El Sol Issue IX - Summer 2017

EL SOL Issue IX — Summer 2017

One strike & you are out!

America’s shameful deportation of Veterans

EL SOL

Editor-in-Chief Mirella Lopez Assistant Editor Alyssa Pajarillo Copy Editor Brian del Carmen

Issue IX — Summer 2017

Welcome to the borderlands Nov. 8, 2016 may have been a happy day in red state America, but it felt like a storm gathering over this southwesternmost part of the United States.

It was an election that cast a shadow across the dreams and the image of our beloved borderlands. We have become the scapegoats of a regime that is 3,000 miles away and understands us not one bit.

We are not a lawless land of illegal criminals and rapists that needs walling off.

We are not a dusty drug smuggling trail crawling with diseased mulas eager to breed anchor babies. We are not relieved to hear narcissistic billionaires eating taco salads in his Manhattan tower tell us he “loves Hispanics.”

Remarkable San Diego County is America’s most diverse stronghold.

We have the ocean, savannahs, mountains and deserts. We have people from Europe, Asia, Latin America, Africa and the Pacific Islands. We are military, immigrants, ancient Natives and brand new races. We have a culture that exists nowhere else on the planet. We are pioneers, survivors, creators, builders, innovators and visionaries. We are today how the world will be in the second half of the 21st century.

This magazine tells our stories. Activists, survivors, victims and victors come to life on these pages. In the age of “fake news,” this is something real. These are the real stories of people struggling lift up others and find a place in the future in a nation clinging futilely to the past.

Join us for a glimpse into America’s future and meet some of the people who will lead it. We may look a little different, but we are every bit American as the rest of this nation of immigrants.

Mirella Lopez Editor-in-Chief

Writers Elizabeth Farin Cristofer Garcia Victoria Gonzalez Marty Loftin Brelio Lozano Michael McDonald Ivana Morales Chelsea Pelayo Andrew Perez Bianca Quilantan Carolina Rubio Domonique Scott Maria Seudónima Katy Stegall Yamilet Torres Photographers Anibal Alcaraz JoseLuis Baylon Renee Conly Thomas Contant Cristofer Garcia Victoria Gonzalez Maria Joaquin Mason Masis Natalie Mosqueda Peggy Peattie Chelsea Pelayo Bianca Quilantan Designers Cristofer Garcia Mirella Lopez Mason Masis Michael McDonald Alyssa Pajarillo Bianca Quilantan Katy Stegall Illustrators Salvador Barajas Junco Canché Matthew Reilly Advisor Dr. Max Branscomb

EL SOL Table of Contents

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17 On the cover: strike & 67 One you are out

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Tireless activist says environmental degradation, high rates of incarceration threaten our future

College finds effective, outspoken leadership from an unexpected source

Smart, outspoken ASO president fights injustice wherever she sees it

Chunky Sanchez, Presente!

Chicano punk artist discovers that talent plus passion is power

Angela Davis urges students to take the torch

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Ramon “Chunky” Sanchez was a beloved musician-activist and a national treasure

It is a shoddy secret that the United States has deported unknown numbers of honorably discharged military veterans. The fight is on to bring them home.

Talented Muslim women transform student government

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Junco Canché is emerging as a voice in the civil rights community

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Spanish Revival masterpieces drowning in a sea of uninspired buildings

Antonio Chavez Camarillo is the guardian angel of a Chicano holy land

San Diego architecture is losing its distinctivness

Chicano Park under protection of its venerable keeper

A new Mona smile paints her own masterpiece for the ages

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Homeless students are more common than ever, but uncommonly resolute Shivering in a car with her family, doing homework on the dash, a future nurse perseveres

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‘Boy Wonder’ Dan Cordero transitions into a real life LGTBQ superhero

Comic books gave transgender man the courage to become the confident leader he now is

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Southwestern must deal harshly with administrators, cops that perpetuate problem

Celebration of Mexico’s Battle of Puebla has become an orgy of drunkenness and ignorance

Southwestern College student suffers a tedious daily border crossing to stay in school

Nearby Valle de Guadalupe has beautiful scenery, classy tasting rooms and great wine

Editorial: College leaders need to make big changes to address sexual assault

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Viewpoint: America must stand up for its DACA students, soldiers, workers Brought into the U.S. as children, thousands of innocents are as American as the kids next door

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Art of the protest, signs of the times Just as Vietnam fueled an outburst of creative outrage, Trump has inspired a wave of clever protest messaging

Misunderstood Cinco de Mayo can’t get no respeto

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Formerly incarcerated students discover that education is freedom

Ebullient team works to spread the message that doing time in college is a better road

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And the gates of mercy shall be open – if only for three blessed minutes U.S. Border Patrol opens the wall for brief, but emotional reunions of divided families

A 15-mile school commute Underrated Mexican takes three hours when it wineries are an undiscovered treasure begins in Mexico

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Tijuana’s Xolos soccer players are the big dogs of borderlands futbol Mexican league champions are muy popular on both sides of futbol-crazy frontera

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Former college crosscountry champion leaves cancer in the dust After beating illness, retired teacher began running a marathon every month

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Haitian refugees are stranded in Tijuana

Kicked out of Brazil, blocked from the U.S., Haitian families are not welcome in Mexico

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El Sol Magazine is dedicated to the legendary Chicano artist Salvador Barajas Southwestern College journalism students are grateful for his cover art, his belief in our work and his faith in us. Mil gracias, señor!

Angela Davis fights to shut America’s gates of hell Story Carolina Rubio Photo Natalie Mosqueda

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Dr. Angela Davis grew up in the Dynamite Hill area of Birmingham, Alabama. Her neighborhood owes its nickname to the Ku Klux Klan’s bombings of African-American homes during the 1960s.

Now it is Davis who is blowing up convention and blasting social injustice in a country still reeling from 450 years of slavery and oppression.

Davis, the once-controversial UC Santa Cruz professor, rallied an audience of 1,200 in the creaky, cramped but crazed gym. She moved mellifluously from her days in the early 1970s on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list to her current role as the greying but gregarious critic of environmental degradation and mass incarceration.

“We can never forget that this land was forcibly taken from the people who worked its stories, who respected this land and entered a caring relationship with it,” she said.

Davis’ “Education or Incarceration” lecture was part of the college’s Cultivating Courageous Conversations series.

Prison, she said, is the plague of African-Americans. America has suffered a 500 percent increase in incarceration rates over the last 40 years, without an increase in crime rates.

Davis said the targeted groups have been ethnic minorities, with one in three black men and one in six Latino men likely to be imprisoned during their lifetimes.

Putting men of color behind bars is a profitable business, she said.

Davis related mass incarceration to the way capitalism has invaded every aspect of American life.

She encouraged the audience to “form a country that doesn’t need prisons.”

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There is a direct link between the nation’s financial structure and spikes in prison building and incarceration rates, she said.

“Our analysis of the crisis in over-incarceration and the role that racism plays in it, is connected to the way in which incarceration fuels the economy,” she said.

Environmental injustice is the foundation of all other injustice, Davis said.

Land ties everything together, she insisted, as demonstrated by the Standing Rock Sioux tribe protesting the Dakota Access Pipeline. Without the land, she said, there is nothing.

Davis said the election of Donald Trump was unfortunate, but it is waking up a sleeping country.

“This resistance has been led by women,” she said.

She used Trump’s Muslim ban to illustrate how resistance has brought the country together.

“It was absolutely incredible, the way that people flocked to all the international airports and spontaneously created all of these demonstrations,” she said.

“In cities where there were no international airports, people went to symbols of power and demonstrated there.”

Professor of Communication Dr. Rachel Hastings said Davis inspired students to rise up.

“I’m hoping to get some good, honest, historical conversation on how to stay involved,” she said.

Davis would be all for that.

“I am really happy to be able to witness this upsurge in resistance all over the country and all over the world.”

“We can never forget that this land was forcibly taken from the people who... respected it and entered a caring relationship with it.”

Cristofer Garcia

Courtesy photo

Courtesy photo

MUSICAL VOICE OF LA CAUSA – Ramon “Chunky” Sanchez was the favorite musician of Cesar Chavez and a beloved educator and activist in the borderlands. His human rights anthem “Chicano Park Samba” is part of the Library of Congress Folk Music Collection. He was honored with the National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship by President Obama. (top) Sanchez was recently immortalized by legendary Chicano artist Salvador Barajas on the Historical Mural in Chicano Park.

Iconic Chicano Chunky Sanchez : La Musica Hace La Fuerza C

esar Chavez was the face of the Chicano Movement. Chunky Sanchez was the soundtrack.

A Chicano music legend and a beloved San Diego County activist, Ramon “Chunky” Sanchez died in October. He was 64. He and his band, Los Alacranes Mojados, recorded the iconic “Chicano Park Samba,” the story of the 1970 uprising that created the world’s largest collection of outdoor murals underneath the Coronado Bridge.

Story Cristofer Garcia Illustration Junco Canché

Sanchez was born in Blyth, California.

His parents were both farm workers.

A proud San Diego State University graduate, the humble and unassuming Sanchez became a national treasure. He frequently performed at United Farm Workers rallies at the request of Chavez and UFW leader Dolores Huerta. His friends said Sanchez would always drop whatever he was doing, hop in his car and join Chavez if the legendary Chicano leader called.

In 2013 Sanchez was honored with the National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship. President Barack Obama counted himself among the legions of Chunkistas.

Sanchez was in the thick of America’s best known Chicano uprising, the 1970 Chicano Park standoff in Logan Heights.

Residents of the neighborhood were promised a park during the construction of Interstate 5 and the Coronado Bridge in the 1960s, but were shocked to 4

learn in 1970 that the never-developed parkland was to become a California Highway Patrol substation with a large parking lot. Protestors from all over the United States put their bodies between bulldozers and the open space. Others started to build their own park and paint murals on bridge support beams.

Sanchez wrote “Chicano Park Samba” to memorialize a rare victory by the region’s Mexican-American community. It celebrated “a park where all the chavalitos could play so they wouldn’t have to play in the street” in a Chicano vernacular that was revolution with a smile.

Sanchez was popular throughout the county for his appearances at schools where he spoke to classes and sang to children. He was for decades a staple at Adams Avenue Street Festival and other musical gatherings.

Congressman Juan Vargas of Chula Vista read the lyrics to “Chicano Park Samba” into the Congressional Record. Vargas called Sanchez a “talented musician” and an “incredibly active member of the San Diego community.”

“Through his music he would tell the story of the Chicano Movement and of the MexicanAmerica bicultural experience,” Vargas said.

“He worked as a coach, an educator and a gang intervention counselor.”

Chicano activist Herman Baca, chairman of the Committee on Chicano Rights, said he was a compadre of Sanchez since they met in 1970 during a protest at SDSU while Sanchez was a student.

“Chunky and I were doing what we were going to do for the next 45-plus years,” Baca said.

“Chunky was singing and playing and I was speaking, and we

kind of hit it right off.”

Their friendship grew through all the protests and rallies they attended, Baca said.

“I saw Chunky over the next 45 years at community struggles that had been brought or initiated by the Chicano Movement,” he said. “There was a lot of activism, a lot of what you call social-political conciencia. There was a whole bunch of clamor and yelling and screaming for change in U.S. society by various groups.”

Baca said he and Sanchez fought together for Chicano Park, which became Chunky’s second home. Baca and Sanchez are both featured on a gateway Chicano Park mural.

“Chunky would play every year at the anniversary of Chicano Park,” said Baca.

“Chunky immortalized Chicano Park.”

Chicano Park celebrated its 45th anniversary on April 22, 2015 and the old activistas were both there.

“When I spoke at Chicano Park at the 45th anniversary of the takeover,” said Baca, “I read a little part of Rodolfo “Corky” Gonzales’s epic poem ‘I Am Joaquin.’ Afterwards, when I was getting off stage, Chunky said ‘Herman, if you’re ever able to recite that poem for me, please do it.’”

Baca read from the poem at an emotional memorial service for Sanchez held at Chicano Park attended by thousands.

“I must fight and win this struggle for my sons and they must know from me

who I am,” Baca read. “I look the same, I feel the same. I cry and sing the same. I am the masses of my people and I refuse to be absorbed.”

“I Am Joaquin” encapsulates Sanchez’s life work, said Baca.

“It was powerful in that it was in memory of Chunky because I think the poem epitomizes what Chunky was all about,” he said. “He refused to be absorbed by those we confront who have placed us in this situation.”

Baca said the Chicano Movement lost a big part of its history with the death of Sanchez, but his spirit would continue in the community through his music, and the activism of those he taught and inspired.

“As long as you listen to those songs, Chunky is always going to be here,” he said. “If you’re ever in a demonstration, a picket, a rally or you come to Chicano Park, you’re going to know Chunky’s spirit is here. We buried him, but he has not left us. He was the heart and soul of the Chicano Movement and he was the cement that held our people here in San Diego and Aztlan together. That’s his great contribution.”

Architectural Apocalypto San Diego County buildings are losing their multicultural distinctiveness

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outhern California has become a melting pot of world cultures and immigrants make an exceptionally large part, but in the San Diego region their influence on architecture is restricted to a few surviving examples of Story Marty Loftin Photos Maria Joaquin and Mason Masis

Spanish colonialism and the revival movements inspired by the building style of those Catholic missionaries.

San Diego has long since evolved past being a Spanish colony. It represents much more now, but it might be hard to tell by looking.

