An Undocumented Immigrant Story: Immigrant Data and 1986 Amnesty

Do you want to know about undocumented immigrant #Facts and #Real World Immigrant Data?

Are you tired of hearing undocumented immigrant stereotypes and misinformation that is fear-based?

In 1981, I ran across the US-Mexican border at 7 years old for 12 hours across the desert. We were running away from civil war-torn El Salvador. My mother (working on equal pay for teachers) received death threats that included killing her, my brother, and me.

My family and I applied-and got our temporary residency cards through the vetted 1986 IRCA (“amnesty act”)

Hear our family's story- there are many millions more out there of the estimated 11 MM undocumented immigrants in the US.

Hear published census information on undocumented immigrant employment, tax-filing, crime, and incarceration rates- associated data that is publicly available and published in the literature.

What is missing? real world data (directly from the estimated ~11 MM undocumented immigrants) and longitudinal data (where are they now and what have folks been up to? What does their societal contribution look like?

We don't exactly know- because it is not being collected. All of the wonderful immigrant contributions from this ~11 MM group of folks is not being documented in an organized publicly available way- if at all.

...That's what Lifeundocumented.org seeks to do.

Lifeundocumented.org mission statement:
Collect and disseminate undocumented immigrant stories and data to effect immigration policy and promote a humane, holistic, data-based, and globally responsive immigrant rhetoric.

We seek to speak up for undocumented immigrants, as well as getting positive and inspiring stories of undocumented immigrants into the public domain/media.

The organization's remit is to collect these stories, speak to them, and disseminate undocumented immigrant data (based on deidentified stories and published data) to support policy decisions that are humane, holistic, data-based, and globally responsive.