All right, let's start to take our seats.  First of all thank you guys so much for being here. I'm really overwhelmed by the turnout and what it says to me is that this is a city that cares very much about everyone who lives here. So thank you so much for coming out on a Sunday to be here with us. Now for those of you who I haven't met, my name is Diego Bernal. I'm your friendly estate representative for House District 123. I just want to give you a quick background of where this came from. After the election I spent about a week and a half being the district grief counselor and with lots of people coming to me asking me what to do next, where do we go, what's going to happen and there were a group of people, a group of students in particular who were concerned about this issue, what's next for Dreamers. And unfortunately the truth is that we don't know anything with certainty but I promise them that we would get them as much information as we possibly could so that everyone is standing on the firmest ground possible and we can sort of move together as an informed community and that is what is here today. Before I continue, Maria Rocha, where is she? All right, we have translation services. If anyone needs translation, we have folks. Okay. And also we're being broadcast live on Nowcast. We appreciate you guys being here and helping spread the word. Also just know that they operate through donations. They provide this public service through donations so consider that. I'd like to thank UTSA, the College of Public Policy, the Center for Civic Engagement, Dr. Lajerio Sainz, Michelle Skidmore, Carolina Canizales, where is she? She's been wonderful. Thank you so much for helping us organize this. You've done an amazing job. Thank you. Brian Halderman, Maria Rocha again. Thank you so much. These people have done a tremendous amount of work to help us organize this. Now, again, before we start, I want to explain to you, you may have seen the flyer, and on the flyer is a very, very, very long list of elected folks. They're not going to get to talk really. Two of them are, but the rest aren't, and if they all were, we'd be here for hours before we got to it. So, and I explained that to them, and they were good sports about it, but I want to read the list of people who have signed on this to the event so you know how many of your elected folks not only care about this issue, but are willing to put their name on something to show the community that they have their back. So, bear with me while I read their names. We have State Senator Jose Menendez, State Senator Carlos Suresi, State Representative Barbara Gervin Hopkins, State Representative Roland Gutierrez, State Representative Justin Rodriguez, State Representative Diana Revolo, State Representative Ine Minhares, State Representative Tomas Suresi, State Representative Philip Cortez, County Judge Nelson Wolfe, County Commissioner Paul Elizondo, County Commissioner Tommy Calvert, County Commissioner Chico Rodriguez, City Councilman Roberto Trevino who's here, City Councilman Alan Warwick, Councilman Rebecca Villagran who's also here, Councilman Ray Saldana who's here, Councilman Shirley Gonzales who's here, Councilman Ray Lopez, Councilman Ron Nuremberg, also would like to recognize one of my former colleagues, Leticia Ozuna, former Councilman for District 3 and there's also someone here from the mayor's office. So just know that this is not something that in the past I think a lot of elected folks would have shied away from and been afraid to put their name behind and in this case we have easily the lion's share of elected people in this city willing to put their name on it. So I appreciate that very much. Now there are two people who I didn't list because you're going to hear from them right now. This is essentially a federal issue and it is important that we hear from our folks from the US Congress but I also want to just make the point that in this city we are really blessed to have two real advocates who represent us and swing the bat really hard. So I'm going to start with Congressman Joaquin Castro who's going to make opening remarks and then he'll be followed by Congressman Doggett. Good afternoon. How's everybody doing? It's wonderful to be with you. I want to say first of all to everybody here thank you for taking the time to be here. Thank you for caring enough about the Dreamers to spend time on Sunday as advocates on their behalf. Thank you to Diego Bidnau for spearheading this effort to bring us all together to my colleague Lloyd Doggett in US Congress who has been a champion of the Dreamers for so long now and to all the other elected officials who put their name on this invitation to show first of all how important an issue this is but also the fact that many elected officials in San Antonio and in Bear County are with these young people and care about their futures and about their fates. This situation got tougher after the November election obviously and there's been a lot of uncertainty about exactly what will happen to our young people but just on Friday there's been a glimmer of hope that things will turn out okay. On Friday there was a bipartisan bill that was filed in the United States Senate by Senators Durbin of Illinois and Senator Graham a Republican of South Carolina called the Bridge Act and I'd like to read you a little bit about what that act says now this is of course it's been filed it's a proposal it would have to pass the Senate and also have to pass the House and be signed by the President but more recently during the campaign candidate Trump obviously was very derogatory I think about immigrants in general and also very pessimistic about the fate of Dreamers more recently he seemed to change his tone a little bit talking about how we need to essentially do right by them so you know he kind of flip-flops back and forth on a lot of things I hope that that will be his position ultimately once he takes president once he becomes president but let me give you a little bit of a brief on the bill real quick. So the Bridge Act filed by Dick Durbin and Senator Graham this bipartisan bill would provide three years of protection for young people that were brought to the U.S. as children. The bill follows the same set of standards established by President Obama through his 2012 DACA executive actions. The bill would protect young Dreamers from deportation and provide them with the legal authority to continue working and studying in the United States. The program would provide a provisional protected presence for those with DACA or those that are eligible for DACA. So in other words it wouldn't just be the people that have already signed up for DACA it would be it would be beyond that. Just like DACA these young Dreamers would be subject to similar criminal background checks and fees. However under this legislation young folks would be protected for three years rather than the two years currently available under DACA. Please know that in Lloyd and I and so many other folks in Congress you have strong voices up there arguing that that these young people are not criminals that they are just as American as those of us that were born in the United States that they deserve a future that all of us should stand up for them. I think that that sentiment is shared by almost all Democrats but also I believe many Republicans and I'm hoping that that's going to be true once we go beyond January 20th and so I know I don't want to take up too much time because you probably want to hear from the experts here the legal experts but I just want to say you guys know that we're in for the long haul and we're in for a fight and we all got to be prepared for that. There may be some days that are grim and some that are rosy but in the end I think that if we all work hard if we all come together and if we all tell the story about who the dreamers are I believe that in the end things will work out so thank y'all. Thank you Joaquin, Congressman Doggett please. Thank you. Well Diego thank you so much for taking the lead on this and Joaquin is not only participating here but he was the first person in Congress to call on all of our colleagues to hold forums excuse me like this all over the country and I think you said you've got about a dozen of them already organized so this is we're part of a national movement thanks to Diego we're at the front part of the national movement. I'm here because I believe in our dreamers. I believe in what you are contributing now and what you can contribute to make this an even greater country and this is all about our being in solidarity to assure that your dreams are fulfilled. Like everyone else here probably it wasn't a dream but a nightmare on election night when Donald Trump was elected and in 40 days 40 short days he takes the oath of office as Joaquin suggested predicting what he will do is a little like predicting the weather in Washington on inauguration day. I can tell you that it will be very cold it will make yesterday here in San Antonio look like a spring day but whether it's so cold and stormy that it becomes dangerous I'm not sure and the same is true regarding the Trump administration as it relates to the dreamers we know in so many other areas in civil liberties and social services and health care it's going to be potentially catastrophic but as to the dreamers where the case is so strong for those who've already cleared a criminal background check and paid a fee and are contributing to our country and our schools the case is very strong for the bridge act or for something to address this problem. I know we've all heard of calling through the election process for putting an end to all of the executive orders of President Obama. I was encouraged in a limited way with this comment that he made just this past week to Time Magazine in his Man of the Year interview when he said quote some were referring to the dreamers some were good students some have wonderful jobs and they're a never never land because they don't know what's going to happen we're going to work something out that's going to make people happy and proud well I'm not sure if what makes Donald Trump happy and proud is what will make us proud but it is a change in tone and the reaction of Speaker Ryan to the bridge act and to Trump's comments has been encouraging I believe you will hear from the experts about people that are in different stages of the process in terms of whether you've got DACA already whether you have a work permit up for renewal whether you're considering applying in the future many individual cases in our office as I know it's true of Joaquin's we're available to back up these experts and to try to help wherever we can on individual cases as we've done in the past surely the most infamous claim of Donald Trump during the campaign that we all know about was he's going to build a wall and Mexico will pay for it and while that's all rather stupid and wasteful I think the real danger from the campaign to all of us is the walls that he's tried to build between us within this country and our effort for the dreamers just like our broader effort on immigrant families being torn apart is how we overcome the walls that Donald Trump has already begun building with extremists within our country that is also a factor in the way for years immigration concerns dreamers families coming here the insensitivity of ice to the families that were dropped on san Antonio in the middle of the night last week last weekend all of these things conflate security with immigration there is the the appointment of a general to head homeland security the suggestion that our national security is somehow threatened by those who are among us and contributing as immigrants we have to overcome and I would just ask you as we move forward to help us to help you we can't do it alone with just votes in congress we've got to overcome those walls that trump has built and so for dreamers every school that you're at every business that you're employed by every chamber of commerce or trade or professional group that that business is a part of they need to be helping us uh even some of the groups from san Antonio that come to see us every year have kind of wavered back and forth through the years on how strongly they would advocate for dreamers we have a number of leaders as well from the city here we need every level of government to express itself in support of our dreamers we need every one of those businesses every one of those schools to speak up in support of our dreamers uh I do want to recognize that we have many folks that have