undocumented

The threat of deportation is what kept many members of my community silent — unable to advocate for their basic needs of safety, fair wages and a retirement plan.

Universal financial access to care can help address unmet health needs, reduce delays in care, increase the use of preventive services, help prevent unnecessary emergency department visits and hospitalizations and help our children get better starts to life. It is the right thing to do, and we have the means to do it.

And the survival of derogatory terms such as “wetback” is a constant reminder that I don’t belong and continues to make me feel estranged from a country I recognize as my home.

All Berkeley can do now is wait, hope that its resources are enough and ride out what is –– in the final analysis –– just another battle in a long, exhausting clash of political civilizations.

I’d been living undocumented for 17 years when on June 15, 2012, former U.S. president Barack Obama’s administration made the groundbreaking decision to deploy the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA.

It is because we are not safe on this campus. And under these circumstances, we cannot continue to choose to be reactive over being proactive.

In the United States, 2 million people were eligible for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, in 2016, while thousands of others who arrived here during or before their teenage years were not deemed eligible.

We refuse to let government relations staff or any UC Berkeley administration official take credit for the work that was done by the undocumented community.

In the midst of the Trump administration’s threats to undocumented residents, a network consisting of 11 jurisdictions, including Oakland and Alameda County, will provide publicly funded legal representation to anyone facing deportation.