A letter from an undocumented mother
OPINION Maru Mora Villalpando is the director of Latino Advocacy and a member of the #Not1More Blue Ribbon Commission of undocumented leaders that issued its…
A group of undocumented immigrants are asking for a seat at the table in meetings with President Barack Obama to share their own expertise on immigration. (AP Photo)
OPINION
Maru Mora Villalpando is the director of Latino Advocacy and a member of the #Not1More Blue Ribbon Commission of undocumented leaders that issued its recommendations to President Barack Obama for immediate administrative relief. She is participating today in a picket at the White House calling for a boycott of meetings with Obama without representation by undocumented people.
My daughter is about to turn 17 years old, and it has taken her more than a decade to acknowledge publicly that her mother is undocumented and may be deported at any point from this country.
As a family with everything to risk and nothing else to lose, we decided to join the campaign to make President Barack Obama stop deportations and risked arrest in civil disobedience. After so many people pushing, we have been able to move the President to accept that yes he can take many steps to stop deportations.
Maru Mora Villalpando wants more undocumented immigrants like her to have a seat at the table in meetings with Obama over the issue of immigration. (Photo credit: Alex Garland)
SEE ALSO: Menendez has no doubt Obama will take immigration executive action
It may seem counterintuitive, but its actually my motherly instinct that has taught me that risking everything for a just cause is the beginning to a real positive change.
That is why I joined the delegation of undocumented immigrants to visit the offices of three very well connected national groups that have had a seat at the table with President Obama. We asked them not to meet with the President anymore until he fully acknowledges our presence in this country and our own expertise on the immigration issue.
Unless he hears from undocumented people and lets us be our own advocates at the negotiation table to alleviate the record deportations and end family separation, its hard to imagine what anyone else would accomplish.
SEE ALSO: 6 executive actions Obama can take on immigration
The good intentions of those allies that want to protect our rights can only be true if they leave the space open for our leadership. Our place in the movement has evolved. Years ago, undocumented people werent even talked about. Then we were told to keep our status to ourselves for our own safety. And finally, weve been asked to share our stories.
But we are more than sad victims or saintly heroes. Were leading strategists and our own best defense. Often when you hear about negotiations, you hear the concern that the underrepresented may be thrown under the bus. But here too, we have a solution for that: we the underrepresented cant throw ourselves under the bus.
Real leaders build the leadership of others and welcome its growth. With all of our shared experience, we hope then that self-representation is a shared value we all hold. And that, until undocumented immigrants experienced in our own family separation and racial profiling meet with him to ensure the revision to detention and deportation policies that is based in our experience and our solutions, there will be no negotiation without representation.
After all, like I tell my daughter, mother knows best.
SEE ALSO: Poll: Immigration is the nations top problem