been recognized from san Antonio greg where councilman greg casar came in with councilman saldanya a minute ago right here so councilman casar who began at workers defense project is a great advocate now serves on the austin city council and has been a point person up there and is raising some of these issues uh believe you said this thursday at the austin city council but at all of our units of government we just need a collective message going up to president elect trump to our republican colleagues and certainly to reinforce all of our democrats we stand with the dreamers we will not go back we will not accept going back on the dreamers and then we need to ask all of those folks and I'm I'm available to to support any reasonable nonviolent form of opposition to attempts to undermine dreamers but we need to ask everybody as you look at ways of protesting what's going on is what you're doing helping us win over the people we need or is it turning them away from us a good example of that in my opinion is what happened up in hampshire college in new england with some students burning the american flag you know we need to be not defacing the flag we need to be wrapping ourselves in it because what is more american than immigrants except for our native americans we're all immigrants and we need to be affirming that and saying that there is nothing more american than our support for our dreamers and for our immigrants here and those symbols will become really important as the trump and the trumpets are looking for any justification for deporting people or undermining and and satisfying some of his most ridiculous promises so we're here to listen and learn from you and your experiences and to look how we can build coalitions that are broader that reach out and include more people so that we stand firmly on the side of our dreamers and then we move on to deal with some of the other big immigration issues that are remaining on our agenda most of which will never be repaired until this administration is out and some new people are in thank you Diego thank you congressman dogged congressman castro before we get to the experts i think it's important that we don't talk about these students these people as if they're not here so i'd like to bring up the immigrant youth leadership DACA group here Carlos Aguilar and Narda Martinez to talk about really the the main reason why we're here come on hello everyone my name is Narda Martinez science i am co-coordinator of the immigrant youth leadership organization here at UTSA and i just want to invite every immigrant youth student at UTSA and allied to come and join our group this upcoming semester and i just want to say a few words so within the last year oh sorry i wanted to thank everyone that is present today for taking your time um to attend today and for taking um support to the UTSA and city of san antonio dreamers we are here today to present our organization and invite you like i said and within the last year i don't think we ever imagined that we would be here standing in this room again fighting and advocating for our futures but we are and we will keep fighting as we have had in years past to have you here is a reminder that our dreamers who hold and don't hold DACA are important to our city we know that we are worth fighting for so that together we can keep providing new ideas work passion and love to the city the state and this country as a DACA holder as a dreamer i do thank you i've taken so many great things i've had so many opportunities since i've been a holder of DACA and i want to keep doing so much more for this city and this country my dreams are only to provide more for our future students and our future citizens of this country so thank you so much again as a dreamer and as a citizen a citizen of this beautiful city of san antonio thank you for being here Buenos tardes mi nombre es Carlos Aguilar soy un estudiante de maestría en la universidad de tagas en san antonio y estamos aquí porque vamos a pelear por los derechos y por todo lo que merecemos como comunidad principalmente estamos aquí para presentarles una un proyecto que que comenzó con el afán de apoyarnos unos a otros porque es muy difícil ser indocumentado ser estudiante DACA y no saber quién está con nosotros y creo que lo importante y lo más principal es saber que nosotros como estudiantes estamos los unos con nosotros entonces a dejándola saber esto voy a leer algo que escribí para ustedes creada con el afán de proveer apoyo mutuo a nuestros compañeros indocumentados y beneficiaros de DACA en la universidad de tejas en san antonio y sin tener inicialmente pensado el oficializar una organización hoy me encuentro frente a ustedes para presentarles un proyecto que nace de la necesidad de cuidarnos unos a otros en la lucha por dignidad respeto y tolerancia no solamente para estudiantes pero para nuestras familias y nuestra comunidad porque el verdadero cambio comienza con nosotros mismos porque nuestros padres sacrificaron demasiado por una vida de oportunidades esta es nuestra oportunidad guiados por principios característicos de nuestra comunidad como el trabajo harto la disciplina el respeto y el deseo de sobresalir y preparados académicamente por un sistema educativo que nos enseña a ser americanos y que nos induce a ser cívica y políticamente activos en este país nuestro país esta es nuestra oportunidad quien sabe cuál sea el destino de DACA mañana pero DACA no nos define con o sin DACA nuestra comunidad es vital en esta sociedad de los estados unidos con o sin DACA nuestros niños y jóvenes han sobresalido en las escuelas de este país con o sin DACA nosotros definiremos nuestro destino y el destino de nuestra comunidad en los estados unidos porque esta es nuestra oportunidad hoy les hago un llamado para que se una nuestra causa y dicho sea de paso le reitero que no es tan solos y que nuestra organización en la universidad de tejas en san antonio está con ustedes como organización estudiantil en la universidad de tejas en san antonio haremos uso de esta oportunidad para luchar por la mejora de nuestras condiciones educativas y laborales dentro de esta institución como meta final buscamos el éxito académico de nuestros estudiantes la base de nuestro movimiento y los arquitectos de un futuro de un futuro próspero y digno para nuestra comunidad muchas gracias y que pasen buen día thank you guys very much if there's anything that you take away from today and this showing it is that we are with you so here's how we're going to do this these three illustrious experts are going to give brief introductions and then as we promised the students many weeks ago this is an opportunity to ask every and all questions you can think of and have these folks do their very very best to answer it so that we all walk out of here with as much information and understanding as we can possibly have right now so the program is short the question and answer should be long and i'll just start you guys can go one after the other with marisa bono thank you my name is marisa bono i'm the southwest regional council of maldev the mexican-american legal defense and educational fund for almost 50 years now maldev has fought to protect the civil rights of all latinos living in the united states regardless of their immigration status and we i'm i'm very gratified to look around the room right now and see many dreamers and others who we've worked with in that fight along the way and i think now we will need that solidarity more than ever dreamers i'm talking to you specifically right now it's very disconcerting to me that so many times people approach your community as being at a deficit we always talk about the rights that you don't have the power that you don't have the resources that you don't have and i'm hopeful today that the conversation will be about the tools and the resources that you do have you have a room full a city full a state full of advocates and leaders who are here to protect you and empower you there are laws and institutions that have been established and are not going away regardless of what this administration does or regardless of what anyone does and at maldev we stand with you and we will use every tool at our disposal to protect you and your families we're here for you as a resource and i hope i've worked with these individuals here many times they're brilliant legal minds and experts in the field and i hope that you'll ask your questions today so that we can move forward together um we stand with you my name my name is marisa old betis and i work here with 15 other lawyers um specifically in the area of immigration nationality law i've been doing this for 16 years i'm board certified and it really is a passion of mine to work with the immigrant community in all facets of the area of immigration law our firm here locally based in san antonio and other places in texas have had the great honor of working with dreamers and we have throughout our careers seeing the wonderful leadership and basically the evolution and the change that we've seen not so much legislatively but in terms of policy and the discretion that's exercised by the federal government because of the acts of these young leaders in our community i'm happy to share whatever information i can share today as an immigration practitioner i will tell you that the last couple of weeks because i have the great honor of working with our immigrant community and i mean immigrants that are documented and undocumented the families of these dreamers the spouses of these dreamers todos los parientes de nuestra comunidad aquí emigrante i have spent the last couple of weeks as the other advocates here in this room talking with our community about the importance of standing together recognizing the rights the civil and legal protections that we have in place that will be there regardless of who our president is and also letting them know and i think this is wonderful evidence of that that we stand with them we are no different they are a wonderful part of our citizenry fabric here in the united states yet we are one in the same they may lack certain documents but we do stand with them and my part of my message that i hope that we can share and leave here today is that we express to individuals that we do need to be cognizant about what may happen in this unpredictable future that we have as immigration advocates and immigration lawyers and and immigrants ourselves but also we need to be reminding ourselves equally spending as much time equally talking about the civil rights that we have in place we have clients now that you know we're questioning should i send my child to school should i do certain things so moving forward not rolling back and reminding our community of the rights that we have that have not been destroyed and of our fight that we have to to to go forward with good afternoon thank you all for being here thank you uh representative vernell for convening this meeting uh my name is jonathan ryan i'm an immigration attorney i'm also the executive director of a non-profit organization here in san antonio with offices across the state of texas called racists and our mission is to protect refugees and serve immigrant families and our communities shocked stunned i don't know what to do i can't believe this what's gonna happen what are we gonna do these are the words that i've heard spinning through the circles of people with whom i've spoken over the past few weeks following this election the people that i've heard saying this have been some of the most educated empowered privileged forward-thinking and forward-acting people that i know when i talk with immigrants and refugees in detention mothers who have been thrown into a for-profit prison system and i talked to them about this election their coal died their stone faced they're not shocked they've seen it before they know exactly what's going to happen and as the group that's been working with these people and with our community for more than 30 years so do we let's not have any illusions here we do know what's going to happen because we've seen it before we do know the fight that's ahead because it's the same fight that we have been fighting all along we're not strangers to this we've seen it we've seen the fight we've seen what it takes we've seen what it takes to win and that's exactly what we intend to do us at riasis are ready to fight we stand with this community we stand with the dreamers we stand with all immigrants we oppose any attempt to divide our communities to divide the immigrant community with good immigrants and bad immigrants