“I feel anger, but also gratitude. I hope that the community and the students will take to the streets and continue demanding our rights.”
Jazmin Alejandra Serrano attended middle school in Santa Ana. Since childhood, she had been an honor student, earning straight A’s. She loved studying and reading, which she had been doing since kindergarten. Her dad would take her to the library for books, and her family was very interested in her academic success.
One day, due to her grades, she received news that one of the most prestigious high schools in the city would be offering scholarships, and she was one of the chosen ones. When she attended the school’s presentation, she listened carefully. When they reached the requirements, they told the scholarship recipients they had to be citizens or legal residents. Some of Jazmin’s classmates looked at her as if they had conspired. She was not eligible; she was undocumented.
“I felt a lot of shame, also sadness and anger. I wondered why my parents had brought me to this country. I was an excellent student, and this was my punishment. That school was private; it cost a lot of money, and I could have had that scholarship, but I was not eligible,” Jazmin remembers.
It was during the rise of Donald Trump and the anti-immigrant rhetoric. Jazmin, in addition to feeling shame, also felt paranoid, making her think that being undocumented meant she was doing something wrong in this country.
“I cried a lot,” she says. Her parents told her to have faith; something would happen.
Aunts, uncles, and grandparents were around to support and help care for her when her parents went to work.
“They were always hard workers. My mom worked in the fast-food industry, and my dad worked in construction and other jobs. I rarely saw them. But they were always looking out for me. They didn’t let me go out much; I had to stay away from gangs and violence. I couldn’t get into trouble; the police couldn’t come and talk to my parents; we were in danger because of our status,” says the co-director of the Undocumented Student-Led Network, a member of the board of MEChA UCI, and a UCI Dream Project Fellow.
Jazmin came to Santa Ana with her family at the age of two. She was born in Mexico City. In this city, they had strong support from an extended family.
As a child, she played with Barbies and dolls like many girls. She lived in an apartment, and sometimes, she would go to the neighbor’s house to play inside. Other times, the neighbor would come to her. It was a carefree childhood, and she felt happy.
Santa Ana is a city with a majority Latino population, many of whom are undocumented. Spanish is spoken, and many Mexican restaurants offer tacos and other Mexican dishes as if one were in Mexico.
One day in elementary school, she worked on a project where they had to explain their history, and where they had come from. She, as was normal, said she was born in Mexico, and everyone turned to look at her.
“To say you were born in Mexico was like saying you were undocumented,” she says. But it didn’t matter much. In Santa Ana, the community was very similar to her family.
As a child and teenager, she dreamed of being a teacher. She dreamed of being able to share her knowledge with others and sought to help her teachers. She felt very enthusiastic; for her, sharing was a privilege.
During those years, the DACA benefit was announced, and her family was happy; she could continue studying without problems when the time came to apply for it.
The family had to move from Santa Ana. The first signs of gentrification arrived in the city; the famous Fourth Street was starting to change, and with it, housing prices.
Her parents decided to migrate to Riverside.
“That affected me. From being in a city full of Latinos, we arrived in an area where there were very few Latinos. In high school, I was one of the few Latinos. If you looked Latina, people automatically thought you were undocumented. I became friends with one of the other Latinos in school; we started hanging out, and I thought he was cute. But one day he told me, ‘I need to get a white girlfriend; I need to fix my papers.’ That’s where we were,” Jazmin says.
There, she viscerally felt racism; she felt out of place. Her school had no support programs for undocumented students, no support at all.
“That (Chicano studies) empowered me. I felt smart; I didn’t have to dress like a white girl; I had to identify as what I was. I wanted to fit in, but I wasn’t like everyone else; I had to embrace what I had, not feel bad,” she adds.
But that didn’t stop her; she pushed forward. Her goal was to continue studying; she had an idea of how to do it, thinking maybe a community college. She wasn’t thinking about a university.
“Just before I graduated from high school, we were in a classroom filling out financial aid applications. All the other students were filling out forms for federal aid. I just watched; I couldn’t apply for it. The only thing I could do was request a state loan. When the teacher came up to me and saw my form, she said, ‘This is the first time I’ve seen this; I can’t help you.’ I felt embarrassed again,” she says.
Her grades kept her strong. She thought everything would improve. They took a tour of UC Irvine, and she liked it; she was impressed. She applied but didn’t hear back when her classmates did.
