Dear Donald Trump,
My name is Valerie Lamb, and I am the daughter of an immigrant. You are quick to call immigrants rapist and murderers, and while you tend to focus on Mexican immigrants when you say these harmful things, you are stereotyping all of them. Every single attack you’ve made against immigrants feels like a personal attack on my family, and friends whose parents made the same decision to come here. I have tried to remain unbiased when writing about politics, but hearing you say, “There are some bad hombres out there,” in Wednesday’s debate has push me to my boiling point. Would you feel the same if you knew all the hardships immigrants have had to face before coming here? I don’t know if it will ever change your opinion (I doubt it will), but I’m going to tell you the story of my mother.
Growing up with seven brothers and sisters wasn’t easy, especially when her mother was a single parent and made little money. Because she was one of the youngest, she was sent to live with a relative in a middle-class area in Santiago de los Cabellaros, Dominican Republic. It was hard to live apart from her family, but this was the best option for her to receive the best education she could get and eventually attend college. After graduating, she ended up running the relative’s salon -- and was doing well for herself -- when she started to learn about drug dealers using her store as a place to make exchanges, and when she wasn’t there, would go in and use her phone to elicit deals. My mother was terrified, She had heard of stories where storeowners got killed because they knew information they shouldn’t, and she in no way wanted to be a part of the selling or purchasing of illegal substances. After visiting America twice on travel visas, she decided to make one more trip.
In 1990, my mom decided to stay after her visa expired because she no longer felt safe in the country she grew up in, and she wanted to make a better life for herself and live “The American Dream.” The relative she grew up with had already moved to Florida at this point, and was able to help my mom get a job as a maid at a hotel nearby. Everyday, she’d walk three miles from home to the hotel and back, terrified that if she slipped up just a little bit, she’d be sent back to Dominican Republic with no chance of coming back.
She started taking night classes at the local elementary school, practicing her English, and assimilating herself into American culture. My dad, who was in his late 20s at the time, just like my mom, and a teacher at a middle school nearby, decided to teach night classes for adults who wanted to learn English. Everyone in the class was around the same age, and lived on the same island (North Bay Village), so they would go out together at night and all became friends. After the class ended, they stayed in touch. One of my mom’s classmates even ended up being my sister’s godfather. My parents didn’t start dating until after the class ended.
They fell in love and got married and 1993, and my mom was officially a resident of the United States of America. She went on to get her citizenship, even though it required her to denounce the citizenship of her former country. She works as a hair dresser and I’ve never seen anyone work harder on anything than my mom.
This, Donald Trump, is a true example of an immigrant, not these terrible people you portray in your speeches or in debates. This upcoming election, I will not vote for you, because voting for you is voting against people like my mom who came to this country looking for opportunity and acceptance. Voting for you is saying immigrants aren’t welcomed here, and that’s something I can never agree with.
Sincerely,
A child of an immigrant