and a bridge over here and a bridge over there a three-year bridge a bridge to where i say it's another bridge to nowhere to those of you out there looking at us in our suits with our microphones and our process and our pieces of paper and our elections i want to remind you we've never done anything for you you've never been helped by us the only people who have ever helped you are you DACA was a failure of the dream act to pass the dream act was introduced in 2001 i wasn't even in law school and it's never passed DACA failed and the people who were angry and many people think of me they say oh jonathan you're so passionate no i'm sorry i'm not passionate i'm pissed off i'm pissed off that today we're here talking about trying to save this bridge act for one segment of the immigrant population that we collectively have decided are the good immigrants they're not the criminals they're not those illegals that we're going to have to throw on to the pyre just to help a few for three years what is this where have we come where do we stand right now and with whom do we really stand the question i ask you is where do you stand and are you ready to do again what we've already had to do and what generations before us have had to do to save our future DACA only happened the crumb from the table that it is and it's nothing but that only happened because people like these two heroes stood up and said enough and they didn't just step out of the shadows they stepped on to the streets and they took action and they didn't say please they said damn it now that is the model we are not going to save the dreamers the dreamers are going to save us that's the plan that's how you make change you don't sign your agency over to some hero and you don't resign it to some monster you take action that's what we are going to do and riasa stands with you and we stand ready to fight any attempt to attack our communities be they immigrant be they lgbt be they people of color be that people without access to clean water be they veterans be they the old we are all preparing to be under attack and we stand ready not just to defend you but to fight back and we know how let's be thank you thank you very much here's what we've got we have two microphones if you want to ask a question raise your hand we'll bring you a mic also if there's a question you want to ask but you don't want to ask it yourself we also have folks with paper and pens so you can jot your question down and we can pass it off and have someone read it for you but let's get started who's got a question all right over here okay my question has to do with the midterm election normally after a major four-year presidential level election we tend to fall back on the two-year midterm what in terms of individually and collectively as a community what structurally in terms of building the political infrastructure can we do to prepare for the fight so our office documented a number of problems that occurred statewide during both early voting and on voting day there appeared to be rampant misinformation on photo ID and the identification that was required to vote both during early voting on on voting day and we documented it most during in bear county but it appears from other reports that we've gotten both during and since then to have been statewide and so we're actively working with our local county office and with the state to try to ensure that that type of misinformation doesn't occur again next cycle our biggest concern or one of our biggest we have many one of our biggest concerns was the fact that we the information tells us that we had a potentially a record number of first-time voters this past cycle and i think many were perhaps disillusioned that their vote didn't count especially when clinton received 2.5 million votes and more than her opponent and the popular vote yet her opponent won the election and so i think on a personal level and for all of us it's incumbent to make sure not only that we vote but to continue encouraging our family members and our co-workers to vote it's really important now more than ever not to allow that sense of disillusionment to keep us from being um politically engaged and thank you for that and what i'm going to do is i appreciate the question and it's a great answer but let's let's do our best to use this time and the opportunity to ask questions about about this issue at least to start off with i don't want to have a conversation where we re-litigate the election we're here to make sure that the people who need information get that information um now i'm not going to tell people what they can i cannot talk about but i do want to at least remind them of the the purpose of the of the forum if i could respond just briefly because i do think that there is a there is a connection between the two i think if i could if i could find a connection there and and so i i think that there are various levels that we need to address i think it begins with a reality check and now is the time that the government needs to stop being some kind of hazy distant figure on a hill we need to learn you need to learn exactly what are the mechanics what are the processes what are the offices what are the titles you need to look at the org chart of your federal government and you need to understand it inside and out now i think that on an agency to agency or department to department basis today we're talking let's say with department of homeland security and that particular secretary that is definitely going to have our community under attack you can look at other departments such as maybe the department of justice where the black community can see a department that is not going to have its back as as it has potentially with this administration and so i think different groups we need to intersect among ourselves we need to learn what parts of the government we engage with and have engaged against us and we must learn from each other the processes the tactics and the techniques that we have developed in our individual efforts and we need to find a common tie between those right well i think that there is intersectionality with each with each group to to immigration and i i think that we're here and what i do is i listen if i want to know what to do about the dream act i listen to people i intend on speaking with these people immediately after this meeting and learning from them but we see we know how the how how DACA was passed and it was passed through action through visible action by the affected people who took to the streets there were sit-ins there were hunger strikes i see people here who participated in those and so i think that this is the kind of direct democracy the flesh and bone kind of democracy the organizations like united we dream that have listservs that provide mailers with updates on both federal and state on legislation that potentially affect dreamers and also have information about local efforts you've probably heard the terms sanctuary city sanctuary colleges we're not big fans of those terms but i was just telling mati sole i think the train has left the station i think that's i think it's political rhetoric that is used for political gain since there technically is no such thing as a sanctuary city or a sanctuary college these are just places that are following the law and respecting the law in terms of those laws that are in place to protect both dreamers and immigrants but i think getting more in touch with those organizations that are putting those those efforts out there is is really critical at this time okay all right right here i'm Robert Lidia Salazar Martinez United Methodist pastor retired and i'd like to know so what are the options for some of the dreamers to become citizens at this point i heard you know getting married to american citizens what about being adopted by american citizens can they be adopted at whatever age or whatever i think there's a variety of circumstances that we explore with individuals who have DACA status now so for example there are many ways to immigrate to the united states and we also have other than DACA we have protective status for a number of other individuals but for example if you're generally speaking you know through family immigration certain family members competition for other family members through business or corporations there are circumstances where they can petition for them so what i think it's important for that for for looking at that it's not a one size fit all answer i do think that it's worth and these the DACA kids that that are out here and the and the DACA leaders and and their families i mean they have amped up they are asking they are exploring options we're talking about all kinds of legal circumstances that might provide them with a benefit and in addition to any kind of immigration benefit that might be available and i will tell you there aren't many this is why we have a great number of individuals in this country that are heavily contributing to our worth of this country that do not have options and this is why we all support immigration reform but those folks who have options available are seeking those options and also we're equally informing them of perhaps circumstances where they may not have options affirmatively but defensively if they're placed in removal proceedings what kind of options they would have available in that circumstance well i'm just wondering if the general public knows what the options are say for instance if i wanted to adopt somebody i mean i don't know what the general public knows of how we can be helpful i continue generally speaking adoption law under our immigration nationality act is very established and just as a little snippet to give you um you're adopting somebody who has to be your child under the immigration nationality act that person has to be under 16 that person does not have any parents or parents that have abandoned them there are various very strict requirements that the immigration nationality act requires for you to be held in that circumstance but what i would say on that point there are many individuals who come to immigration lawyers who have options who are citizens by nature of their birth in some cases who are you know a variety of circumstances i would say through nonprofits through lawyers individuals who have knowledge about immigration law that they go and and seek kind of what their plan B would be thank you just a couple just two minor quick on the same answer uh we do a lot of these so-called DACA clinics where we will meet with a lot of people uh Marisol's office both of these both offices Maldefin Marisol's office both participate in many of those on average when we do a DACA clinic between 15 and 20 of the people with whom we meet are in fact eligible for some other better long-term immigration benefit so it behooves any person who believes that they may be eligible for DACA or who doesn't have immigration status they consult with an attorney to find that out if you did if you do hold DACA and since obtaining DACA you have requested and received what's called an advanced parole document and you have left the country and subsequently re-entered the country with that advanced parole you should consult with an immigration attorney this could represent a change in your circumstances with the immigration law that could open up more avenues for obtaining permanent status down the road thank you now we have a question over here with the microphone hi my name is Alva Avila i represent um well i'm a teacher at david kaka elementary just down the street on the west side um something that i really wanted to um i guess spring fourth because a lot of my fourth grade students you know are asking me you know worried about what's going to happen to their families where it was going to happen to them um what are some key um like information or even resources i heard you miss um bono saying that this is the time to talk about resources what resources do we have to share with those families with those parents that unfortunately aren't here whenever i look at the crowd here i mean without due respect this is not the population that i serve you know my students are living in pure poverty um so what resources can i give to those families that honestly they need it the most and and i'll tell you the number one thing that you can do for families who are coming to you with questions is to urge them to go to an attorney preferably a board certified attorney low-income families are very susceptible to schemes of notarios and so it's very important and i i mean if you're that engage with