A classmate encouraged her to ask directly, telling her that sometimes schools forget to communicate that students have been accepted, and so she did. The result was positive. She had been accepted—and with even better news.
“UCI offered me a full ride. My grades and the family income, which at that time depended solely on my mom, helped with that,” she says.
When she got home, she announced to her mom and brother that she had been accepted; she saw more worried faces than joyful ones. They were concerned about the economic cost.
Getting to UCI was a success, but it came with a reality check.
“I came from a family with very little economic income,” she says. “There are hardly any Latino students; the students who come here are very wealthy; they wear expensive clothes, Gucci, and drive Mercedes cars. I felt very low.”
The first three years were a nightmare; she felt like everyone was looking at her, looking at her strange, as if she didn’t belong there.
Then she had an encounter with something that changed her life. The Dream Center. She met Chicano teachers, began studying Chicano history, and when she took a class called Undocumented Immigrants’ Experiences, she realized one thing: “I wasn’t the only one living and experiencing what I had lived.”
“That empowered me. I felt smart; I didn’t have to dress like a white girl; I had to identify as what I was. I wanted to fit in, but I wasn’t like everyone else; I had to embrace what I had, not feel bad,” she adds.
In that third year, she set aside her emotional burden and adopted a more activist role. She began to get involved in movements and protests.
“I had to have hope in something. Education has helped me fight,” she says.
Of course, there are moments when she gets desperate. Then she gets depressed, cries, and feels helpless.
“Many times, I didn’t want to leave my dorm on campus. That happened when my DACA application was denied for the second time. I locked myself in; I didn’t go to class. I was so angry,” she says.
Her voice conveys that desperation but also a clarity about her situation. She is about to graduate, but she won’t be able to work in her field of study. She wants to pursue her PhD, but she can’t do that at the moment. She hopes the UC system will find a way to help them.
“I feel anger but also gratitude. I hope that ordinary people, the students, will take to the streets and continue demanding our rights, that they help us. Only the community can do it. I am sure I will meet good-hearted people who will help us,” she adds.
After finishing her education, she plans to find work where she is given the opportunity; she wants to save up to pay for her PhD when the time comes. “I don’t want to put all my faith in the university,” she says.
“One day I would like to travel. I don’t mean Paris or Europe. I mean Mexico City, where my family lives. And of course! That I would have the guarantee of being able to return,”.
When on September 22, Governor Gavin Newsom vetoed Bill AB2586, which could have provided work opportunities for undocumented students, Jazmin was not surprised.
“It’s an election season; I thought there were good opportunities, but it wasn’t like that. California is a migrant state, and that didn’t matter to the governor. My faith is not with politicians or organizations that claim to be pro-immigrant. They do not have my respect. I have faith in the people, the community, and the students,” she says.
Jazmin laughs and reflects.
“To be honest, I have more faith in a person I met yesterday than in politicians. I have cried about what has happened; it has impacted my personal life. My dog got sick; his name was Bandido, a Husky, the first dog in the family. The costs of veterinarians are very high here in California. We asked around and were told that people take their pets to Tijuana for consultations. We couldn’t cross the border. Bandido died very soon at the beginning of September,” she says. “Having immigration status is a privilege.”
And if she saw Newsom?
“If Governor Newsom were in front of me I would ask him what the difference is between him and the MAGA politicians he claims to be ideologically opposed to? His gubernatorial veto of the Opportunity for All Act will have repercussions for immigrant communities that are on the same footing as the disastrous effects the Trump administration’s DACA rescindment in 2016 had. Just like Trump’s cruel executive action, Newsom’s veto will deny thousands of California’s undocumented students of dignified employment opportunities. I firmly believe Newsom’s veto will be remembered as an example of the sort of political violence immigrants in the United States fought against following the mainstreaming of right-wing, white supremacist ideology ushered in by MAGA political extremists. I hope Gavin Newsom knows that his governorship’s anti-immigrant policies will be remembered in parallel with those of the ill-famed California Governor Pete Wilson. “
Jazmin doesn’t ask for much in her dreams.
“One day I would like to travel. I don’t mean Paris or Europe. I mean Mexico City, where my family lives. And of course! That I would have the guarantee of being able to return,” she concludes.
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