Future architects might consider drawing inspiration from the wide variety of cultures that exist here, lest the region become dominated by modern and postmodern designs. Of the 32 tallest buildings that define the San Diego skyline, only the 31st tallest building, the El Cortez hotel, evokes the spirit of immigrant culture with its Spanish Colonial Revival style.

San Diego County is the second largest county in California and the fifth largest in the United States. It has a population of 3.1 million people and 21.5 percent are immigrants who collectively speak 68 different languages, according to the Health and Human Services Agency of San Diego. About 37 percent of San Diego residents under the age of 18 are Hispanic and that population is expected to continue to grow.

The architectural obsession of the early 20th century with the old and exotic which fueled the Mission Revival, Spanish Revival, Pueblo Revival and Mayan Revival styles that exploded across California has 7

since faded away.

While there are examples of Spanish-inspired architecture scattered throughout San Diego, which consists of primarily churches and museums, it is disappointing that immigrant cultures are not also represented through architecture.

Inspiration can come from anywhere in the world, whether it be the Great Mosque of Djenné in the Sudano-Sahelian style of West Africa, known for its use of mud bricks, adobe plaster and cross beams that just out like spikes on a cactus, or influenced

by Indian stupas, Japanese pagodas or Southeast Asian wats. It should not be that the Japanese Friendship Garden in Balboa Park is the only public place to future Asian architecture in San Diego. The different cultures of San Diego should be valued and must be represented more fully.

Non-white, non-Christian immigrants and their families should be able to worship in places that are comfortable and have all the amenities they might expect from their homelands. The Islamic Center of San Diego, for example, would not be recognizable as a mosque if not for its humble dome and spire.

People can learn to accept what they cannot control and adapt to changes, but their culture should not be hidden from the eyes of the public.

Balboa Park is home to some of the finest architecture in the region thanks to the Panama– California Exposition in 1915, which celebrated the opening of the Panama Canal and helped put San Diego on the map. At the time, San Diego was the least populated city to host an international expo and

BERTRAM GOODHUE many opposed it so planners had to get by without federal funding.

Bertram Goodhue was the architect that masterminded the construction of many of the iconic buildings found in Balboa Park. His genius can be seen in the California Building and adjoining California Tower, which successfully combine elements from Gothic, Plateresque, Baroque, Churrigueresque and Rococo, all of which were know for their lavish ornamentation, to emulate a Spanish Colonial church.

Although Goodhue drew inspiration primarily from Western European cultures, this type of design process that draws elements from across a wide array of sources from around the world is an excellent way to promote diversity through architecture. As the nonwhite population continues to grow in size and influence, they will want to live in homes and work in buildings that reflect their homeland.

There are also many variations of thatched, wooden huts found across the Pacific islands, such as the Fijian bure, Samoan fale or the triangular men’s huts of Palau. Just because a place does not feature

SPANISH REVIVAL OR BUST—This likeness of explorer George Vancouver is one of several busts and statues on the California Building, home of The Museum of Man.

SPRECKELS ORGAN PAVILION

buildings made of stone or clay does not mean that it cannot be translated into modern architecture.

Although upper-class neighborhoods like Mission Hills and Point Loma have the luxury to copy architectural movements that thrived in the 1910s, 1920s and 1930s, the cultural influence on this region has largely been watered-down to allow for the mass production of acceptable knock offs.

Many homes and businesses in Southern California imitate the pale adobe walls of the Spanish Missions, with their curved arches, white stucco and ruddy-colored tile roofs, but other cultures have almost nonexistent influence on architecture.

These types of homes metaphorically dip their feet in the waters of immigrant culture without diving in.

Catholic missionaries cast the first seeds of western civilization across the West Coast in the 17th century, but over the centuries the architectural mingling of Spanish and Native American culture has been reduced to a few examples choked by modern architecture.

St. Francis Cathedral in Balboa Park, JunĂ­pero

San Diego Museum of Art is a monument to Spanish revival architecture.

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Serra Museum in Presidio Park and Santa Fe Depot downtown were built to celebrate the Spanish influence on the region. Now is the time to go beyond Spanish and recognize other cultures that have become a part of San Diego.

How refreshing it would be to see modern architectural styles that blend influences from Asian, Pacific Islander, Native American and African peoples instead of rehashing European designs over and over.

People from all over the world call Southern California their home and it is time for buildings to look as multicultural as the people that occupy them.

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Cheerful Muslim women transform student government Five fearless Muslims in the ASO elevated discourse and activism Story Elizabeth Farin Photos Thomas Contant and Natalie Mosqueda

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ive American Muslim women who wear hijabs stand out in the ASO. They are also standouts in the ASO. Associated Student Organization President Mona Dibas and her sister, Vice President for Public Relations Nada Dibas, were first known as Southwestern’s first student executives to wear the Islamic headscarf. Now they are known as two of the college’s best-ever student leaders.

Mona Dibas said joining the ASO as a Palestinian Muslim woman was difficult at first. She said she found little support for her ideas from others.

“I am often told you can’t do that, you can’t accomplish this,” Dibas said. “You are too sensitive to be in charge. You’re too nice to take responsibility.”

Dibas said she received a great deal of pushback from some people on campus when she was elected president.

“I always feel like people are waiting for 11

me to mess up,” she said.

Dibas said sometimes her hijab overwhelms her words and actions. AntiMuslim prejudice has been more out in the open since the election of Donald Trump, even in multicultural San Diego County.

“Now the fear is real,” she said. “If I’m walking alone, someone can just walk from behind me and pull my scarf.”

With Trump elevating tension with his controversial Muslim ban, Dibas said she concerned by the elevated level of ignorance and hostility that immigrants and minorities face each day. Because of this oppression, she said, she is able to relate to more students at SWC, who are primarily minority. She has managed to turn diversity into a positive by motivating other students.

“Being a triple minority has helped me

to empower other women,” said Dibas.

She wears her scarf passionately each day as a statement to other Muslim women.

“I’m the first Muslim hijabi ASO president,” she said. “I hope I’m not the last.”

Dibas said she will continue her social activism after she

“I’m the first Muslim hijabi ASO president. I hope I’m not the last.”

-Mona Dibas

MADAM PRESIDENT AND ‘THE PRINCESS’ – Ebullient ASO President Mona Dibas and Vice President of Public Relations Nada Dibas (affectionately known as “The Hijabi Princess”) were outspoken advocates for Black Lives Matters, humane treatment of immigrants, women’s rights, safety from sexual assault and other causes relevant to Southwestern College students. They also publically spoke out about racist tweets by Otay Water Board Director Hector Gastelum.

Both sisters were SWC Student of Distinction Award recipients, Diversity Award honorees, Chula Vista Champions medalists and Woman of the Year awardees from California Assembly Member Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher.

They will attend UC Berkeley in the fall.

leaves SWC because she wants minorities to embrace their culture and be proud of who they are. She said she would like to be a history professor and come back to teach at Southwestern.

ASO Social Vice President Yasmeen Obeid said she is proud and excited to represent SWC with other Muslim women who wear hijabs. When she joined the ASO she said she only knew one other Muslim on campus, Mona Dibas. Obeid struggled to find a group with shared beliefs, she said.

As a result, she began to educate others who did not understand her religion and why she wears a hijab.

By joining the ASO, Obeid said she wanted to show people how American Muslims really are, instead of the oftenunflattering ways they are portrayed in the entertainment media and by American conservatives.

Obeid’s quest to educate others has borne fruit, she said. Now she is able to have one-on-one contact with students who respect her as a human being and respond to her more open-mindedly.

“They see behind my scarf,” she said.

“And that’s exactly why we wear the scarf.”

It has not always been smooth sailing for Obeid in the ASO. She recalled a time when another student threatened the Muslim women who served in student government. The student verbally attacked them and demeaned them, criticizing their qualifications to fill positions, she said.

Obeid said they were able to remain strong and stand up for themselves with the help of SWC’s Muslim Student Association (MSA) and each other.

Nada Dibas is president of the MSA. She said she understands the challenges that come with her position, but she focuses on understanding issues and resolving conflicts. Working alongside her sister they found a common goal.

“I realized we need more representation,” she said.

She described the acute lack of diversity in SWC’s leadership and she wants to encourage other minorities on campus to participate in student government, she said.

Nada Dibas said being an ASO leader has required a great deal of sacrifice. She has a full class schedule as a student, works relentlessly on issues, is an intern for Congressman Juan Vargas and competes on the SWC debate team.

Mona and Nada were honored recently as Chula Vista Champions by Mayor Mary Casillas Salas.

Brainy, energetic and charismatic, the Dibas sisters have reshaped the face of the ASO. Five Muslim women are either executives or senators. Obeid said it is healthy for student government to open itself to all students.

“If you have people to support you no matter who you are,” she said, “you’re not gonna find it as hard to adjust to the changes around you.”

DONALD TRUMP HAS TRANSFORMED INTO A HORRIBLE HYDRA. MULTIPLE BADLYPIPELINE, TONGUES TOUPEED REPTILIAN HEADS SNAKE OUT OF A KEYSTONE XL VENOMOUSLY LASHING OUT.

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he words “Muslim Ban” and “Alternative Facts” are spray painted in bleeding neon green and red behind the chimera on the polarizing wall the president promises to build on the U.S.-Mexico border.

This is the artwork of Joaquin Junco Jr. and he takes no prisoners. Known under the aliases Junco Canché and the Chicano Punk Rock Artesano, Junco is a rising editorial cartoonist like no other, whose work forces viewers to look at the polarizing xenophobic tendencies of modern America as well as the frank expositions of the blunders and misdeeds of politicians.

Junco, 26, had a modest upbringing, his family splitting its time between Chula Vista and Tijuana.

Artistic inspiration hit early in life.

“I remember being into art and drawing as far back as I can remember,” he said. “Saturday morning cartoons were an early influence.

Later on I got into political and editorial cartooning. Lalo Alcaraz and Rius were artists I looked up to.”

Alcaraz, author of the syndicated comic strip “La Cucaracha,” has known Junco for many years and calls himself “a huge fan.”

“Junco’s work is sharp, well drawn, and well written,” he said. “Seeing it gave me hope that political cartooning was not going to die, it was going to thrive. It was also reassuring to see that another Chicano political cartoonist was rising.”

Another of Junco’s major influences is punk rock.

“My brother introduced me to punk when I was in high school,” he said. “He noticed my passion for politics and he told me these bands talk about the same topics. I fell in love with the genre. It’s the ‘do whatever you feel like’ attitude of punk rock that I try to incorporate into my artwork.”

Junco got his first big art gig during his second semester at San Diego City College.

“I was in one of my Chicano history classes and busy doodling away in my notebook when this girl sitting next to me looked over and asked if I’d be interested in cartooning for an independent zine that her and her friends were putting together and I immediately said, ‘Yes, let’s do this!’”

Already interested in political cartooning, Junco drew cartoons for the zine satirizing the Bush administration and the war in Iraq. He was also a state champion cartoonist for the Southwestern College Sun and El Sol Magazine.

Since then has worked as a freelance artist for such publications as the San Diego Free Press, El Coyote Online, La Prenza San Diego and Pocho.com. He is currently majoring in

Chicano punk artist fights back with creativity Story Andrew Perez

Photo Anibal Alcaraz

graphic design at CSU San Bernardino.

Junco said he is very passionate about Latino and Chicano rights.

“One of the zines I drew for, El Coyote, would always be involved in activism at San Diego City College,” he said. “I would participate in many of the marches organized for Latino causes. I was always ready to contribute and participate.”

When it comes to Trump, Junco feels like his work is cut out for him.

“I notice I haven’t really been that active as a political cartoonist this year,” he said. “Ever since Trump became president I find it kind of redundant to draw anything related to him. I look at the headlines in the news and I feel like they speak for themselves.”

Junco insists that Chicano artists have an important role to play in modern society and that Latino communities should get together and support local artists.

“You go to a place like Chicano Park,” he said, “the murals tell the stories of our ancestors in Mexico and the immigrants working in the fields and what they had to face. It is important that Chicano artists put down their stories for future generations, to go and learn about what these people did not just for our cause, but also for minorities in general. We need to create visibility for our communities.”

Chicano artist Marci Luna said he is impressed with Junco’s ability to convey complex political topics into a simple image and still retain the subject’s immediacy.

“Words are one thing,” he said, “but as the saying goes, pictures, in this case drawings, can tell a thousand words and be interpreted in just as many ways. Junco’s art continues to transcend crossing borders, cultures and current events and

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It’s the ‘do whatever you feel like’ attitude of punk rock that I try to incorporate into my artwork.

“The First Week of the Next Four Years”

Junco CanchĂŠ in front of his murals inside Border X Brewing, a Barrio Logan brewery.

“App r Hips opriatio n te Fem r,” “Whi in te Bruta ism,” “P olice lity”

it’s great to see him gain more exposure.”

Junco said he is pleasantly surprised at how much he has accomplished.

“I never thought I would be able to pull it off,” he said, “but now I am actively making a name for myself and getting myself out there, I’m making it happen. My whole family, my dad in particular, have stood by me and supported me. Not a lot of artists have a lot of support, so I’m very appreciative and grateful for that.”

Junco urged those wishing to pursue a career as an artist to stay determined and focused, and to constantly work to fine-tune their craft.

“You have to draw every day,” he said. “No matter what it is, just draw.

Find your style and don’t be afraid to experiment. Once you feel like you’ve reached the top, don’t settle for that and always strive to be better than you are now.”

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Ageless pillar of Chicano Park stands ready

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ntonio Chavez Camarillo wakes up every day at 3 a.m. to get to work at Chicano Park by 4 a.m. He sets up a trash bag packed with

cleaning supplies on a worn bench, takes a sip from a small Styrofoam cup of coffee and starts his work day with a prayer.