your parents i would even recommend asking who they're helping them look the attorney up the attorney that they're going to on the state bar website to make sure that it's someone legitimate um many low-income families pay for services many immigration attorneys work with families who are lower income on payment plans but like marisol said and like ryan said every circumstance is different um people often have relief that they didn't even know was available to them so if there's any time to start exploring that it's now as far as your as far as your fourth graders in our office um and come talk to me after we have some resources it's we've been looking up resources that we've never had to look up before like grief counseling for um elementary and middle school students i'm reaching out to local professors including professors here at utsa trying to find those resources we have some in our office and we can connect you with people um if you have students um you know i know that different students um are dealing with this in different ways and as a public school teacher you don't always have the ability to screen you know the battles that you're struggling with on a day-to-day basis um but i i think you need to assure um your kids that um no one is going to get deported overnight and the processes that i'm referring to are when someone gets when someone gets someone is entitled to notice um you're entitled to have your case heard by an immigration judge review by an immigration judge and then there are processes that allow families to appeal decisions and oftentimes these processes take many many years and so i think when people casually throw around terms like mass deportation um there's a an image that comes to children of of the boogeyman coming in the middle of the night and taking away parents right um and certainly that happens you know has happened in some instances but that's that's not what mass deportation really means i mean the obama administration deported um more people in the 20th century than all of the previous administrations combined and so really i mean if trump wants to do mass deportations he should just keep doing what we're doing now because that's sort of already the situation that we're in so i think assuring kids um that there are laws in place that will give them at least some time and um encouraging parents to talk with attorneys now make those contacts with attorneys and relationships with attorneys now start exploring options that are available to them now so that they can be prepared when and if there are drastic changes in our system that could affect them i mean i i mean your role is critical as a teacher because in my experience having worked with many many clients the teacher is a confidant for many individuals and so i think because you're their advocate in a very safe place um i think you know your role is to get them out the door and to see somebody who can give them some good information and i have many individuals i mean i will tell you and i i have respect for many many colleagues if you can just get them to see a lawyer that it's a safe place that there's no danger they're going to get some good information from some reputable immigration lawyers they are going to get the tools they need and in fact we can refer them to individuals and perhaps it's you know not the right fit at our firm or someone else's firm but that first step which really i think teachers and priests and you know religious workers all of those folks who really serve as that safe confidant for many many many immigrants in the city and in this country if they can just push them to make that first step i guarantee they will not be disappointed if they go to any you know in person with immigration information because they will learn a lot they will learn a lot and it will change it will change their circumstance are you are you in region 20 i believe i believe region 20 has workshops with different immigration firms and so maybe now's the time i mean i think i've seen spoke with a lot of teachers i've seen a lot of teachers trying to step into that role of activists for the purposes of serving their kids and their families so maybe now's the time to talk with your school leadership about bringing attorneys in maybe doing some type of workshop for the school i'm trying to figure out what resources are available through region 20 i think that's something that i take it you're a teacher too yes i love it god i love you guys um i think now's the time to form a group and try to see what you can do to become more active and create more options for your families within your school and within your district and we'll help you do that come talk to me right this does we all of our legal services for DACA recipients and DACA applicants are completely free and we do hold DACA clinics and we stand ready and on call to any school any community any church any group we will come to you we will have our clinic inside for your community in a place that you feel comfortable that's what we do as an agency so find us on facebook and reach out to us all right and also you can use you can use our office to help connect you with these folks um over here the mic use the microphone that um after renealing three times five years uh you can apply for uh citizenship i mean my question is is that is there any law uh is that true and what can i do DACA is not alone a pathway towards a further more permanent state so it could be that people who hold DACA based on another separate reason may be able to obtain permanent status but solely by having DACA it is not built into DACA as a program that after a certain period of time you graduate or you become uh eligible to to to move on to another state of of residency DACA is kind of a perpetual uh a kind of a purgatory state quite frankly where you're you're you're here without uh being placed in removal proceedings uh again people who hold DACA may based on other criteria be able to obtain that that resident status but DACA by itself and this is one of the problems frankly with DACA and this is how it was not the dream act is that it failed to provide that true pathway forward okay so it's gonna be my third time to reneal already but there's no ending to it i mean to to get more instead of just the permit i mean i would say and this is kind of the message right now DACA is still in place if you have applied initially if you've renewed if you're up for renewal even if you're up for initial you should talk to somebody about whether you should proceed the law is in place today i tell my clients every single day DACA 2012 is in place if you're eligible for the benefit today we will talk about how we can file today for DACA travel for DACA renewal i have folks coming in that have been eligible for DACA since 2012 and have never stopped the benefit and they're still walking into our office and we're still discussing about how we can seek this benefit so we don't know what will happen we hope that there'll be you know um that this program will continue but i've taken the position and i know many advocates have as well that if you're eligible for the benefit today then let's talk about seeking the benefit today and certainly if you're eligible to renew if your deferred action is going to go away within 150 days we're urging people to go ahead and renew because the program's in place the government already has your information um if you're using your work authorization you might as well continue using it to work and and save money support yourself um there's no there's no change that was made with the election of trump that somehow affected those benefits that you have now i think that there's an important legal point here and please do correct me if i'm wrong but when you have DACA what you really have is something called deferred action the DACA program president obama did not create deferred action deferred action has existed for a very long time and it's been a while since i've asked this question does anybody know who the first person who ever received deferred action was you could say you know you could say he was a dreamer john lennon was the first recipient of deferred action by the united states it was created for john lennon by his attorney uh and uh and so when under the law a grant of deferred action is valid until it is affirmatively withdrawn by the government there is an expiration date on the work permit that you have based on that deferred action so the work permit has an expiration date and a clock your deferred action exists until you receive a notice from the government the government makes an individualized determination in your case that they are going to withdraw deferred action okay so we in addition to deferred action for childhood arrivals all of our offices work with applicants for deferred action under many other contexts and the federal government has discretion to grant deferred action under its discretion which means whenever it wants to okay and so another part of our program in the future and our DACA program we have a grant okay i don't care if mr trump takes DACA away the people who give me the grant to do DACA want me to do something we are going to continue even if DACA is removed to continue to work with the population to prepare deferred action requests you can still present an individual deferred action request to the government okay now is not the time to shirk back into a shell we have heard and we've been very disappointed by national groups that immediately announced stop applying for DACA don't renew stop no no the strength of the program is shown by the applications and if we see just a dead die off of applications of DACA over the next couple weeks well then what are they going to say in the next administration see we don't need it nobody's even applying so we as well and i'm very very heartened to see the DMCA has the same position continue to press forward with with with DACA applications and we will do so for as long as that program is on the books and after if in the event it is taken away or potentially as we know replaced with something that's going to be beautiful and big and better we will continue to file applications under that and if there is no program we will file applications for deferred action all right let's get a question from right here in in the center and you guys just know this this is for both groups there are lots of questions so you've got your hand up and there's 20 people behind you and you guys know that there's lots of folks that want it don't want to hear from you hi um my name is Adaneli Moreno both my husband and I have been recipients of DACA since 2012 since it came out and i am about to graduate and uh become a bilingual educator so so my question my question to you is what do i tell districts as i'm starting to look for jobs um just because uh i finished my student teaching about a week ago and i was offered a job and i couldn't take it because my uh ad card or my ead yes it hadn't arrived so i told them i couldn't apply to anything no districts no anything because my driver's license expired everything's expired um my husband's been a recipient as well and he's lost his job every single time because the paperwork doesn't come in and of course hr has to see the paperwork um so what do i as you know i start looking for a job what do i tell districts do i tell them do i do i just leave it just because a school semester a school year it's fall to spring and my um DACA expires during the fall so i would literally believe in school every single year or every other year i would recommend that you potentially renew the work permit um did you want to i mean i would i mean we can both chime in so right now i mean i tell clients no your question i'm like you have status today you have status today and it could be very well it could very well be that you will have status after next fall if this progression continues in terms of there was a big um issue happening over the summer with regard to DACA renewals um the DACA renewal so if you look at the facts which is the cis facts that they show on for deferred action for the childhood arrivals they have a list of questions there a number of questions where they give you information the recommendation was and yes this was very frustrating for many individuals who have DACA status and those that represent them to file around 150 days within the 120 to 150 day time frame and not they recommended highly recommended that you not file before the 150th day because they didn't want overlap in the two-year card they wanted you to get