where I was going to be was the place where generations of individuals were making laws that now affect me.

What being undocumented means to me is my resilient identity. So for me, I feel like it’s almost like a responsibility and a necessity to share my experience.

Q: What was it like to be in Washington as the guest of a congressman?

A: Yesterday there was a period of time where I was shadowing him in his meetings and that just blew my mind.

What I love about it, too, was that everybody’s experience and narrative is unique and there’s not like, “This person’s guest is more important than this person’s guest.” It was just a handful of American people being present. That was one of the most magical things, to share the room. I feel like that’s what America always strives to be: With the people and for the people.

Q: Was there another guest that you really felt like you connected with?

A: I was super excited to hear that there were going to be more DACA recipients attending and there was this moment where we were all in the same room. I was just like, “Yes.”

Q: What was it like listening to the speech?

A: In a way, I was happy about where my seat was. I couldn’t really see him. It helped me just listen to what he was saying. There were things where I was like, “I believe this, too.”

When he talked about immigration and immigrants, I paid a lot more attention. I think because I’ve known his rhetoric and how he talked about immigrants, that wasn’t a surprise. I was indifferent to it.

But I’m learning research now as a sociologist, and I was like, there’s so many potential flaws in this. I want to know where your information is coming from.

Q: Do you mind if I ask what you wore?

A: I laugh because I was freaking out about what to wear. I was coming into a space where these people are people with power, economic status, everything. How do I fit in? I think I went the safe route, wearing business professional clothing. I did wear a white shirt in support of a lot of congresswomen.

On campus, we have a Dreamers’ graduation and in our Dreamers’ graduation we have a sash. So I actually asked for my sash in advance as a statement piece. I was hoping it would spark dialogue.

Q: How are you going to use this experience going forward?

A: I’m definitely not as afraid as I was before.

I have until 2020 with my permit. And that’s kind of my safety net, so I’m going to try to do as much as possible while I have DACA and I’m going to continue to advocate for something bigger that will just benefit not only the Dreamers, quote-unquote.

Q: Last question: Do you think that you might want to run for office someday?

A: One of my Lyft drivers, as I was telling him about why I’m here, he was like, “I like how you talk, you should run for office.” And I was like, “Would I have your vote?” He was like, “Yes!”

Definitely, being here and being present and seeing people being passionate about moving forward the agendas that are important to them and making every single topic special and important has motivated me to get more involved.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.