Chavez Camarillo, beloved by locals as “Tio,” is the official unofficial groundskeeper and guardian of Chicano Park, a national landmark established by a community uprising that took place April 22, 1970 in Barrio Logan.

A sprightly 78, Chavez Camarillo came from Guanajuato, Mexico to the United States in 1956 when he was 17. He has tended and guarded the park for 40 years, and made it his duty to keep it safe and welcoming for everyone. He has no job, no title or salary— just an immeasurable love for the rich history the park encapsulates.

“Aquí llegué y aquí voy a morir,” he said. (“ I arrived here and I will die here.”)

His devotional altruism, though rare in nature, is a testament to the do-it-yourself spirit and community pride that created the remarkable park. Today it is a national historic landmark, a point of pride and America’s largest outdoor gallery of murals.

Chavez Camarillo and many others, however, can still recount the tense struggle to wrestle the park away from the California Highway Patrol following a promise broken.

“It has a lot of history,” he said. “There has been a lot of suffering here. You can’t imagine the amount of history that has happened here— there can be books and books filled with it.”

In the early 1920s, San Diego’s bayfront Logan Heights community was home to the second largest Chicano barrio (neighborhood) on the West Coast, with a population of 20,000. When World War II ended in 1945, a sudden change in zoning laws transformed elegant Logan Heights from a residential community to a gritty industrial area. A once neat and prim neighborhood of split-level Victorian

Antonio Chavez Camarillo, in the spirit of Quetzalcoatl, is a defender of knowledge, learning and creativity

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Story Chelsea Pelayo Photos Thomas Contant and Chelsea Pelayo

houses, manicured yards and free-roaming children was forcefully and forever changed.

By the 1950s Logan Heights had suffered an invasion of warehouses and auto junkyards that crowded out homes and local businesses. When Interstate 5 was built in 1963 the freeway bisected Barrio Logan and displaced even

more residents. When construction of the Coronado Bridge was finished in 1969, Barrio Logan was again vivisected. Its population shrank to 5,000, a 75 percent decline from the early 1920s.

Alberto Pulido, a member of the Chicano Park Steering Committee and Professor of Ethnic Studies at the University of San Diego, said the story of Chicano Park is inspiring.

“It’s a story of rebirth,” he said. “It’s a story most definitely about resistance and it’s a story about self-determination. Those are all really important values that we hold regardless of where we are from.”

In the face of changes forced on Logan Heights by city, state and federal government, community leaders began to push for a neighborhood park in 1967. Two years later, on Nov. 9, 1969, the petition to establish a park under the Coronado Bridge was consolidated by a new state law that allowed the site and “other unused parcels of land near highways to be used as community recreational areas.”

City leaders thereafter were not responsive. Five months passed and there was no progress towards the park. On April 22, 1970, bulldozers appeared unannounced among the pylons under the bridge. Construction crews had come to develop a California Highway Patrol Station where the park had been promised. Unbeknownst to Barrio Logan residents, the land had been acquired by the state shortly after the Coronado Bridge opened.

Logan Heights residents were furious about the surreptitious acquisition of the community’s land by the state. That fury led to a community uprising heard around the world. People streamed out of their homes, schools and jobs to occupy the land.

Jose Arteaga, treasurer of the Oldies Lowrider Car Club, said he remembered the day.

“I was 17 years old going to San Diego High School when they called us to come to see what was going on at Chicano Park,” he said. “When we got there they were already digging up the land and the police were trying to kick everyone out.”

Demonstrators arrived at Chicano Park at 7 a.m. and were joined throughout the day by residents, students like Arteaga and sympathizers.

They formed a human chain in front of bulldozers and forced the construction to stop. Others began working the land with shovels, picks and rakes. Construction of the park was underway, but a tense standoff followed.

Activists from throughout North America drove, flew and hopped trains to Chicano Park to support the takeover. As the land swelled with resolute Chicanos and their supporters, the police backed off.

Demonstrators planted cactus, magueys and flowers, and raised the Chicano flag on a telephone pole. Also known as the Flag of Aztlan, the Chicano banner is a green, white and red flag that resembles a Mexican flag.

Instead of an eagle is the symbol of the three-face image. It represents the

“Aqui llegué y aqui voy a morir.”

(I arrived here and I will die here.)

-Tio Camarillo

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“Tio” Antonio Chavez Camarillo

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Spanish (European), the Native and the Mestizo identity. The flag raising is reenacted every year at noon on Chicano Park Day. Chicano Park’s story of community collaboration is now depicted on the forest of pylons holding up the Coronado Bridge. Patricia Aguayo, who painted several murals in the park, said art played an essential role.

“In 1970, when the park was taken over by the

Aguayo said the artists of 1972 helped to memorialize heritage.

“The other thing they did was claim the space with art, and not just any art but history, Chicano history, Mexican history,” she said.

Aguayo owns a free lending library in Barrio Logan that houses Chicano studies books and literature for those seeking to learn more about the culture. She said she aims to translocate

community, the city finally saw that the (people) weren’t

the knowledge from a place of academic privilege to a location

going anywhere.” she said. “Their presence and chaining

that is accessible to all.

themselves to these bulldozers established ownership of the park.”

Residents gained legal ownership of Chicano Park in 1972. Residents and artists continued to homestead cultural ownership of the place. Salvador Barajas painted his

Like an artfully-curated urban museum, a record of Chicano Park’s history is beautifully depicted on the walls and pylons refusing to recede into obscurity. Muralist Guillermo Rogel’s piece closely depicts the story of the “Chicano Park Takeover.”

Tio Camarillo has earned a spot on the mural, but his work

famous “Founders Mural” on a wall. Mexican and Mexican-

continues. The way he is depicted on the mural is how he is

American political, human rights and artistic heroes were

today. Resplendent in a white sombrero and billowy white

painted large like a walk-up textbook. Barajas recently added

mustache, Camarillo tends to the land and keeps the park clean.

Chicano rights icons Herman Baca and Ramon “Chunky”

He stands in solidarity with the volunteers and activists that

Sanchez to his wall of fame, as well as Delores Huerta. This

created the national landmark.

spring Barajas completed the park’s newest mural, a tribute to the human rights group Border Angels.

“Here the community sees me as something good,” he said.

“La comunidad es mi familia.”

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First Muslim president hopes she’s not the last Story Brelio Lozano Photo Natalie Mosqueda

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Mona Dibas will be leaving Southwestern College for UC Berkeley, but her impact as ASO president will not be soon forgotten.

Dibas’ long list of accomplishments includes being the first Muslim ASO President, organizing the UNITED Movement in support of LGBTQ students, fighting for immigrant rights and against campus sexual assault.

For many at SWC, she was the face of hope.

Dibas said that having the pressure of the presidency on her shoulders was tough.

“The ASO President position has had me on my toes and has had me constantly checking myself and constantly having me to ask myself, ‘Am I doing the right thing?’” she said. “Am I helping students? What am I doing right now? Are all these meetings for nothing, or am I doing something for the betterment of this college?”

She also struggled with being put up on a pedestal by many, she said, though she appreciated the recognition and support.

Dibas was named Woman of the Year by Assembly Member Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher,

Chula Vista Champion by Mayor Mary Casillas Salas, Champion of Diversity by the EDI Committee and a 2017 SWC Student of Distinction Award recipient.

“I questioned people why they look up to me,” she said “Why me? I’m just a regular person. I’m not special. I’m not important.

People would come to my office like ‘oh, you’re Mona Dibas, thank you for everything that you do.’ It causes a lot of pressure and it’s tiring. It’s exhausting to be the forefront of anything. However, it has been the most amazing experience to know that I had inspired people to do what is right. I had inspired someone to stand up for somebody who is being bullied, somebody that is being sexually assaulted. For them to be inspired to have that courage because of me, that is the greatest blessing this presidency has given me.”

She said that she will miss everything at SWC.

“Taking the time to now sit and reflect, it’s sad,” she said. “I’m going to genuinely miss this place. Southwestern College has given me way more than what I’ve given to Southwestern College. It’s given me experience. It has given me hardships that I’ve had to overcome. It has taught me so much. I’ve met some of the most amazing human beings.”

One of her highlights, she said, was the appearance of guest speaker Dr. Angela Davis.

“I got to hug Angela Davis,” she said.

“How many people get to say that, let alone introduce and get to meet her afterwards?”

Like many students, Dibas said that she struggled through some personal problems during her year as president, including a car accident and her grandmother’s diagnosis of stage 4 pancreatic cancer.

“I have had a hard time physically, emotionally and mentally,” she said. “In the

“Am I doing the right thing? Am I helping students?�

accident, I hurt my left eye and my face was a little bit messed up. It was hard for me.”

Her struggles continued on campus.

“There were difficulties within the ASO and in my classes,” she said. “There were so many times that I wanted to give up. I haven’t slept in three days, all I have eaten was a Twix and I’m tired. I could have given up, but I didn’t. I had amazing people that motivated me and pushed me through it.”

After Donald Trump was elected, SWC and the South Bay faced uncertainty and anxiety. To bring the college together Dibas and the ASO created UNITED, a movement to oppose hate and bigotry.

“I’m most proud of the UNITED Movement,” she said. “That was something that (came together) in a matter of two or three days. It was because of those people that believed in me. I came up with this crazy idea and I asked if we can do this tomorrow. Those people were like yea, like we got you, we will do what you need.”

As an American Muslim, Dibas had already anticipated adversity in whatever she sought to accomplish. Soon after her election, the SWC Sun and El Sol Magazine featured her face on their covers.

Thousands of publications were defaced, stolen or destroyed.

“When I came into this position, I realized that not only will people not like 29

me, but some people are going to hate me, and some people are going to hate me for no reason, and will try everything to take me down,” she said. “That was the most difficult thing that I had to go through. It was hard to stay true to who I am and not giving into them trying to take me down. It was difficult keeping my head above water when people try to drag you under.”

Dibas said that she had to stay true to herself to overcome the opposition.

“It was staying true to who I am, continuing to doing what was right, and not letting them get to me,” she said. “These people were trying to do everything to take me down, personal attacks, attacking my family and friends, trying to do things to hit me where it hurts the most. Her work gave her energy and strength, she said.

“I was able to continue doing everything that I was doing while protecting the people that I love, while staying mentally sane,” she said. “I never lied or changed myself to please someone else. I never changed who I was.”

Dibas will be replaced by Kirstyn Smith, whom Dibas endorsed.

“I hope they continue what I am doing with the (UNITED) Movement and the things we have done for the students, but I also hope that they have their own original ideas,” she said. “They are a group of people that will do what is right for students. They

were original, honest, kind, humble and everything I look for in people I work with.

I would be honored if they continued the work I do.”

Dibas attributed her work at SWC to God, saying that all her success and failures were part of God’s plan.

“I believe in God and I believe that everything is made for a reason, put for a reason and done for a reason,” she said. “So whatever I was able to accomplish, that was because of my faith and my plan was here at this campus. I would have loved to have more of everything, but this what God’s plan was for me.”

Berkeley beckons and May 31 is at hand.

As her term winds down, the next phase of her life is winding up.

“Reflecting on my last day, I’m just thankful,” she said. “I’m so sad and heartbroken that I have to move on, but I am so thankful for everything that I have learned from everyone that I’ve met, all of the things that I struggled with and overcome and all my failures, because even with those failures I learned. Now I know how to do things better. I know how to do things right. I’m honored, I’m sad, I’m grateful and I’m humbled.”

Dibas had advice for next years’ SWC students.

“Don’t give up, always do what is right and stay true to who you are.”

Hunger and homelessness no match for determination Story and photos Cristofer Garcia

DINING OUT (AGAIN) — Park tables serve as the dining room table for the homeless community living at the J Street Marina in Chula Vista.

Georgia really wanted to earn a good grade in a class she loved. So she turned on the overhead light and spread her books across the dashboard of her car. It was cold, her mother was asleep and they were parked near the Chula Vista Marina. Georgia was homeless, but loved being a college student.

Georgia (a pseudonym) is a 19-year-old nursing student and one of the 32 percent of California college students experiencing housing insecurity. A recent study by the College Equity Assessment Lab (CCEAL), a research lab under the Interwork Institute at San Diego State University, found that homeless students across California are silently facing a grim struggle to survive.

Southwestern College is no stranger to the problem.

Georgia recalled the brutal year she spent as a hungry homeless student with her family of six sleeping in two cars.

“It wasn’t easy for me,” she said. “Every morning I was waking up at six and going to the park and rinsing off in the sink water. It was the coldest time of the year.”

When she was 17 her family moved to Southern California and she started at SWC. They were living with a relative until problems arose and the family suddenly found itself with nowhere to go.

“We were just like, ‘This happened, what do we do now?’” she said.

Fearing custody loss of Georgia’s baby cousin, her mother reached out to government resources that helped the family find a safe parking zone in Chula Vista. They spent most of their time there before it was closed down. Georgia and her family started parking in a lot between J Street and Marina Parkway because “that’s where all the other homeless people were at,” she said. They found a place to live last October, but Georgia said the obstacles she faced as a homeless student were taxing.

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HOME IS WHERE THE CAR IS­— After the sun goes down, the J Street Marina transforms into a rolling homeless camp.

“There were plenty of times that we didn’t eat,” she said. “Like, ‘Oh we don’t have (food) today, oh well. What are we going to do?’

I thought about begging for money.”