your two years out of this and what we saw that was happening over the summer they were not adjudicating your cases within the 150 days right so firms and advocates were doing service inquiries and demanding that they adjudicate these cases because they were not really letting you file the 150th day but would not adjudicate with 150th day and then USCIS had the nice surprise of actually trying to adjudicate within 150 days but then would say we're not going to grant your work authorization until at least 90 days when the clock really starts when you get your deferred action notification so there have been problems with processing and the adjudication of this applications and I will say because I see everything it's not necessarily just for DACA kids there were a lot of things being transferred to different service centers my recommendation is right now file file even because you don't know if it's going to happen within 150 days or longer with regard to DPS I will tell you that you know the ALA folks and other lawyers up here they've been liaisoning with DPS if you have the notification that you've been granted deferred action but you're still waiting on your work authorization DPS is under instructions to issue driver's licenses because you do have status you don't have a work authorization with your photo on it to show that your work authorized but you do have status if you at least your A21D has been granted and DPS they'll do a save verification but they should issue a license if you have problems we have people who can liaison with them I can give you my card but we've been doing that for lots of individuals not just our clients but others because you technically have status so you got to file the 150th day or before to try to get it timely and if it's still pending service increase keep hassling immigration that's what we do yeah and I just received it um but my question was to the district do I bring it up to them do I just let it be do I you're under no obligation I mean you're authorized to work you're you're authorized for employment and so today so you're under no obligation and on the delay issue in addition to doing requests I know it's not the specific question but just as we're on that theme there are also a couple people who can help you with that if you are experiencing delays beyond processing times sorry sorry to throw you this way but nodding their heads there are the two people who are your voice in the federal government right there and so and I know that they are but I'm not I'm not throwing them under a bus that they don't want to be drive on and I know that they're because because they come to us asking us for examples of their they're here yeah that's right they're here exactly so but I'm pointing them out because that's a resource also in addition to working with individual clients we do engage in wider advocacy as an agency we are currently draft we have drafted and we are currently circulating among employers a sign-on letter that employers of any kind around the country can sign stating that without uh any respect to the removal of DACA they will not terminate any employees solely based on the withdrawal of DACA status we intend to move this sign-on letter out we're looking for very large employers national employers to sign on because many people did law firms universities corporations organizations exactly and just like mine affirmatively sought to seek to hire people who held DACA status because you're brilliant and and so we as a community of employers refuse to have our families torn apart by this process either and we stand as employers with you and also we are trying to bring other employers to that table can I just add real quick and first of all thank you because we have a shortage of bilingual teachers in Texas and this is exactly why we need DACA so thank you I just want to clarify you're under no obligation to tell the district about your situation but if you're affirmatively asked through the hiring process then you need to be honest about what's going on because that could be a grounds for termination later on so just a little clarification okay great right down here this goes back to doc and the question of enforcement I'm asking is a university trustee and I was recently in a trustee meeting where the question of DACA students at a northwest sorry a northeast university came up and it was quite a conversation and mercy you made a comment that sanctuary city sanctuary colleges was all I'm not I'm not crazy about the phrase well okay so the question I have is the chancellor of the university made the statement that no the city of Cambridge Harvard University MIT police Harvard police are not enforcing federal immigration law and the question is what are the requirements for a university at this point and I guess John you might have a thought in what are the risks that that current situation might change I mean look my response to that is universities local law enforcement campus cops the mall cops none of those people have a role in enforcing federal immigration law okay and I think that's one of the one of the biggest disservices of this recent election was all of this misinformation that was that was distributed about the way our government works federal immigration law falls squarely within the purview of the federal government federal law enforcement local law enforcement should not be doing the federal government's job okay and so um when when the when when when universities are standing up and saying we are sanctuary campuses and I again I get I get it I get it drives me nuts but I get it um what they're saying is we are respecting the rights of our students and we're and and on top of that DHS has always had college campuses and um places of education as its lowest priority in terms of enforcement because those are the groups of people that we don't really want to be interfering with right um and and so I just um yeah my answer to that is they have no role they have they historically they have no role legally they have no role there have been agreements made between um local jurisdictions and municipalities and ICE and the federal government and they those have taken different forms over the years but typically those are um formal agreements that are made between local government and and the feds it's not something that should be done automatic as a matter of right okay I mean I think part of the concern is um a lot of universities have a lot of federal research dollars and so there was the concern that there might be some kind of pushback um sort of like the way Trump did his carrier deal you know you want to make planes for united air you want to make jet engines you you're going to do x and so this is this is a very weak president he's a very weak person it's not just going to be one university oh it's going to be all the universities exactly and and and you have I mean this is what it takes it's going to have to take solidarity at an institutional level and regional and national levels and you have to present a situation that they cannot confront that they do not have a response for you have to make them bring every single chancellor and every single trustee in America to the table because they won't this is a this is a blinking contest and I don't intend to blink he's also just one person I mean a lot of the promises that he made he cannot do as the president of the United States he needs legislative authority to to do so when you're talking about pulling federal funding that's that's a law that would have to pass that's not him just willy-nilly signing a document off of his desk and these students the students that are asking college presidents and you know you know university presidents to do this they're not asking them to do anything that they're not already doing they're basically saying stick to the business of educating our students on our campus and affirm what is already the legal obligation to basically allow us to go to school and if Immigration and Customs Enforcement because they have a memo that they don't want to get the business of coming to universities then to you know if there's law enforcement activities require that they do their job have a warrant and do all of the legal things that they're required to do under the Fourth Amendment before they come on to this campus so for me I mean I think the messaging has been a little vague but these students are basically saying come out and say ICE if you want to come to our campus do what you're required to do under the Fourth Amendment under the Constitution have a warrant only do law enforcement activities that are necessary but let us educate our students great we got a question over here and by the way do you do you guys feel like you're learning something today okay good yes ma'am me yes okay real quickly um as one of the people who's headed the sanctuary campus maybe we should call it protected space campus but one of our concerns is that well so precisely we've been getting a lot of pushback in terms of if they already have to obey you know the Fourth Amendment what's the purpose of standing up and saying we want to be a sanctuary campus is it even a valuable use of our time is it just grandstanding that's going to draw more attention to the university in particular there's a worry that it's going to target the university precisely over the issue of research funding especially because governor Abbott has come out and said we will try to penalize anybody who does this but knowing i teach history and i've had students come in my class talking about these issues and so i don't personally feel as an educator i can ignore this it's like the fourth grade teacher over here who's gotta you know comfort her her little kids i'm trying to do the same at the university level and they're not little kids and this is real life stakes for them and i i guess i'm kind of wondering is it worth our while to actually if i my original question had been if you could say three things that those of us who have legal status and who have essentially a position of privilege in the university what three things would you recommend for us to do what are the most effective things that we could do right now to help support our DACA students great question i was right with you to you say just say three things but let me i'm what i what i want to say is that universities have and schools have an obligation to protect the health safety and welfare of their students and that includes their emotional and their psychological well-being all right so if students are scared to go to class if their families are scared to visit them on campus that should be a problem for the university and i say your efforts are absolutely worthwhile because this is a matter of protecting the integrity and the community and the safety of the university and it's also important to send a message to the students on campus we've seen a rash of hate crimes hate speech since the election and that the university solidly sending a message saying we are a community that is open to everyone everyone is equal here there are no outsiders here that's a very strong message to preserve the integrity of the community of the campus and to the universities who are scared of sticking their neck out there they're scared of something that might ambiguously happen in the future i would just say well can we cross that bridge when and if we get there when it comes to governor Abbott i don't know what authority he thinks he has to do what he claims he's going to do i really don't i mean i'm really kind of fascinated to see what that's going to look like sort of as as you know just a private taxpayer but also like it's a blood thirsty lawyer like this is going to be really this is going to be really fun but but i'm just i'm just saying challenging those fundamental assumptions is really important i mean if he's promising to do something he doesn't have the authority to do then you know we need to balance you know what's more important are students or some ambiguous bogeyman that may or may not happen in the future and may or may not be legal all right yeah okay before we take the next question i want to excuse the congressman both of them have places to go and thank them for being here um and taking the time thank both of you very much because everybody has the question of what can i do especially for our dreamers uh one thing i omitted earlier that is very powerful is for you to let us know your personal story because we talk about 700 000 people who've gotten uh deferred action through the DACA program it's much