Georgia said she decided to study at SWC instead of Grossmont College on recommendation of her former high school counselor.

SWC became an escape from her problems when she was homeless, she said.

“We had each other, but we were living in our (two) cars and it was really cold,” she said. “I always felt depressed, but when I came to school it was always like Southwestern had this environment. It’s so cheerful and I don’t know how to describe it. It was my getaway.

I would stay here for long hours and I still do because I like being here.”

An English professor Georgia confided in was quick to point her to people who could help her.

“I wrote a paper in English class and my professor said to see her after class and then she asked me about (being homeless) and I told her,” she said. “She did her best to help me and continues to do so.

It was my first year in college and I didn’t know anybody.”

Her situation was not unique.

ASO Senator-at-Large Roy Castillo is the Region X representative for the Student Senate of California Community Colleges. He said he has made it a priority to help students who face housing insecurity, including more than 30 this year.

“Seeing the devotion, motivation and determination in these students really encouraged me even more to be a student advocate for them,” he said.

One of the students he recently helped reminded him of the importance of actively reaching out, said Castillo.

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“It was quite clear to me that this individual had said to her professor that she was homeless,” he said. “The reason why the student wasn’t able to feel comfortable to chime in and talk was because she hadn’t eaten for four days. Due to her situation, because she didn’t have any proper support, she wasn’t able to do the basic necessity of just showering. When she stated to her professor that it was her fourth day, I literally broke down in tears. This broke my heart due to the fact that no student should ever have to deal with such a hard situation by themselves.”

Dean of Student Services Dr. Malia Flood said the college is aware there is a problem with students facing housing and food insecurity.

College officials are developing strategies to provide necessary resources she said.

“We’re on the right track,” she said. “I was looking at the recommendations for practice on the CCEAL report and I thought we’re (already) doing a lot of this, so it’s good. Of course there’s always more to do, but we’re doing a lot of this.”

Flood said students who seek help with housing or food insecurity often report anxiety and stress, which can affect their concentration and retention. Her findings are in line with the CCEAL report, which found that “students with food insecurity are significantly less likely to feel confident in their academic abilities (or) feel a sense of control in academic matters.”

Flood said it is hard to estimate the number of homeless students at SWC because the college does not ask that question when students are filling out applications. She said the school is mostly dependent on students self-reporting their situation when they seek out services.

California has the largest homeless population in the United

“Every morning I was waking up at six and going to the park and rinsing off in the sink water. It was the coldest time of the year.”

States at 118,142, according to an annual report by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. San Diego County was the county with the fourth largest homeless population in the country and the second largest homeless veteran population.

Flood said the campus food pantry opened earlier this semester is busy and is an indication of the challenges faced by many students.

“I think there’s a lot of need on campus,” she said. “(The food pantry) confirms that need.”

Flood said she is forming a student housing insecurity committee in the spring semester. It will include student representatives as well as Angel Salazar, the financial aid liaison for homeless students. Dean of Athletics Jim Spillers is a key member, Flood said, because he will help make shower facilities available to homeless students as required by Assembly Bill 1995.

Castillo said the legislation was a crucial step to create a more welcoming environment and that SWC has been out front on this issue.

“AB 1995 is creating a stepping stone to start recognizing that homeless students are individuals just like you and me,” he said. “I feel Southwestern College is going to make a revolutionary impact by helping those students that need the most help.”

Student feedback is also important, Castillo said.

“Many (students) don’t feel comfortable to speak up on that particular topic due to the fact that it’s so taboo,” he said. “We, as a modern society, have to address food shortages. There’s always room for that discussion.”

Georgia said societal stigmas

related to homelessness blunt discussion.

“It can happen to anybody,” she said. “I know people stereotype all kinds of homeless people (as) drug addicts… it’s not like that.

We had a five year old with us and she didn’t need to go through that, but we were all going through it and it’s not because we were drug addicts. It’s just financial issues and we couldn’t live with the person (we were living with) anymore.”

The nursing student said resources like the food pantry and AB 1955 would have been helpful to her, though she also said counselors should take a larger role in identifying the problem.

“Every student here has to go to the counselor at one point and time,” she said. “I feel like the job of the counselor is to ask them personal questions also… that’s their duty. I feel like counselors now are more focused on (finishing) your educational plan and get out. You have to seek them, they’re not seeking you. It’s kind of hard.”

She said her rough patch made her want to become a tutor at SWC. She now works at the Academic Success Center as a mentor.

“Every day you hear somebody at work, in the streets or school saying ‘Oh damn I didn’t do my homework.’ I look at them and wish I could tell them my story.

I had to stay up late at night, I’d beg a lady from church to let me stay at her house for a little while just so I could do my homework.

Then I hear people having all these excuses. Things happen, but people make an excuse for everything. I just want to tell people excuses are not valid. I just want to change the mentality of people.”

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THE BOY WONDER TAKES CHARGE

Story Katy Stegall Photos Anibal Alcaraz

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Dan Grayson Cordero is the Rick Grimes of Southwestern College, leading his ragtag team of queer survivors to a sanctuary of safety, hope and liberation.

Dan Grayson Cordero is the Rick Grimes of Southwestern College, leading his ragtag team of queer survivors to a sanctuary of safety, hope and liberation.

His weapons are intelligence, talent and courage—sprinkled with moments of doubt. He is a classic Joseph Campbell hero who transcended his ordinary life to face down danger and serve his people.

Cordero, the insightful and articulate president of the SAGA Club (Sexuality And Gender Acceptance) is lobbying college administrators to create a safe space for SWC’s queer community. He is getting stiff pushback, he said, but he can push back, too.

Cordero transcends his 4 feet 11 inches height and double-digit weight. He has the strength of a Jaguar offensive lineman.

Anibal Alcaraz said he is fortunate to be a friend.

“When I meet people like Dan, it reminds me that there’s a great change in people happening right now,” he said.

“It’s going in a direction that’s more empathetic, more understanding. The world could use more of that mentality.”

As a transgender man, Cordero had his own rocky journey to self-acceptance before he could be a beacon for others.

Emotional claustrophobia was a constant in his adolescence, he said. He felt something was not right.

Society, friends and family saw a girl when they looked at him, and so did the mirror. His heart said otherwise. In middle school he decided to become the man trapped in his body.

As he transitioned from female to male, he found solace in comic books. Dick Grayson, formerly known as Batman’s sidekick Robin, The Boy Wonder, was undergoing his own transition into Nightwing.

Cordero saw himself in Grayson.

Nightwing is a man with integrity who was, nevertheless, afraid of losing everything. Grayson was iconic for his role as Batman’s sidekick and considered Bruce Wayne family. Wayne did not approve of Grayson’s transition to Nightwing and he severed ties when Grayson left to become leader of The Teen Titans.

Cordero could relate. Grayson’s narrative of transition into Nightwing mirrored Cordero’s transition.

“Ultimately, when I look at Dick Grayson, I see myself,” said Cordero. “I see the 4’11” Latino transman who just hopes and dreams that one day his art can affect someone else in the positive way that Dick Grayson affected him.”

When it came time to legally change his name, Cordero adopted Grayson as his middle name. He introduced himself as Dan years before the legal change.

Money was a barrier. On Transgender Remembrance Day, members of SAGA presented to Cordero the money they had fund raised for him to legally change his name. Trump’s election was the catalyst, he said.

“I think after the elections last year, changing my name was something I felt like I really needed to do for my own safety,” he said.

Cordero said he was fortunate to have supportive friends and parents. His father and mother welcomed the closeted teen into the open.

Bruce Wayne was the only family Dick had, but Cordero had more support. Coming out is not a narrative that typically ends well for transpeople, he said. Cordero’s parents handled his transition better than Bruce Wayne handled Grayson’s. Cordero affectionately calls his dad Mufasa, the Lion King.

“I’ve been really fortunate to have a good relationship with my dad throughout the course of my life,” he said. “My transition didn’t negatively impact it at all. Both of my parents were of the mindset that ‘we’re going to do whatever it takes to make you happy.’ That’s a privilege that so many transpeople don’t have.”

Art also helped him through his transition.

Drawing became cathartic. Cordero became a star artist at the Southwestern College Sun student newspaper as an illustrator and editorial cartoonist. He won state and national awards from the Society of Professional Journalists, San Diego Press Club and other professional organizations.

He served as a cartoonist at The Sun for four years, until he discovered SAGA, formerly the Gay Straight Alliance.

Dr. Max Branscomb, the faculty advisor of The Sun, said he tried to convince Cordero to serve as Editor-in-Chief of the student newspaper or run for ASO president because he is very intelligent and a natural leader. Cordero declined the offers to remain with SAGA because he felt the club’s work on campus has just begun.

“I stayed at the paper for so long because I had found a place that worked as a community and a family,” he said. “Then when I came across GSA, it was even stronger as far as passions go. The activism completely drew me in.”

Friends crowned him the King of the Gays, but Cordero blushes at the homage and said he is a

Miriam Shoultz

“When you’re young and LGBT, it’s like a ship at sea in the fog. You know you’re going forward because the ship keeps moving you, but you don’t know where it’s leading you. You don’t have direction because you can’t even see the stars that guide you. Yet out of the fog comes that beam from the lighthouse. Just like those sailors who cling to the beam of that lighthouse, SAGA members have clung to Dan for guidance. SAGA members have clung to Dan to learn how to be gay and have it be okay.”

service leader who models respect and acceptance. When Cordero first decided to go to a GSA meeting, it was a tiny club of four people, including the advisor and himself. It had the potential to be great, he said, but lacked vision. Cordero changed that.

SAGA advisor Shannon Pagano, a psychology instructor, said Cordero transformed the club into something unique and powerful. Under Cordero’s leadership, SAGA was named the 2017 SWC Diversity Award recipient. Cordero was also honored individually for his outstanding leadership. He is also a Student of Distinction Award recipient.

“It just became this phenomenon,” Pagano said. “He singlehandedly made SAGA what it is.”

SAGA became a safe space for members of the queer community to have the full college experience. It grew from club of four to a family of activists. Cordero’s leadership role solidified after the election of Trump and a conservative backlash against the LGBTQ community reared its head.

SAGA Treasurer Oliver Byrd said Trump was a turning point for Cordero.

“That’s when his passion for the community really showed up,” said Byrd. “He was always an activist, but now it’s more charged—because it has to be.”

SAGA took its first real step into the broader campus spotlight with the decision to host “Gayties,” a 1980s-themed gay prom. Byrd said it was a statement to tell the college that the queer community was present and out in the open.

Every hero has a battle to overcome. Gayties was Cordero’s as the event seemed snakebit from the start.

The venue was locked, though it had been reserved months in advance. There was no electricity in the building, which almost proved catastrophic considering they were to have a photo booth and a DJ throughout the night. Cordero 39

handled it as he handles all stressful situations— he rolled his eyes and then rolled up his sleeves. Volunteers tore down the entire set up they had just finished with less than three hours to spare and moved it outside into the cafeteria patio.

Pagano said Cordero was running around like a chicken with his head cut off well into the event— but prom happened.

Gayties was a highlight of the SAGA year, but Cordero said he wants the club to be remembered for its advocacy for a Southwestern College LGBT Center. SAGA members said they feel supported by some people on campus, but some top-level administrators may need more convincing.

Cordero said he will not let resistance deter him.

Pagano said students of SAGA rely on Cordero.

“When you’re young and LGBT, it’s like a ship at sea in the fog,” she said. “You know you’re going forward because the ship keeps moving you, but you don’t know where it’s leading you. You don’t have direction because you can’t even see the stars that guide you. Yet out of the fog comes that beam from the lighthouse. Just like those sailors who cling to the beam of that lighthouse, SAGA members have clung to Dan for guidance. SAGA members have clung to Dan to learn how to be gay and have it be okay.”

Cordero identifies with the hero Grayson, but also the conflicted Beast from Disney’s “Beauty and The Beast.”

Part of him relates to the flawed and insecure prince, afraid that no one will learn to love the beast within. Pagano said Cordero is sorting through his own bursts of heroism and bouts of anxiety.

“We can look at Rick Grimes and Dick Grayson and they’re both true to him,” she said. “But the one we need to look at is The Beast. People have to help him learn that many people have already learned to love the beast. And there will be more.”

Viewpoint SWC Editorial Board Illustration Matthew Reilly

One year ago the Southwestern College Sun published a controversial 16-page special edition focused on sexual assault – including assault on our campus. We sent two journalists to the University of Nevada, Las Vegas to cover a powerful anti-assault rally featuring Vice President Joe Biden and rock superstar Lady Gaga. We reported that one in five women are sexually assaulted at their colleges and 1 in 16 men.

One year later we asked ourselves if the situation in America and at Southwestern College has improved. The answer is a resounding no. Sexual assault in our nation and on our campus is actually worse.

The election of Donald Trump, a documented misogynist, as the President of the United States, has made a bad situation for women even more tenuous. Just this month, he embraced serial sexual harasser Bill O’Reilly while threatening Planned Parenthood with defunding.

Across Trump Country, “Daddy Donald” is saying through his words and actions that sexual assault is OK. He is part of the reason that now one in four college women are assaulted and one in 10 men.

At SWC, impossible as it may sound, the situation is much worse.

A stunning lawsuit by a former student worker in the SWC Campus Police Department accuses three male employees of systemic sexual harassment over a two-year period, culminating in an attempted gang rape of the woman by police employees inside SWCPD headquarters.

Even more stunning is her description of how the situation was mishandled by campus police chief Michael Cash. According to the lawsuit brief, she reported the harassment and misogynistic behavior to Cash, who then violated her confidence and told the defendants.

They were not investigated or punished.

A second young woman who used to work in the SWCPD has said she is planning to file a similar sexual harassment suit.

Certainly the men accused have the right to due process and are innocent until proven guilty, but matters continue to trend badly for Cash and the SWCPD. Trust is dribbling away.

One would think our campus police would learn from past mistakes, such as promising escorts for threatened women but not showing up, refusing to open the door to the police department after hours when

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Campus sexual assault in America continues to worsen a rape victim desperately pounded on it, failing to keep accurate crime reports, questioning the way sexual assault victims were dressed and openly laughing off published accounts of sexual assaults in meetings of college administrators. They learned nothing.

Our sexual assault issue was inspired by a lesson we learned from Cash, Dean Mia McClellan and other high-ranking college administrators – it is too easy for authorities to blow off sexual assault if women will not come forward and if they will not allow the news media to use their names and images. So we put out a call for women to come forward, and they did. Courageous and proud young women shed the taboos of shame and the cloaks of silence draped over them for years. They came forward, they told their painful stories, they signed their names and they stood for photographs.

As the voices of these rape victims rose, Cash and McClellan fell suddenly silent. The mocking and disrespecting of sexual assault victims stopped, at least out in the open.

Cash is on administrative leave and McClellan was shuffled away to a job where she supposedly cannot hurt students anymore. Why they still work here at all is a mystery and a large of part the reason that Southwestern College is so dysfunctional. Behavior that enables rape culture and sexual assault should not be tolerated. Administrators who re-traumatized sexual assault victims should not be tolerated. Administrators who are too lazy or too disinterested to assist sexual assault victims should not be tolerated.

People like Cash and McClellan who have consistently demonstrated these behaviors should be terminated and made a public example of. A symbolic head on a pike on the college lawn would send a clear message to other would-be sexual misconduct enablers that this institution is changing. Otherwise, the problem rolls along for another year, another decade, another generation.

SWC is, of course, not the only campus with a sexual assault problem.

Women suffer sexual abuse at colleges and universities across the nation.

Amy Ziering, the producer of “The Hunting Ground,” the Academy Award-nominated documentary which rattled America with its stark look at sexual assault and rape on our nation’s college and university campuses, summed it up best.

“Colleges are target-rich environments for predators with weak enforcement mechanisms,” she said. “The message to victims is clear,

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WOMEN ARE SEXUALLY ASSAULTED WHILE IN COLLEGE

even if you speak up you are not going to win.”

Our new college president Dr. Kindred Murillo, Governing Board President Tim Nader and Trustee Nora Vargas have all said forcefully that the culture at Southwestern College needs to change. That is a tall order that will require bold strokes, including the termination of employees who contribute to rape culture by ignoring sexual harassment complaints, insulting victims, laughing off “boys will be boys” behavior, protecting predatory employees, pushing aside complaints out of laziness, falsifying crime data and sweeping problems under the proverbial rug.

New board policies on sexual misconduct are a very promising start.

Sexual assault needs to move up to the top part of the agenda along with accreditation, construction and finance. Our college has taken its eye off the ball. While our leaders (and lawyers) are wrestling with racial tension among squabbling employees, upheaval in our campus technology and other self-inflicted wounds, concerns of students – particularly young females – are being treated as secondary issues.

We hate to restate the obvious, but this college is here to serve students.

It is a place of teaching and learning. Everything else should take a backseat. Title IX says that women have the right to equal access to public education. They do not have equal access if they are not safe.

Changing a college’s culture will not be easy. Ours took half a century to develop and fester. But change can happen. Our governing board proved that in 2011 when it forcefully and decisively changed the corrupt culture of the college’s purchasing, bidding and awarding of contracts following the South Bay Corruption Scandal. Trustees Norma Hernandez and Nader were part of that board. Trustees Vargas, Roberto Alcantar and Griselda Delgado ran for the board promising to continue the process of cleaning up this institution.

We need bold strokes again. We need to make some big changes. We need to rid the college of people who have old fashioned ideas about sexual assault and sexual misconduct just as we had to rid the college of people who had old fashioned ideas about pay-for-play, intimidation and silencing free speech.

In 2011 Mrs. Hernandez declared, in a loud, clear voice, that “The pay-for-play era at Southwestern College is over.” It was her “Ich bin ein Berliner” moment. Now we need a board member to say “The sexual assault era at Southwestern College is over.”

A year has gone by and we are waiting.

1 IN 10 RAPE VICTIMS ARE MALE

88%

OF SEXUAL ASSAULT VICTIMS ON COLLEGE CAMPUSES DO NOT REPORT Statistics from The Hunting Ground and RAINN

Viewpoint Chariti Niccole Illustration Salvador Barajas 42

America has always been a sanctuary for productive immigrants Hide and seek, a favorite childhood game, is not so much fun anymore if you are an immigrant student.

College students all over this country who are not U.S. citizens must hide in fear of being deported back to their “country of origin” because of President Trump’s militant stance on immigration. Problem is, many of these students have zero recollection of their “country of origin.”

Students that were illegally brought to the U.S. as minors, called Dreamers by President Obama, are currently protected under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. With this 2012 executive order, Dreamers were given written confirmation that they would not be targeted by law enforcement as long as they were in school, the military or working, and avoided criminal behavior.

With Trump’s repeated promise to overturn Obama’s DACA program during his campaign, his election escalated fear in the immigrant community. If Trump repeals DACA more than 750,000 students would have to abruptly end their educations.

Thousands of undocumented students and their supporters have demonstrated on college campuses throughout the U.S., insisting that schools become sanctuaries.

Trump’s hostile campaign rhetoric and propaganda bombarded Americans with falsehoods about vile Mexican immigrants raping, stealing and smuggling their way from sea to shining sea.

“When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best,” Trump said when he announced his candidacy. “They’re sending people that have lots of problems and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re

bringing crime. They’re rapist. And some, I assume, are good people.”

Since being elected, Trump has publicly switched sides and said he would not overturn the DACA program. Then he said he would. Then he said he would not.

“They (Dreamers) shouldn’t be worried,” he said to ABC news in January. “I do have a big heart.”

And a big mouth, which he can speak out of from both sides.

Fortunately, Department of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly and House Speaker Paul Ryan have gone on the record saying DACA is alive and well.

Trump’s actions, however, did not match his fellow Republicans’ words. A law abiding Dreamer was deported from Calexico, California in February.

Juan Montes, 23, was brought to the U.S. by his parents when he was 9. After a day spent with his girlfriend, Montes stopped to get food and was approached by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers. Unfortunately, Montes had left his wallet in his friend’s car and had no proof of his DACA status on him.

Within hours he was back in Mexico, the first undocumented immigrant with active DACA status to be deported under the Trump administration.

Even before Trump’s election cities nationwide that wanted to protect their friends, neighbors and co-workers were declaring themselves “sanctuaries.” These cities vowed not to actively assist the federal government with immigration enforcement.

This is nothing radical. Most local law enforcement already have policies not to ask people about citizenship so as not to racially profile or to cause anxiety and mistrust in the community. Most local police want people in their communities to trust them and not be afraid of them.

Immigrants who do not trust police do not report crimes.

Trump’s hostile campaign rhetoric and propaganda bombarded Americans with falsehoods about vile Mexican immigrants raping, stealing and smuggling their way from sea to shining sea.

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Sanctuary protection, be it a city or campus, is largely undefined and differs by location.

Some believe a sanctuary should protect the undocumented citizens or students from federal deportation at all cost, while others view sanctuaries as a safe haven that allow students and residents to live without constant fear.

Some conservatives question the legality of safe havens. Many Republican lawmakers think it is protecting people who are in the country illegally.

Some have drafted laws to prevent colleges and universities from declaring a sanctuary campus by threatening their federal funding and financial aid.

Texas Gov. Gregg Abbot brashly tweeted that he would personally prevent sanctuaries.

“Texas will not tolerate sanctuary campuses or cities,” he wrote. “I will cut funding for any state campus if it establishes sanctuary status.”

With the fear of losing federal funding, many institutions of higher education have been hesitant about taking on the title. Others caved in to the pressure.

Garrey Carruthers, president of New Mexico State University, said banning federal agents from campus might jeopardize its federal funding so the campus will not be a sanctuary. Others have acted with a fearless commitment to serve as a safe space for all students. Portland Community College voted in December to declare itself sanctuary campus in response to the plea from the student body.

Southwestern College and the city of Chula Vista are having it both ways. They are avoiding the politically connotative term “sanctuary” and are instead calling themselves “welcoming” institutions. Bottom line, though, SWC and Chula Vista are on board with protecting undocumented members of the community.

Thousands of SWC students would lose their chance for higher education if the college lost its federal funding, which pays for most financial aid.

About two thirds of all American full-time students in 2014-2015 paid for college with some financial aid. At SWC the number is nearly 90 percent.

Even so, colleges must not cower to Trump’s bluster. Higher education stands for freedom, courage, hope, equity and advancement. These are ideals worth fighting for. Colleges that engage in cowardice do not deserve any students or financial support.

Students protected under the DACA program were brought to America by their parents in hopes of a better future. They had no choice and did nothing wrong. Their parents risked everything to bring them to America and give them better then what they had. These kids were raised in

“Right now is a time for us to stick together, because our students are scared. We are a target, our college is a target and our people are a target.”

-Trustee Roberto Alcantar

America. They attended elementary school, middle school, high school and now college, all in the U.S. They pledged allegiance to the United States. They played football, debated, served in ASB, were cheerleaders, homecoming queens and valedictorians.

Dreamers are solid American kids, insisted Obama.

“I will urge the President Elect and the incoming administration to think long and hard before endangering the status of, for practical purposes, American kids,” he said.

SWC is the closest American college to the Mexican border. It has hundreds — even thousands — of students pursuing their education and chasing after dreams under the DACA program.

Some are out in the open about it, many are not.

Governing Board Member Roberto Alcantar said SWC will do whatever it needs to do to protect its students.

“Right now is a time for us to stick together, because our students are scared,” he said. “We are a target, our college is a target and our people are a target.”

Standing next to our college brothers and sisters is more important then ever. America is known as the land of opportunity. Immigration and second chances built this country. Men and women tired of the oppressive British monarchy came here for a better life for themselves and their children.

Same with people from Ireland, Germany, France, Poland, Nigeria, Argentina, The Philippines, Portugal, Spain, Norway, Egypt, China, Japan and dozens of other countries. So why single out Mexicans?

Colleges need to be courageous and ethical and stand up for its most vulnerable students. These are productive, educated, law-abiding Americans same as the descendants of Europeans, Africans and Asians.

The DREAM must continue. We all need to do our part to keep it alive.

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“If I were to remain silent, I’d be guilty of complicity.”

-Albert Einstein

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THE ART OF PROTEST Hand-made signs in a divided country can be witty, angry, hopeful and humorous.

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9.27.16 - DEATH OF ALFRED OLANGO Photos Thomas Contant

Protests sparked after El Cajon police shot and killed an unarmed African-American man who pointed a vaping device at officers.

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November 2016 About 300 students, staff and community members marched against the rhetoric of President-elect Donald Trump.

WOMEN’S MARCH Thousands gather in downtown San Diego to protest the misogynistic behavior and attitudes of Trump.

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Photos JoseLuis Baylon 53

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Time to put down the cervesa, Cinco de Mayo is a day of service Story Michael McDonald Illustration Junco Canché

St. Patrick feels your pain, Cinco de Mayo.

Pity the patron saint of Ireland whose birthday has become the National Day of Drinking in the United States. Now thirsty party hardy Americans have co-opted a minor Mexican holiday and turned it into “Drinko de Mayo.”

Mexican-American history instructor Gregorio Pantoja is saddened by the “Cinco de Drinko” phenomenon, but insists May 5 can become a day of thoughtfulness and service.

“Cinco de Mayo: An American Celebration,” hosted by the college on May 4, was an attempt by Pantoja and colleagues to bring the community together through a traditional celebration of food, music and culture. Learning, he hoped, would follow.

“This Cinco de Mayo event is really centered around community outreach,” he said. “At the basis of the holiday are what were called juntas patrióticas or patriotic groups. With the battle of Cinco de Mayo the juntas started to fund raise and get the community involved. They became the news and support center for community members.”

Juntas were groups of people banded together to support the war effort against France, which invaded Mexico in 1861 ostensibly to collect an unpaid debt. Pantoja said they sprouted out of the American Southwest as Mexican-Americans found a renewed sense of pride in their heritage.

When news reached the U.S. that Mexico had defeated the French at the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862, the first Cinco de Mayo celebrations were held in el norte in Tuolumne County.

Juntas raised money to support the soldiers defending Madre Mexico, but they were much more than fund raisers, Pantoja said.

Juntas were the news centers, helped with legal costs and burial services, and looked out for their communidades.

“They began to be the center for community members,” he said. “Although the main point was to support the wars and find out what was going on with the news, they then

became more involved with the community around them.”

Pantoja said he wanted to welcome students and members of the broader community.

“At the heart of Cinco de Mayo is community involvement,” he said. “(There is a tradition of) looking out for each other, taking care of each other and helping out people in need. We have to, as a school, become a part of the community and the community needs to become a part of us.”

Students from MEChA, Puente Project

“At the heart of Cinco de Mayo is community

involvement.” and Mexican-American Studies Scholars organized the event, which included performances by ballet folkorico dancers and SWC’s world-famous Mariachi Garibaldi.