more powerful to have the photo of one person i use maria who offered to translate and told her story about uh i guess you're still kindergarten teacher first grade now okay uh and had the story uh of of her in some of my speeches so if you're here as a dreamer uh send me send Joaquin your story if you want it told sure and it's here that they tried every day to work with a license my family members where does dapa stand because i fear getting home and they're not there simply because they don't have a charge for voices my my mom works for these wealthy families they just have been cleaning their homes my dad should i sweat our text is heat working for these families and they don't have a license and that's that's my concern right now is i can go home and they not be there fellow friends here so where does dapa stand because our parents are the original dreamers because they came with the illusion to follow and pursue and so you know the american dream and this beautiful country that is my question where does dapa stand i appreciate your your your passion and that came up so much in the immigration debate that we not split apart community something that jonathan referred to earlier uh the direct answer to question about dapa for parents is that it's uh it stands nowhere right now like the daka program it's not from any law that the congress passed i voted for that law we passed daka through the house and our senators helped block it in the united state senate so we don't have a law it exists only because barack obama signed an order saying we have it and the same thing is true of dapa and it was blocked in brownsville and the supreme court doesn't have a full compliment and so it does not have any status at all there is no executive order and there's no law this congress will pass that will solve that problem the only thing we can do as to defend individual parents vigorously as our experts have indicated they will do where they can do it and work toward a day where we have the votes to pass the comprehensive immigration reform that should have been passed years ago thank you diego thank you all it's very inspiring to hear your comments thank you sir question right here oh hi my name is xy guardado i'm also a teacher i'm um undocumented and um i have a specific question um i know you said earlier that it's not like the boogeyman comes out but at least for me it does feel like the boogeyman is out there and my family has been affected through this process so many times over and over again so it does feel like the boogeyman is out there and you know i know you're trying to come from me i feel like i'm in my classroom right now where i'm telling my students i'm not going to be deported your families are not going to be deported but the reality is it is going to happen like he said right we know this has happened before we're fighting the same battle this is something that we know so well in my community being undocumented it does feel like we are being hunted so my question is what does san antonio do because i i'm not a senator i wasn't born here well obviously right i haven't been raised here sorry and so my question is what is san antonio doing in terms of like police enforcement because where i come from from washington dc and other communities the police does regardless of what the protocol is the police does work with ice they do regardless of what they're supposed to do there's racism and i know that here in san antonio there's racism within the police department i have experienced it so i want to know what is san antonio doing to make us feel safe educators families like what what can we do when these raids start happening because they have like you said they've been happening and they're going to continue happening so what can we do when these raids start happening like who do we who do we call where do we go to what's a safe place is it churches like so let me let's take let's let's take that question and a couple pieces i've brought up councilman saldania to talk about specifically police and fire and first responders and the way that they do or don't engage with immigration law and then we'll go on to the next part of the question okay thank you there is probably nothing that i can say that's going to make you feel comforted and and i know that but what i know is to be true is that there are people who are in those positions that control our first responders that is orders from on high saying that we will not be enforcing any federal any any federal law that is not our role plus there's a heart to our police chief like there's a heart to a lot of our police officers in fact that discretion i'm sorry that you had that experience but that discretion in a lot of cases has helped a lot of people who an officer knows he doesn't have that mandate and also has a heart not to say that this is a family that is just like like my family so there is protocols in place that will not make they'll ensure that what you experience doesn't happen but at the same time you know there's also leaders who if it does happen we need to know about it your experience personally and and there's nothing that we can do on a whole to to really make you feel as comfortable as you need to but know that police chief has your back city council has your back mayor has your back and we can talk individually right after this as well and is there is there a place where people can go to see what because it's my understanding that first responders for example can inquire cannot inquire into immigration status cannot ask for proof of immigration status um and that includes even if someone can't produce an id that doesn't entitle the officer to then ask about their status and so i think there's a lot of confusion about that about what officers can and can't do so when that happens people not even may not even realize oh that's something i should have reported because they're not allowed to do that so is there a place that people can go to see exactly what the policy is in terms of what the police department or first responders can can't do is that publicly available in any format so so it is publicly available but it's the question is publicly available versus digestible for the general public especially communities that are vulnerable um that is probably good action for us to say that when you're asked for an id you don't have to produce uh when you're asked about any immigration status you don't have to produce an answer in that the three lawyers to my left you're included can probably rebuff that but that's good direction for what a council what a city can do to make folks feel a little more and then also to be clear once someone has been arrested ICE does have the discretion to put a hold um once they've been arrested but they can only hold them for so long 48 hours 48 hours and if they're held longer than that period of time then we're going over into a constitutional violation and muddy souls firm is representing someone who was held for 76 days without um he had already bonded out on the criminal charge I believe and um ICE apparently just never showed up but nonetheless he was held um for over two months and so understanding that there are limits even in that situation even if you're told oh well he's not being released because there's an ice hold well if it's been long it's been longer than 48 days that's where you need to call the immigration attorney or where you need to call me um if if uh you haven't already if I could if I could just talk about the philosophy behind the police and the fires point of view imagine a situation where you've got a household where one person is is has documents and the other one doesn't and there's a domestic violence situation if that if anyone in that household is concerned that by calling the police to help solve that problem instead an officer is going to show up and ask about their status they're not going to call same thing if the house is on fire and so the primary purpose the primary driving philosophy of our fire department and our police department is public safety regardless of what the immigration status is of those folks and so and so I want you to understand that they just want people to call so they can help them and they don't want to have those barriers of people being afraid of them when they're calling them for the right reason uh and and both the fire chief the police chief the city manager have been very upfront and open about this policy now Ray is absolutely right that there's not really a place that I know of and there could be and Councilman Trivino can help us with this maybe that needs to be more available but that is the philosophy I see you can see me a second right um but but you're right that they have people have to know that that philosophy is there as opposed to sort of finding it out in a very sort of small forum like this because I don't want to jump in as well confidence sorry I just want to jump in as well let you know that we are organizing on exactly this issue and it is you're an educator education is that's how you get rid of that bogeyman as you learn and just to try to go over enforcement as very quickly and quickly as I as I can when we talk about these immigration raids raids conducted by immigration right just let's let's think we saw those happen on new year's day new year's weekend by the obama administration he raided families he took children from school stops he had his officers lift babies out of bed and bring them to detention centers they said publicly every one of those people had no recourse left legally they had all had their bite at the apple they had removal orders and their cases were done every single one of those people who was brought to our detention centers who got uh access to an attorney is free today living with their families today okay so don't listen to them when they say that it's over it ain't over okay also you've got immigration is three parts you've got apprehension you've got detention and you've got removal okay if you don't already have a removal order that is say a judge an immigration judge has ordered your removal in front of you or in your absence you should have known that you had court immigration has no right no authority no reason to be raiding you they have no authority to deport in that case when you hear about immigration showing up and raiding a workplace and bringing people right to the border normally it's because those people signed what's called a voluntary departure so if you are if you are apprehended by immigration they will try to coerce you through the nastiest of tactics to get you to accept to go home it's your right to say no and say that you want to see a judge and you want process but on those three levels of arrest detention and deportation right arrest often has to do with the police just like you say okay so if you're witnessing or your community is experiencing harassment or or racism or profiling then that's a police issue that goes to the city council okay the handover of folks who are arrested by bear county right that's your detention issue and it's counties so you need to be thinking about your county level elected officials they're the ones with control over the detention aspect both the turning over from county the uh sheriffs to ice but also most of these for-profit centers are actually contracts with counties so arrest is at your city level city council detention is at your county level your county's courts okay and then the actual removal process people think of deportation as enacted as a long protracted process and deportation is at the federal level the judges are employees of the department of justice the prosecutors are employees of the department of homeland security and there is your dogged in your castro so arrest is your local city level city council detention is your county level and then deportation is your federal level and you have to identify your allies along the way and let them know and push on them if you see any instances of profiling or aggression in your community i think it's very important i know that jonathan's group rices and maldev certainly does that know your rights in terms of recognizing the difference between what what is sapd asking about because the only thing there to be investigating if they stop you or search you or detain you is a state criminal or city criminal violation it's not about whether you're here without status or with status sometimes when you've committed allegedly or have committed a crime and you are in custody then that's when immigration and custom enforcement gets involved