MAS Scholars student Anna Buhrend said getting students, clubs and families involved benefits everybody.

“Most clubs don’t talk to each other,” she said. “Students don’t talk to each other.

Faculty and students don’t talk. We need to bridge that gap. To come together and actually be there for each other is important in a campus climate.”

Pantoja explained how, at the time, Mexico and the United States were fighting simultaneous wars for the future of the western world. Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Benito Juarez were allied in existential struggles against slavery and French imperialism.

For the juntas and the people living in former Mexican lands of the American

Southwest, this instilled pride and love for both countries, Pantoja said.

“This dual identity came about,” he said. “(Patrioticas) were Americans (that) supported Abraham Lincoln and the Union, but they were also Mexicanos and supported Benito Juarez and our mother country.”

That dual identity continues today, Pantoja said.

“We have students that cross the border every day,” he said. “Depending on what day it is or where you’re spending your weekend, you’re either American or Mexicano. We’ve been socialized to believe that we’re supposed to have a singular identity, which is a complete fallacy.”

Buhrend said learning the history that ties the countries together has given her an understanding of her heritage she did not learn growing up.

“There’s so many things to be proud of being Mexican-American, but they’re just not taught,” she said. “It’s either Mexican or American. Most people don’t acknowledge the middle ground.”

Panotja said he wants “Cinco de Mayo: An American Tradition” to become the seminal event for Southwestern College’s Mexican-American studies program and to grow within the Chula Vista community. He said that through education a commonality can be found porque somos una familia (we are a family).

Governing Board President Tim Nader said he supports the idea. He said education on the shared history of the two countries is essential, especially in these tumultuous times when relations between the Untied States and Mexico are strained.

“Anything that educates is beneficial,” he said. “Many people, probably on both sides of the border today, are not totally aware of the common heritage we have in this region. Especially in these times where on a national level we see a type of rhetoric that feeds on ignorance and fans hostility of people toward each other, learning about our common history and heritage is more important than ever.”

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FORMERLY INCARCERATED STUDENTS USE EDUCATION TO TURN LIVES AROUND

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Story Katy Stegall Photos Natalie Mosqueda

HUMANITY RECLAIMED — (l-r) Patrick Wallace, Maria Elena Morales and Kenneth Cochran have dedicated themselves to helping other former prisoners turn their lives around through education, support and hope.

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Maria Elena Morales locked herself in the bathroom of an abandoned house with a razor against her wrist, threatening suicide as her husband pounded desperately on the door.

He encouraged her to do it.

“I was in the way of him getting high,” Morales said.

Addicted to drugs and squatting in an empty, dilapidated house, Morales was not aware as she looked into the filthy, cracked mirror that this was her rock bottom.

She made it back from the brink. Most do not.

Morales is the co-founder and president of Urban Scholars Union, a support group focused on easing the transition from incarceration to education. Morales, co-founder Ryan “Flaco” Rising and three USU members were invited by Professor Kathy Parrish and Director of Staff Development Janelle Williams to share personal testimonies. They spoke on how pursuing education has helped defy the notorious school-to-prison pipeline.

Rising’s charisma contradicted the bleak testimony he shared of being in and out of lockup since age 11. A life of gang violence led him to maximum security at Folsom State Prison, which Riser called “The Devil’s Playground.”

Rising joked about having a unique form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder following his release from Folsom, which he called Prison Traumatic Stress Disorder.

USU provides essential support, he said.

“It gives us a blueprint to not go back to prison,” he said. “Urban Scholars Union saved my life.”

Weekly meetings center on moral and financial support.

Me m b e r s d i s c u s s t h e struggles to finding a postprison identity, staying out of prison and defying stigmas attached to the formerly incarcerated. Participants work to reclaim their personal narratives and capitalize on their second chances.

Panelist Kenneth Cochran said he did not know how to handle going from a 6’x9’ cell to a classroom. He, like most former inmates, received no transitional support.

“This system is geared for you to fail,” he said.

Ex-prisoner Steven Czifra, now attending UC 59

Berkeley, agreed.

“People with convictions don’t get to be professionals,” Czifra said. “We get no support with our education. Cops say, ‘Fuck that. I have to pay for my kids to go to college. I’m not paying for these dirtbags.’”

Czifra is co-founder of Underground Scholars Initiative, a support group for Berkeley students affected by incarceration.

Czifra spent 16 years in prison, eight in solitary confinement.

He is now a prominent activist, speaking out against mass incarceration, solitary confinement and the denial of meaningful education.

Rising said he contacted Czifra near the end of his sentence after hearing about USI, eager to start a similar group upon his release.

With the help from Morales, the Urban Scholars Union was born.

“My experience has only been a liability and I was going to use it to benefit people,” Czifra said.

Members of Urban Scholars Union share the same sentiment, Morales said.

“The hustle I had on the street, I now use with the (activism) work I do,” she said.

Not everyone surrounding the members of Urban Scholars Union are supportive, despite their motivation and chipper spirits.

Some instructors at San Diego City College ridiculed the former prisoners for their lack of computer knowledge, Cochran said.

One said he could see the fear in the eyes of classmates when they learn there is a convicted felon in the room.

Panelist Patrick Wallace said even family members can join the ridicule. Upon his release, he said, one relative teased that they had better not drop the soap in front of him.

Parrish said USU members were courageous to share their testimonies at SWC. Rising said USU aims to branch out from City College and SWC, to create a network for those affected by imprisonment in San Diego County.

“This incarceration monster is not going away,” said Rising.

“We need to get back into the business of making people, not breaking people.”

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LOVE HAS NO

BORDERS Story by Cristofer Garcia and Bianca Quilantan Photos by Natalie Mosqueda and Bianca Quilantan

A

hulking steel door on the towering metal fence splitting the United States and Mexico rusts in neglect, seldom opened. There, near where the fence stretches right into the Pacific Ocean, six immigrant families living in the United States, unable to cross into Mexico, stood by.

Laura Avila and her daughter Laura Vera Martinez waited nervously on the United States side of the border with her mother standing inches away from them in Mexico. Rusted pillars and steel mesh divided them. They could hear one another, but not touch.

Avila had driven 140 miles from Los Angeles to San Ysidro, a San Diego district and the last U.S. exit before entering Mexico. Her mother, Maria Socorro Martinez Lopez, had flown 1,821 miles from Puebla, Mexico, for a chance to see her daughter and granddaughter.

Only six families and two alternate families were selected by Border Angels, a humanitarian group, and the U.S. Border Patrol to have the opportunity to briefly reunite with their loved ones that could not legally visit because of their Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program/work permit. It allows them to stay in the U.S., but also prevents them from traveling abroad. Most of their families across the border also cannot visit legally because they have been deported.

Luis Hernandez-Bautista, 25, of Los Angeles, received a big surprise after his girlfriend applied for him to participate, allowing him to see his father who was deported five years ago.

“My girlfriend did it for me as a gift to me because my birthday (was) in a week,” he said. “I talk about my dad all the time. (My girlfriend) asked ‘Hey, if you could hug your dad again would you, even if it’s just for three minutes?’ I said of course and then that’s when she had told me that I was being approved.”

Avila’s family was an alternate. There was no guarantee she was going to get see her mother after more than 20 years of being separated, but Avila was hopeful.

Five minutes before the event started Enrique Morones, founder of Border Angels, gave Avila the news that she would get to embrace her mother for the first time in 20 years – for three minutes. Her mother would also get to meet her granddaughter for the first time – during the same three minutes.

“Words cannot describe how we felt together,” she said. “She’s already 71 and I was worried I wouldn’t get to see her again. I told her I missed her face, her eyes, because I’ve always told her she has beautiful eyes. I felt like I was dreaming because it was very magical. Even though people might say three minutes is not enough, those three minutes were a lot to us. It meant a lot. Just to be able to hold her and touch her.”

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Each of the six families present were guided one by one to the great doorway.

For 180 seconds, family members embraced, kissed and exchanged words of love. Spectators observed, photojournalists elbowed each other to capture the emotional moments and Border Patrol agents watched carefully.

At first spectators clapped for the joyous reunions and camera shutters flickered like cicadas. As the enormity of the event soaked in, silent sobs and the crashes of Pacific Ocean waves in the distance were the only sounds.

Hernandez-Bautista was the first person to get to see his family. His girlfriend had submitted an application on his behalf as an early birthday gift. He was 5 years old when he first came to the United States 20 years ago. Hernandez-Bautista said he had not seen his father in more than five years. His brother also came along but did not get to meet with their father because of the six-person limit.

Tears began to stream down Hernandez-Bautista’s face as he was escorted by Morones and Border Patrol agents to the opening in the fence where his father stood.

They embraced. They cried. They talked about how much they missed each other. As time ran out, the veins of his father’s hands strained as he pulled his son tighter in his embrace.

“It was very emotional and I felt a lot of joy,” HernandezBautista said. “Honestly, I didn’t believe I was going to cry as much as I did. I just wish that it was more than three minutes.”

Hernandez-Bautista is part of President Barack Obama’s DACA program. Because he arrived in the U.S. as a child, he is able to work and study in the country temporarily. HernandezBautista recently renewed his DACA application for the next two years and said he did not expect Donald Trump to win the presidency and is worried because his presidency will last at least four years.

“What Trump has proposed is so scary for a lot of minorities, myself included,” Hernandez-Bautista said. “He has said he plans to undo the law that protects me. He doesn’t even have to look for me. He has my address given that I’m in this program.”

Hernandez-Bautista said he feels like an American in a country that is weeks away from a wrenching debate about immigration.

“I’m terrified,” he said. “(DACA) is one of the things he said he would take away. All I can do is just hope, but I am terrified.”

As his three minutes ticked away, tears filled HernandezBautista’s eyes. He hugged his father goodbye and made a solemn promise.

“I promised him that it wouldn’t be the last time I hug him,” he said.

Morones said the theme of the event was “Love Has No Borders.” Its aim was to bring humans together to see the effects of immigration policy.

“Only with love can we conquer discrimination,” he said.

“This is not a political statement, it’s a love statement.”

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Morones said the border wall causes migrants to come over to the U.S. illegally, which is dangerous. He said many risk their lives for family reunification.

“The wall doesn’t stop people,” Morones said. “It just forces people to cross in more dangerous areas. There’s the ocean, there’s tunnels, there’s ladders. So what we want to do is to prove that love is the answer, not hate.”

Jose Luis Hernandez Cruz is a survivor of the infamous freight train “La Bestia” (The Beast) known for mangling the bodies of migrants. He is an immigrant who went through dangerous and illegal means to get to the United States.

He was 17 years old when he traveled on the tops of trains for about 20 days with little to no food and water. One day, he fainted and fell off. He lost his right leg, his right arm and all but one finger on his left hand. He now is part of a group called Survivors of the Train and estimates that about 700 people in Honduras have been mutilated by La Bestia.

“Don’t risk crossing, you could die, you could lose your limbs,” he said. “Fortunately, I landed in a city where I got help, when many migrants land in the desert and aren’t so fortunate.”

Some migrants who make it to the U.S. do not get to stay.

Avila’s mother was deported after entering illegally. She said the last time she saw her, her mother was 50 and now is 71.

“It was an early Christmas present for both of us and a birthday present for her,” she said.

Avila was able to bring only one of her three children, her 11-year-old daughter Laura, to visit her mother. Her daughter had only ever talked to her grandmother on the phone.

When their turn came, the mother, daughter and granddaughter embraced under the doorway and did not let go of one another for the entirety of the three minutes. As time came to an end, Morones walked over to them to tell them their time was up. Avila and her daughter walked away from her mother with faces scrunched from crying.

“Three minutes for us after so many years, you forget those years,” Avila said. “For me and my mom, just to be able to touch her, hold her. I forgot it had been more than two decades. It didn’t matter.”

As the clock struck 2 p.m., Border Patrol agents walked over to families to let them know their time was up. It was time to re-seal the wall.

Hernandez-Bautista stuck his pinky through the steel mesh in order to touch his father one last time before Border Patrol agents ushered the last few people out of Friendship Circle.

Morones said he has been in contact with other humanitarian groups along the U.S.-Mexico border and hopes to have this event happen in all four border states – California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas in the future.

Martinez said Border Angels was truly on the side of the angels. She said that although she worries about the Trump presidency, she remains hopeful that human rights organizations like Border Angels and the communities that support them will speak up and demand just treatment of immigrants.

“It will take (Trump) time to do something different and change immigration laws,” she said. “That time it will take him, our good people will raise their voice and do something about it. I have a lot of faith.”

THREE MINUTES OF JOY – Border Angels founder Enrique Morones negotiated with the U.S. Border Patrol to open the massive metallic gate in the international border wall at Friendship Park so that families vivisected by la linea could embrace for three minutes. (previous page) Luis Hernandez-Bautista hugs his father Eduardo Hernandez for the first time in five years. (l) Laura Vera Martinez and her mother, Laura Avila, exit the gateway after hugging family matriarch Maria Soccorro Martinez Lopez for the first time in more than 20 years. Seùora Martinez Lopez traveled 1,821 miles from Puebla, Mexico for the brief reunion. (above) Delia Valdovinos-Sanchez and her baby son Ricardo reunited with her mother, Ramona Vargas. Morones said he meets regularly with Border Patrol officials and hopes to hold similar border openings in Arizona, Texas and New Mexico.

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Education is worth a killer international commute Story Maria Seudónima Photos Natalie Mosqueda

When my “early-rising” classmates are slapping the snooze button on their 6:30 a.m. alarm, I am behind the wheel of my idling car in a smoggy serpentine line at the international border. I have already been stuck in the creeping formation of rumbling vehicles oozing towards la frontera for an hour, since 5 a.m., poking the buttons on the radio while my little brother sleeps. We have at least an hour more to wait. God forbid, maybe more.

Light is slowly silhouetting the eastern mountains, but the line pointed towards el norte is a river of light in the gloaming from thousands of cars and trucks whose low beams illuminate the way to work or school. Flinty roadside entrepreneurs sell breakfast burritos, tamales, tortas and an array of traditional Mexican breakfasts from dented aluminum trays 65

or slumping chunks of cardboard. I eat at home to save money, but sometimes I cannot resist the urge for a warm, sugary churro. Thick as a broom handle and gratuitously greasy, churros are the Dunkin’ Donuts of border crossers, a guilty pleasure.

Southwestern College is only seven miles from the U.S.-Mexico border and about 15 miles from my house as the crow flies. Even so, I get up at 4:30 a.m. every day and plan on a 3-4 hour journey. It does no good to think about the fact that in the time it takes me to go less than 20 miles to school, a classmate starting at SWC could drive to Magic Mountain or Yuma, Arizona or Bakersfield or most of the way to Las Vegas or Phoenix.

It is the commute from hell, but it is worth it to attend Southwestern College.

Born and raised in the United States, I grew up going to local schools in Orange County never more than a 15-minute walk from home. Three years ago my parents decided they wanted to move back to their native Mexico after living in the United States for 25 years. They wanted to spend their retirement in their Mother Country where they grew up. Americans to our red, white and blue cores, my younger brother and I found ourselves living in a foreign country in the teeming border city of Tijuana.

I was a second semester college student at the time of the move and I did not want to abandon my dream of a degree from an American university to study at a Mexican university. I could not have made it, anyway. I had never gone to school in another country. I had never taken a Spanish class. I knew that if I enrolled in a Tijuana university I would struggle and ultimately fail. Tijuana’s three universities are rigorous and science-oriented. I did not feel

confident pursuing a degree in a language I did not grow up practicing in school. Even though my DNA says I am Mexican, I would be an American outsider.

My younger brother felt the same way, but he was braver than I was and gave school in Mexico a shot. He attended a middle school in Tijuana for a year, but suffered greatly. He would often come home from school in tears and with a headache.

His Spanish is not as good as mine. He did not understand what was going on in class.

Like me, he was submerged in American culture his entire life. He attended elementary schools where the majority of his classmates were white and English speaking, so he did not get to practice Spanish.

Going to school in another country where the native tongue was completely different was brutal. He may as well have tried going to middle school in Japan, Nigeria or Latvia. After seeing him come home in tears after his first day, I knew that I could never do what he did.

I also knew crossing the border to get to school would be a grind. Gone are the days we can wake up for school at 7 a.m. They now start no later than 4:30 a.m. and we are out the door no later than 5 a.m.

I give myself three hours to cross, drop off my brother at his school and get to my 8:30 a.m. class, but that does not always happen. Wait times to cross vary tremendously. On average, we spend two hours in line, but there have been days when we wait more than five hours. We miss class and our grades suffer. Most of my professors understand when I tell them I live in Tijuana and I sometimes might arrive late, but I also have professors who lecture me on how I must arrive on time with no excuses.

THE WAITING IS THE HARDEST PA R T — M a r i a S e u d ó n i m a ( a pseudonym) and her brother roll out of bed by 4:30 a.m. to hit the road by 5 a.m. Though SWC is 15 miles from her parents’ house in Tijuana, the commute north over the border takes three hours on a good day – five on a bad day. (l-r) Maria waits in line during a June sunrise as thousands of students and workers crawl along in a walking line waiting to go through Homeland Security inspections.

Street vendors are Tijuana’s version of the drive-through. Motorists can buy sweet café de la olla, breakfast burritos, tacos, deep-fried sugercrusted churros and other portable delicacies.

There is nothing that can brighten up my day more than finding out that I only have to wait an hour to cross.

It is still a much longer commute than most students, but I do not care. I gain an hour back! I cherish each hour of the day, so if there is less than two hours of wait time, I am in heaven.

As the semester grinds on I run out of ideas of what to do in my car as I wait. What keeps me going every morning is morning talk radio. It feels like the conversation I am not having with my sleeping little brother. Some days I get creative and complete unfinished homework, eat or jam out to my music while waiting.

There are other days I can barely keep my eyes open after waking up so early. It takes a toll on my body. I envy my sleeping brother.

Heading back home is also a challenge. My brother is a versatile athlete at his high school who plays sports year-round. He practices after school every day until 6 p.m. Rush hour is at its peak, which means we also have sit in traffic to get home. This commute from school to home usually takes about an hour, but anything can happen, including the closing of the border during a high-speed freeway chase, a terrorist threat or Attorney General Jeff Sessions popping in for a visit.

My brother and I typically spend about 12-14 hours a day away from home. By the time we arrive home it is already dinnertime. We have to eat dinner, shower, do as much homework as possible and then we are off to bed since we have to wake up at 4:30 the next morning. The only time we can do everyday things like watching television, going to church or shopping is on the weekends. I prefer to nap.

Sometimes I feel like I am wasting my youth sleeping

on Saturdays, but I would much rather rest after my hectic weekdays than to go grab a drink with my friends.

Time for activities like hanging out with friends, going to movies or even relaxing has almost entirely vanished.

Still, I feel blessed. I am determined to complete college and be a successful American. So I decided to cross la frontera daily. I thought that crossing the border every day would be manageable, so I enrolled in college and started my daily international commute. A year later, my younger brother joined me on this journey.

Because we are American citizens we are able to cross the border every day to attend school. Students with residencies or who are undocumented cannot.

An undocumented student would not be able to cross the border and face immigration officers every day and not get caught. Regardless of people’s perceptions of the Border Patrol, it does a good job of catching people who try to cross the border illegally by car or walking.

People are usually shocked when I tell them I cross la linea every day. Sometimes I have to fight not to roll my eyes when I see the same classmates who live in town show up late to class day after day after day.

I think my college odyssey gives me a better appreciation for my opportunity to attend school in a country that has such a great education system.

Americans who complain about our education system are like fingernails scraping a chalkboard or grinding teeth. There are people who are willing to make enormous sacrifices a lot to attend American schools and colleges.

I know. I am one.

Gone are the days we can wake up for school at 7 a.m.

They now start no later than 4:30 a.m.

Long day’s journey into night 4:30 a.m.

5 a.m.

Wake up, get ready Drive to La Frontera

5:30 a.m.

Wait two-five hours in line

6 a.m.

Churro y café from street vendor

7:45 a.m.

Drop brother off at school

8:30 a.m.

First class at SWC

6 p.m.

7:007:30 p.m.

Pick brother up from practice Finally get home. Dinner, homework then bed. Tomorrow is another long day.

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Duty, Honor, Country America’s shameful deportation of military veterans Story Michael McDonald Photos Peggy Peattie Cover Art Salvador Barajas 67

TIJUANA, MEXICO — Glum immigration officers do not ask deportees if they are veterans when they herd them on to that one-way southbound bus. They do not care if the men are Vietnam War heroes, Desert Storm amputees or PTSD sufferers who battled Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan.

Out they go, honorably discharged veterans deported in a less-than-honorable end to their lives in America.

Most never return. Those who do return in a box for burial at a military cemetery with full honors.

Irony abounds for the United States military veterans dumped like spent ordinance in this scarred and hungry Mexican border city.

Hundreds — maybe thousands — of honorably discharged veterans have been dishonorably deported to a country they never lived in and have no connection to. Tijuana’s makeshift shelters, mean streets and filthy riverbed are peppered with U.S. military vets, a sordid secret some borderlands Congress members call a national disgrace.

Since World War II, joining the military has been a fast

track way for immigrants to become naturalized U.S. citizens. About 8,000 non-citizens enlist annually. It is possible for most non-citizen military members to become naturalized by the time they leave basic training.

Naturalization, however, is not automatic, leaving many honorably discharged veterans without citizenship.

Matters got worse in 1996 when Congress passed and President Bill Clinton signed the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, stripping federal immigration judges of their ability to take military service, family or time in country into consideration in immigration hearings.

Hector Barajas, a veteran of the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division, was deported in 2004. He said since passing the 1996 law, the U.S. has been deporting veterans who previously held legal permanent resident status.

“Before ’96, judges and the courts would go out of their way to not deport somebody if they served in the military,” he said. “Basically (the law) took away the discretion of the

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federal judges and anybody who breaks the law will be deported if they are not a naturalized citizen.”

Barajas founded “The Bunker,” a safehouse and shelter for deported vets in Tijuana.

Resembling a homemade military outpost, the Deported Veterans Support House is adorned with American flags and pictures of their fallen brothers.

It is a small, two-story command center established to lend support to deported veterans who find themselves south of the border.

“First for all, this is a place where you can stay,” he said.

“Second, it’s a place where we’ll help you get your ID, we’ll help you get a job. You have counselors if you need help. You have a place to make phone calls, talk to your family.”

Though Barajas is a patron saint to deported veterans, he admits he has not always been an angel.

In 2002 someone in a vehicle he was riding in fired a gun. Nobody was hurt in the incident, but Barajas and the other people in the car were arrested. They all pleaded guilty to illegal discharge of a firearm. He served two years in prison before being deported to Mexico.

Barajas had never lived in Mexico as an adult. He was homeless, broke and could barely communicate. He said he deserved to be punished for what he did, but not thrown out of the country he risked his life for.

Barajas said the scenario w o u l d h av e p l ay e d o u t differently had he received citizenship during his military service. He confessed to not understanding the complicated process as a 20 year old. Though the process improved, he said, there is still no directive for commanders to walk noncitizen members through the naturalization process.

“It’s not like this is protocol for all the U.S. Army that every non-citizen has to, in three months, do this and do that,” he said. “It boils down to chain of command.”

Jaime Orozco Uranga, 55, said his immigration status was never an issue while he served in the Army from 1981-84, but it is now as a deported veteran.

A green card holder, Orozco Uranga said he was accused of domestic violence in 2000 after serving in South Korea and being honorably discharged. Though his partner at the time told the

“We are talking about

honoring our veterans,

supporting our troops. At one time these men wore the uniforms and they’re veterans regardless

where they are from.”

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HENCE FROM AMERICA ART THOU BANISHED—Honorably discharged United States Army veteran Hector Barajas was deported to Mexico, though he never really ever lived there. In his exile he organized other deported veterans and established “The Bunker,” a safe house for his comrades-in- arms living as refugees in Tijuana. Congressman Juan Vargas and other borderlands elected officials have called the deportation of military veterans “shameful” and a dereliction of America’s obligation to treat its veterans with care and respect.

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judge no crime was committed, he said, he pleaded no contest. He said the judge told him a no contest plea would get him out of jail.

“Desperate to get out of jail, I pleaded (no contest),” he said. “I was waiting to get out that night and the sheriff told me ‘you ain’t getting out, you’ve got an immigration hold.’”

After his immigration hearing, Orozco Uranga said he was put on a bus for Nogales, Mexico, about 75 miles south of Tucson, Arizona. From there he said he took a bus to Tijuana to be closer to family.

Bardis Vakili, a senior staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of San Diego and Imperial Counties, said it requires conviction of an aggravated felony to get deported, but strict immigration laws have broadened the scope of crimes included.

“Aggravated felonies, though it sounds

scary, the definition has been expanded in immigration law to very minor crimes that don’t even require jail time,” he said.

Immigration proceedings differ from regular court hearings, Valiki said, often leaving people without representation.

“In immigration proceedings you only have the right to an attorney if you can afford one,” he said. “If you can’t afford one, one is not appointed. When you combine that with the fact that immigration proceedings (happen) more often than not when you’re detained, it makes it virtually impossible to fight your case. It’s a civil rights issue. They’re denied the right to due process.”

A first offense for possession of a controlled substance or certain DUIs can lead to a life of exile in a country most veterans do not consider their own. Barajas said many of them only knew American life and are no

more Mexican than they are Chinese or Saudi Arabian.

“They got here at a young age,” he said.

“They grew up like Americans, doing the Pledge of Allegiance, watching G.I. Joe, listening to hip-hop, rock and roll, Led Zepplin in the ’70s. They grew up in the U.S. like anybody else.”

Orozco Uranga said he has been stranded in Tijuana for 16 years. He said prior to his deportation he had come to Tijuana only once, on a family vacation with his daughter.

“We went to Disneyland, then came down to TJ just for the night to check it out,” he said. “I never in my life thought that I would be living here. But here I am.”

Adjusting to his new life was very difficult, he said.

“I was a stranger in my own (birth) country,” he said. “At first I felt discrimination, because

of my accent. I speak Spanish, but I have an American accent. I don’t hear it, but down here they can tell right away.”

Orozco Uranga said he ended up living in Tijuana shelters with uneducated, desperate people. Brought down by alcoholism and a badly mangled foot that limits his ability to work, he said he was able to get into rehab and has been sober for nearly three years. Unable to work, though, he was still living in shelters when he found out about the Bunker. Barajas heard where he was living and invited him to stay and join the commune of former American soldiers.

Orozco Uranga said he lost half of his foot in a railroad mishap. Barajas and comrades at The Bunker are working to get him a prosthetic foot or orthopedic shoe to alleviate the pain from standing. He said another deported veteran who makes

prosthetics may be able to help. Without access to Veterans Affairs medical benefits, it may be his only option.