they're the only folks that have the authority to enforce or engage or investigate in the area of federal immigration law so if you see somebody who's being questioned by san antonio police department about a particular violation they need to ask what is what crime am i being accused of because if the only you know crime that they're being accused of is because they look brown and perhaps have presented a matricula consulate that needs to be you know developed and discussed and perhaps there's a violation that's taken place but city sheriffs all of those folks they force our state laws city ordinance laws those kinds of things federal law immigration officials are the only ones that have the authority there are some 287 g agreements but they're for the most parts the only ones that are trained and i don't think city of san antonio or any other places want to go through that nobody wants to try to figure out one's immigration status because trust me it's very convoluted very difficult to comprehend and understand and they don't want that responsibility so i always tell clients you are in a domestic violence situation you've witnessed a crime you need somebody to come and help you or your citizens or call the police department if something transpires from there that you feel like was wrong then let's discuss that but rely on our police department to protect you and to provide your safety that's what they should be focusing on okay january 14th we're going to be having an organizing meeting on exactly this topic january 14th a full day congress on organizing a location to be determined will be publishing it on facebook and the one thing you can say the one thing that you can take away which i'm sure we may discuss later but if you are an immigrant and you are stopped or questioned or whatever by an immigration official the one thing you can do if you're found in that circumstance is not volunteer information or not sign anything and get information i want to talk to a lawyer i want to communicate with a family member that can talk to a lawyer but to the extent that you can you don't want to sign anything because the only person that can inform you about your potential rights or perhaps options is going to be somebody who has it's not going to be an immigration or customs enforcement officer cvp officer they need to get information but the one simple thing no fear mas nada pi de saudencia con juez comunica con alguien lo más pronto posible that's the one thing that we can say right now okay thank you question here just real quick i think the question of the sanctuary city i know that the term's not the best term that we want uh but don't you think maybe the city could do more in developing a committee to deal specifically what we know is about to happen in our communities especially dealing with this crisis that just took place do we deal with it in crisis mode or do is a city kind of understand what's about to take place in the future and put together a committee with people like bryesis having an understanding so that we're not piling innocent women and children into a church that was quite frankly under fire code uh uh uh so i think we could have done a better job what do you what's what's your take on that on other sanctuary city policies throughout the country and and and how that could benefit the community i i personally don't have an opinion one way or the other about san Antonio becoming a sanctuary city and i the city many of the city council people um have reached out to us for information about that issue and others on a number of occasions i think they know that we're here as resources um what honestly what sanctuary so it's very symbolic right but um and it is in many cases um i what i would like to see from the city is some type of um office or dedicated fte that's um dedicated to engaging somehow with the immigrant community and um making sure that they are aware of what access they have in terms of um city resources um making the city more open and available to them and that to me that's just part of building a relationship between city government and our immigrant communities so that when there are violations when there are issues of concern they feel comfortable and they know where to go to um in terms of communicating with the city so i i mean sanctuary city is great sanctuary college is great um but really like let's start thinking about how to to move into something that's a little bit more substantive and not just symbolic i would just say very quickly as a potential positive result of this uh this event that just took place past week we have seen the city come together we had a very i think meaningful i can't necessarily say it was a progressive meeting yesterday uh city councilman saldanio was there um but i i do see the city coming together becoming educated education is the key understanding this apparatus and how it can respond we're starting to see that movement and the only other thing i would say about sanctuary cities is that and we've done i think the advocacy community is doing a good job at that but we need to be focused on that it's controlling the messaging behind sanctuary cities or sanctuary campuses we're not we're not saying don't cooperate with when it's required to cooperate with immigration's and customs enforcement we're basically and that's the message they're saying i mean that's the message that's out there the the message that's out there is we're asking for them not to cooperate and in many circumstances they will do what's right if we keep educating them on that but we're not what we shouldn't couch us as non-cooperation right i'm gonna i'm gonna give the two of the council people who are here a chance to chime in on this we have Rebecca Villagran here from district three and councilman Thurino here from district one hello Rebecca Villagran district three what i would like to say for you all in that question too tomorrow we're actually going to be having a meeting on the mayor's committee on police community relations and i'm going to bring up this topic in particular as one that we have to have as part of everything community police relations this is part of that topic and this is what we need to do with so please um we'll probably be reaching out to you all to be a part of this so we can have information that was brought up just here on a website that's more transparent too so we have better access so people can know what the rights are so these are the different conversations that we will be having already starting in this committee that has started thank you very much thank you councilman councilman and i and i can only add to that of course the great work that within councilman Diego Bernal did for the ndo we added an office of inclusion and diversity but the issue i have with that is it's one person and so i would say you know contact your council member to to strengthen that office i think that office needs a lot of support we need more people in that office it's overwhelmed and there's there's a lot of issues like this one that that office can really help educate our city council and the mayor about so i think that's an important piece that we need to all know about great and just and just for you guys i mean you're getting a lot of information from a lot of people from a variety of different agencies levels of government just know that our staff because we convene this meeting we're prepared to handle all of your questions so if you have a question about who's my council person what was the name of that lawyer on the on the far left reach out to us and we'll connect you with everybody now i do think that just i want i just want to summarize one piece before we keep going and that is that one of the things that struck me is when someone is is from a certain community like the teacher here who says look i'm from a i'm from a certain neighborhood these parents have a certain amount of means if my response to them is go talk to her go get a lawyer that just doesn't sound like a real thing that they can do i i think that part of the responsibility for us and especially the legal community is to find ways to make lawyers and legal resources available especially to those folks that we know are going to even if they're not if it's not right even if their instinct is that's unavailable i know that these three folks do a good job but there are three folks there are three organizations the city is much much larger so i think part of the work on this side is to make sure that the legal community organizes itself and presents itself to the community at large to make sure that those resources are available and you have our commitment to work with these folks and everyone else to do the same all right now another question sir right here in the glasses i've been ignoring you for a long time not on purpose let's do it hello everyone my name is eric hasso i am a DACA recipient my question has two points first of all to you to to your point senator director janathan ryan not yet DACA was not getting there so DACA was not a failure it proved that we can join the workforce it proved that we can be professionals it proved that we can pay taxes it proved that we can join the system and i think that was the success part the failure part is that it divided us it divided us because we were too busy working we were too busy doing our own thing before on the dream act we were all together we were all protesting we were all going to the churches we were all going to the congressmen doors but it divided us so my question is how do we dreamers again join the the the fight you know with president trump well president elect trump uh soon to come how do we stay united and then the other question is what are the real chances of the bridge act to pass this lame duck session it ends this friday so if we don't if we if this doesn't pass we are at the mercy of uh president trump so how do we remain united how do we how do we help you that's my question well i mean i know i know both of these folks have answers to that question but i just want to say i really think there's some opportunities that have been highlighted in the session today to maintain leadership on a local level so you know i heard councilman trivino talking about wanting to beef up the office of inclusion and diversity and potentially creating some type of um segue there for the immigrant community i think that would be a great place um for um immigrant leadership to be involved um we talked about the need for more more a better understanding of what exactly um sapd or county can do and can't do and making that more accessible and more public potentially a website or something like that i think that would be a great place for students to get involved or activists to get involved and create provide support um and so i i mean i just have to say i mean i think it's forums like this there are a lot of it's for me it's a lot of brainstorming and i think that there are a lot of ideas but it also takes leaders to follow up and actually create a plan and effectuate the plan and um i know each of us do what we can in our offices we did we actually did a DACA we haven't talked about it yet a DACA um fact sheet it's frequently asked questions about what DACA is going to look like under the trump administration their copies in the front at english and spanish we've done fact sheets on school bullying and hate crimes and who knows what else since the election but um i think um you know our organizations are limited we're under resourced and so i think for everyone thinking about how you can step out of your comfort zone thinking about what you can do in your school in your community with your local government thinking about your local electeds as partners instead of people who are up on high or on tv every thursday on the public tv station i think starting to think more in in that way um is going to be critical for everyone instead of just looking to um our our leaders historically and i just want to say for you um to say how do we get united again how do we stay strong together and lean on each other's shoulders this is why immigrant youth leadership was started this is a basis that carlos and i said we need this group by utsa this is why we need to ensure that you know we do become a sanctuary campus just to let everybody know that hey this is the stuff that needs to happen and then this is how it kind of should happen and that our rights are not violated in the process of things happening so this is why we invite all utsa students who are immigrants and allies to come and join our organization so that we ensure that together at utsa we feel safe and that we know that there's a group of students because our students are about 700 students that are undocumented at utsa and do you know even 10 of those maybe not we know because we've been coming as a group the last couple of maybe two three months together talking and making sure that this organization is built at utsa so that's when this is why we are inviting everyone that are here that is here to join our group even if you're not an immigrant student just as an ally to ensure that you let your classmates know that when they're sitting next to you they're going to be saved that they're not that you're not going to be judging them based on their status and that's what we carlos and i decided that we needed to bring this organization on campus so if you are a utsa student whether you're undocumented or not and you want to join the group come and talk to us and we'll definitely sign you up for it we are we are working we organizing we invite you to be part of it i think what i can provide is a venue i can provide communication tools and we can provide legal expertise and a and a work plan as an office with offices throughout the state and we have an employee in washington dc we can offer some geographic connectivity perhaps also intersecting with other groups that are facing similar challenges but really what the best that we can do is create a good a venue and welcome uh you sir into into that into that space and then uh you know after after a minimal amount of work is done on our end it's it's it's us to follow the work plan created by you other questions i think what we'll do is this um it's 355 why don't we take two more questions and then you know i'll stick around as long as i possibly can and they will too uh and we'll take a temperature of folks to see how many questions are left after we do this let's go back here this year okay um is this working i can tell i go to utsa um i was brought here because one of my classes um it's built in the education college of education just to advocate for students with um um diversity especially in um lingual diversity um my question is is i know that the resources are really thin with organizations like yours but why has there not been more partnership with organizations like the two DACA students represent to change the general discourse um i know that there has been an increase in hate crime utsa i've heard comments i've been around it um being a white person people think it's okay to say things around me so there it is there still so i feel like there needs to be a larger push um not just for illegal or government level but a change in discourse especially with students at utsa being a hispanic serving institute um i think that we have a lot of power um there's a lot of things that utsa students have pushed for have been able to move for um just by coming together and representing and advocating so i think that a large part that needs a change is the discourse to make sure students sitting next to you know that they're not judged by a white person by a black person hispanic is or whatever you are um so i think that that is equally as important as coming from a legal or government attack point um you know we have been working on the ground with schools and school districts where hate crimes and hate speech has been reported to us um i'll tell you that oftentimes families parents students are scared to report to us because they think that we're going to go until um the schools or the school districts who was saying what and they fear sometimes retaliation the school districts that we've worked with have been very receptive and wanting to um want either wanting more information about what happened or wanting more information about what their responsibilities are there are responsibilities under state and federal law to investigate hate speech um on campus at least k-12 that's based on race and national origin um so it's protected and um but i i agree with you completely i think this is all you know we're dealing with symptoms of a greater problem and we do what we can do but i agree that there's there's it's becoming very apparent that there's some type of infrastructure that's needed there um and some type of wider discourse that's needed there and frankly i i can't tell you today as i sit here what it what it looks like um but if you want to do something together you know call me um i i'd really where we want to support efforts like that but i think the solution that's one area where the solutions are going to have to come from people on the ground who are living it who are seeing it and who are experiencing it um and i'm happy i'm happy to take that direction okay great yes sir i'm arturo chavez with the mexican american catholic college i just want to say that uh you know the the real sanctuaries the churches uh are with the dreamers yes and all the way at least uh you know we've seen it even in in this week with the courageous menonites travis park many other sanctuaries that that are doing courageous standing up and for those sanctuaries that are not we really need to challenge uh what it really means to be a person of faith and and i can only speak for my own church the catholic church all the way from pope francis to archbishop ustavo we're very clear about our stance with the dreamers and with immigrants in general not to separate i just came from a national meeting of the catholic community and uh it's very clear you know that we will stand we will not allow random kinds of deportations you know because that is the fear and to help people attain the information and i know that the best information will come from legal folks but the information is mostly going to come from us non-legal folks but who are committed and who can give the facts as they as that that people do have rights and so we need to speak up we need to walk with and i think as people of faith we need to challenge people in our congregation who sometimes somehow feel that this is not none of their business right and we need to say it is your business as a person of faith and there is a right side and a wrong side and you need to get on the right side all right arch archbishop archbishop ustavo has made very clear and in fact he has been meeting with voluntary with volunteer lawyers over the last couple of months i've been in those meetings hit some of his representatives they are very prepared because working with so many immigrant clients they the one person that they trust is their priest or the hermana that goes to their church with them but they are preparing for that and i feel so lucky to be in this diocese with a bishop and with priests who support that they're planning a series of informational meetings at some of the largest churches in the city many volunteer lawyers are going to participate in that i think the churches really are going to be the ground zero for organizing i honestly believe that and the fact that we have an archbishop and other priests and other hermanas and hermanos that are ready to be with defending their immigrant you know counterparts it's it's an amazing amazing thing that i think we're going to see in san antonio in this archdiocese and i'm very proud to be part of it when i started this i've been waiting a little while because i wanted to say something on behalf of our veterans okay i went to the house last session and i waited until 11 30 at night to speak on behalf of the dreamers okay our veterans fought for your rights okay for freedom this is the land of the free the home of the brave and i can guarantee you that our veterans are not going to sit back and let this happen i'm here my friends are here my dogged is a friend of mine senator menendez is a friend of mine all the city council members are friends of ours of our veterans okay i'm counting on you guys and here's the question because i did this yesterday also to senator menendez and the veterans and it sounds kind of old but you know and it's it's based on the same paradigm that jonith kennedy did years ago and he he's you know he asked us you know don't ask what you're going to do for your country it's the other way around i was going don't ask what your country can do for you but ask what you can do for your country so here's what i would ask you all to do or i'm asking you all to do these folks have telephone numbers we all fight gaber wants to fight real hard from lulac this this right here is the most powerful tool that you have write your councilman write the mayor write the senator write the congressman it's so easy get on the internet send them an email send them your picture send them a picture of your mom i'm originally from i fought for this and i'm going to keep fighting for this and my friends in the room that are veterans here i can see them we're going to keep fighting for this so again i ask you what are you going to do to keep fighting they're here to help you my friends are here to help you i'm here to help you and you talk about the boogie man don't be afraid i think the bigger boogie man is us to turn around and fight him last comment and then we'll we'll turn this into something a little more informal for those of you who want to stick around i'm from the rado my church is a mile from the river and from the river you go through mesquite and all that and there's about three or four people come every night to my church they see the steeple and they say jesus is there no he's not there i'm there i've been there nine years and i the first got there the border patrol were just running all around my church and people down the street were reporting los mojados llegando so immediately the border patrol surrounds me well for nine years i've been successful at hiding people but you know what the coyotes are what they're working and one of the things that the steel is that they uh they tell the people that have paid them thousands of dollars to get them across they said the priest will hide you so lately they've been coming with their telephones and the people in laredo that will come by and pick them up and i teach a bible class and i teach a class to bring old catholics back to the church because a lot of y'all have wandered off there's some characters that are smarter than god you know and they'll tell you you know but anyway uh i have had how would you say stories lately the salvatoreans are the ones coming in they've got horrible stories the government's corrupt and the gangs run the country i mean it's a real sad situation so everything you do to rescue somebody from that country you owe it to god because we're all human beings together you know and uh my people father we need you here at the church if you get caught with somebody in your car you lose your car and you have three years in jail now i'm smarter than the than the border patrol but see if i say that out loud and then you tell them to be here in town we got a bad one over there so anyway this whole thing of immigration is a human issue that's just really human human human and my deal is when i when they first started coming in i had to feed some of them had to hide some of them had to push them up anyway my people mostly i've got a group of women called las samaritanas because i told them the story of the good samaritan where the priest walked by and did nothing and and a samaritan who is a horrible jew and i would the jews and samaria not samaria and and galilee and judia hate the samaritans and and then when they jesus said now who that group was a group was your was your neighbor and they said the samaritan and this jesus must have said that with the most power he had in his voice and he says go and do likewise that's dynamite go and do likewise and then that's the message and i guess that's my message too thank you father there's people now you don't need to know my name but i am a gringo mexicano all right i there's no topping that i'm not even gonna try for let me let me thank all of you for being here i want to thank you tsa for hosting us now cast for broadcasting johnson marisol marisa uh it's an honor to have you here you guys may not know this but marisol marisa and i were maldefi and together not too long ago so it's great for to have you guys here uh with us we're gonna stick around because we know there's a lot of work to do there's a lot of information to exchange people still have some questions they want to get phone numbers and email addresses and twitter handles we're happy to do all of that but for now in the most official capacity we're going to wrap up thank you guys so much