Paradoxically, VA benefits are not forfeited by honorably discharged veterans even if they are deported. They are still eligible to receive them, but there are no VA hospitals in Mexico and they may not return to the U.S. for care. Most have to pay for medical care out of pocket in Mexican hospitals and clinics.

For Mario R., a 71-year-old Vietnam veteran, this meant waiting in a Mexican hospital without medication for 30 days to have surgery on a dislocated hip and broken femur.

He said the month of pain was unbearable.

“Now I know why they kill horses when they break a leg,” he said. “Thirty days, no morphine, no nothing. Just over-the-

counter painkillers. The only time I saw the surgeon was when I had the operation. No follow up. Never saw him again.”

Vakili said access to treatment often comes too late for aging veterans.

“These Vietnam-era veterans that have been deported are really struggling medically and would be entitled to VA care if they were in the United States,” he said. “The only time (Customs and Border Protection) has ever let veterans in (the U.S.) is when they’re at death’s door. So we’ve had veterans paroled in only to die within a couple weeks because they were never let in beforehand (when they needed medical care).”

Barajas said the U.S. Embassy and Consulate do not provide help.

“The U.S. Embassy has nothing to do with us,” he said. “Once deported you lose your

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“I have a daughter I haven’t seen in 17 years. I missed out on her graduation, her marrige, her giving birth. I have four grandkids. I want to hold them. I want to hug them.” social security. The embassy and consulates are only for social security and citizens.”

Valiki said getting deported veterans back into the U.S. is extremely difficult. He searches, on a case-by-case basis, for errors in the original convictions, which is a low-percentage strategy.

“There are very large obstacles to do that,” he said.

“Most notably, they’re deported so they can’t come in and fight their cases in court. And it’s very hard to vacate a case. You don’t just walk into court and say ‘Your honor I’d like the conviction wiped out.’ You have to identify an actual legal error.”

Honoring veterans is a popular talking point in political campaigns, Valiki said, but actual commitment to veterans by the U.S. government is weak. Bringing home veterans who have taken an oath to defend the Constitution is an issue that should transcend party lines, he said.

“I think it’s safe to say that common sense legislation on this stuff is going to be difficult,” he said. “But if there is one issue that can unify the parties, it’s got to be honorably-discharged veterans trying to get back home to their families.”

Barajas agreed.

“Before 1996, this law didn’t exist,” he said. “Why not change it? We are talking about honoring our veterans, supporting our troops. At one time these men wore the uniforms and they’re veterans regardless of where they are from. They should be honored. Not when they die and they are taken home in a box, buried with benefits and their VA marker. There’s no honor in that.”

California legislators are leading the efforts to reunite deported veterans with their families. On April 15 Barajas received a full pardon from Governor Jerry Brown, the first clemency of its kind. This spring the State Assembly passed a bill by Assembly Member Lorena Fletcher Gonzalez to establish a fund to provide legal representation to honorably discharged deportees.

Progress has been much slower on the national level.

Last summer, Congressman Juan Vargas of California’s

51st District introduced a trio of bills addressing three of the major issues faced by deported veterans. H.R. 6091 would track the number of veterans deported, which is not currently being done. H.R. 6092 would allow deported veterans back into the U.S. to receive medical treatment. H.R. 6093 establishes protocol for naturalizing non-citizens while enlisted.

None of the bills made it out of committee.

In March, Arizona Congressman Raul Grijalva reintroduced the Veterans Visa and Protection Act, which would allow deported veterans to obtain visas and return to the U.S. This bill would directly impact those veterans already deported, Vakili said.

“The Grijalva bill really gets to the heart of the problem for veterans that have been deported,” he said. “That would go a long way to reuniting these families. It’s reasonable legislation that I think can be supported across the aisle.”

For Orozco Uranga a reunion with his family would be a chance to see the little girl he took on a family trip to Tijuana so long ago, but who has since grown up. He longs for a chance to meet the grandchildren he has only spoken to on the phone.

“I have a daughter I haven’t seen in 17 years,” he said. “I missed out on her graduation, her marriage, her giving birth. I have four grandkids. I want to hold them. I want to hug them.”

Since his pardon Barajas continued the process of gaining his American citizenship that he began before his conviction. He said he plans to continue working with deported veterans at The Bunker. In April he opened another support house in Juarez, Mexico. He plans to open others in Jamaica and the Dominican Republic.

Barajas and his supporters insist too many soldiers have suffered too long in ditches, alleyways and Third World flophouses for minor crimes. The much bigger crime is what was done to these American patriots who were never officially welcomed in as Americans.

No soldier, Barajas said, should be left behind.

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TOP DOGS­— Southwestern College student Paul Arriola (left) has been a bright light for los Xoloitzcuintles de Caliente, Liga MX national champions in just their fifth year of existance. Named for an Aztec-bred dog attributed with special powers, Los Xolos are one of the planet’s truly international professional teams, drawing fans from Baja California Norte in Mexico and Southern California.

Soccer’s new big dogs run loose in the borderlands Story Ivana Morales Photos Natalie Mosqueda 75

TIJUANA, MEXICO — Soccer is the “Beautiful Game,” but few people expected it to have the power to lift and heal a city racked with violence.

Tijuana’s little big dogs, Los Xolos, have not stopped this city’s gruesome drug wars, but they have brought a new hope and new energy to Mexico’s largest border city.

Xoloitzcuintles de Caliente was founded in 2007, an especially horrible year during the war between drug cartels for dominance of this international gateway. In 2011, after only five years of existence, the Xolos earned the right to compete in the top tier of the Mexican professional soccer league, Liga MX. One year later the team improbably won its first national title. The presence of a champion professional soccer team provided salve for the scarred image of the city.

Soccer-crazy Southern Californians also love Los Xolos and flood across la linea in their red and black jerseys for matches at Caliente Stadium, the “biggest dog pound in Mexico.” Ignacio Palou, General Manager of the Xolos, said the team binds Mexico and the United States as one of the world’s few truly international teams.

“Since the beginning, Club Xolos has been characterized as being different,” he said. “We are a binational team. Thousands of families come from the other side of the border to watch the games and feel a passion for our sport. They celebrate the same goal.”

Los Xolos takes their name from the ancestral Aztec dog, Xoloitzcuintle (CHO-LOS-WINK-LAY). In Aztec mythology the hairless canine was a gift from the god Xolotl and considered a fearless guardian and loyal ally.

Roberto Cornejo, Director of Soccer Operations, said the Xolos symbolize hard working people from both sides of the border who, dayto-day, fight to succeed in life.

“The spirit we demonstrate in every match tries to emulate those immigrants who came to our region searching for new opportunities,” he said.

“Xolos takes the best of both cultures to create success.”

Spanish and English can be heard in the dorms and locker rooms at the Caliente Stadium. Soccer players with dual nationalities pepper the roster. “La Jauria” has star players like Paul Arriola, Amando Moreno, Joe Corona, Michael Orozco and Alejandro Guido, who represented the U.S. national soccer team in World Cup qualifiers and international competitions.

Southwestern College student Alejandro Guido, an attacking middle fielder, said he has soccer running through his veins. He started playing when he was 4, with his father and brother teaching him how to kick a ball.

“I used to live in Tijuana,” he said. “I remember playing in a local league during the mornings and then I crossed the border to play in the United States in the evening.”

Guido, 23, was part of the U.S. Youth Soccer Olympic Development Program tasked with developing young prospects who could play for the United States national

team. A turning point in his soccer career came when he was selected for the U.S. squad at the 2011 FIFA U-17 World Cup held in Mexico.

“Many doors opened after the World Cup,” he said. “I went to Holland to be part of the SBV Vitesse, an Eredivisie professional team, but sadly, things did not work out. Then Xolos offered me an opportunity to fulfill my dream and I did not hesitate.”

Guido’s first match as a professional soccer player was in Copa MX (Mexican Cup) against the Celaya Futbol. Two years later, Guido made his first appearance in Liga MX against the legendary Chivas de Guadalajara. He was 20.

“It was a dream come true,” he said. “A lifetime’s work was finally paying off.”

The Mexican-American player said the team has given him the chance to interact with people, especially children, who find happiness through the “Beautiful Game.”

“It is an incredible feeling,” he said. “You have the opportunity to meet people who infuse you with joy for life.”

Guido said he believes Xolos is a team without borders.

“I have learned how to embrace my two nationalities,” he said. “Xolos takes the best of both cultures to create success.”

Xolos have become a bridge for young athletes on both sides of the border who want to be professional soccer players, said Palou. The team offers a platform for players to mold their technical skills and give them tools to reach the top level of the Mexican soccer league.

“Our fans are everything to us,” he said.

“We want to acknowledge that support by providing a platform where young talent can have an opportunity to develop technical skills and fulfill their dreams.”

The team is building an ambitious youth program that includes the CIX, Centro de Iniciación Xoloitzcuintle on the Mexican side and the Xolos Academies in Chula Vista, Temecula, Oxnard, Minnesota, New Jersey and North Carolina.

Director of Xolos Reserves Ignacio Ruvalcaba said the academies reinforce the connection of the borderlands and their social impact is inarguable.

“Our doors are open for everyone,” he said.

“We do not care about the nationality, we care about the talent.”

Xolos offers education scholarships, psychological preparation, housing, physical trainers, sports physicians, and nutritionists to young players who want to be part of the first team. Some players even receive monthly stipend provided for their transportation. Economically speaking, it costs almost nothing to practice with the reserves.

Cornejo said having a foundation is key.

“Our mission is to build a solid base with players from 76

our reserve teams,” said Cornejo. “We consider California and the Southwestern region of the United States as important targets where we can find and develop young talents.”

Xolos reserve teams are divided into multiple categories according to the players’ age. These categories include players born in 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007. CIX admits candidates born 2013 or later and it currently has six schools in Tijuana. The under-15, under-17, and under-20s squads are part of the Mexican league. The team currently has 25 Mexican-American players on their roster and 15 Xolitos are already branded with “international experience,” either representing Mexico or the United States.

Scouting is essential when it comes to evaluating talent. Once discovered, prospects have a short period of time to demonstrate their abilities on the “green carpet.”

“We give 22 days where the prospect can practice with the team according to his age,” said Ruvalcaba. “Then we make a comparison with other players to finally decide if he stays or not.”

Jesus Enriquez, who plays as a left-winger for the Xolos U-20s, moved from San Francisco to Tijuana at a young age to pursue his dream. He left his family and friends behind after Xolos offered him an opportunity to prove himself on the soccer field.

“When I first got the call for the tryout I had to talk with my parents for a while” he said. “They were not really going for it, but I was able to convince them. That is when everything started.”

Enriquez said moving was not easy, but he adapted quickly to

the city. Being away, he said, has helped him to cherish his family, appreciate American bounty, and embrace the opportunity the club has given to him.

“I have learned that in the United States some things are just given to you and we do not care about it,” he said. “Here in Mexico, people actually appreciate what they have.”

He said he finds an interesting contrast between Mexican soccer and American soccer. Mexican style is more technical while the American style is more about speed and strength. Enriquez said he likes the Mexican league a little more, but if he had the chance to play for Mexico or the United States, he would probably play for the United States.

The connection between San Diego and Tijuana may grow stronger thanks to soccer.

After Alex Spanos announced the Chargers’ departure to Los Angeles, new plans arose to replace aging Qualcomm Stadium with a 30,000-seat stadium for a Major League Soccer team. SoccerCity would include a new stadium surrounded by parks and recreational areas.

Having another professional soccer team in the borderlands could further futbol fanaticism.

Ignacio Palou said he believes a San Diego team and Xolos can exist side-by-side with a positive impact on the border.

“Just imagine the possibilities,” he said. “Competition is always good and we can have an amicable partnership. Xolos fans are loyal and they will not stop supporting our team.”

Like art and food, soccer can erase the border. A little hairless doggie is showing the way.

“We do not care about the nationality, we care about the talent.”

Cross-country pioneer runs through life’s barriers Story Ivana Morales

I

n 1996 Maria Madueño beat practically everyone on the cross-country course.

In 2002 she beat cancer. In 2017 she is beating Father Time.

Madueño, 60, promised herself she would run one marathon per month the year after her cancer recovery.

She has raced way past that goal.

Born and raised in Tijuana, Madueño said her love for competition began on a bike.

“I was 14 when I started cycling,” she said. “I won several national championships in Mexico, and I was able to compete in the first world cycling championship for women.”

Her cycling ended when she turned 21 and got married. Professional cycling was too expensive and the newlywed couple could not afford the costs, so Madueño began running as a hobby.

Practicing at CREA, an athletic training center in Tijuana, she caught the attention of a group of runners who invited her to train with them.

“They were the best runners in Tijuana,” she said. “When they realized I was able to keep pace, they encouraged me to run a marathon.”

Madueño’s f irst marat hon was t he B aj a International Chula Vista-Rosarito in 1984. She finished in an “astounding time.” With only one month of running experience she took first place.

From that moment, Madueño said she knew that she was made for running and began competing in every race around Baja California.

“No one could stop me,” she said. “I started winning all of them.”

It was at a marathon in Tijuana she was recruited by Dr. Duro Agbede, the legendary former coach of the SWC cross-country team.

“I asked my assistant coach to talk with Mar ia,” s aid Agb e de. “When I s aw her I thought, this is the type of athlete that we like to have representing our college. She is a very hardworking, competitive person. That competitiveness was what actually made me try

HITTING HER STRIDE — Maria Madueño was setting records while winning meet after meet running for the SWC cross-country team in 1996.

to recruit her.”

When Madueño arrived at SWC in 1995 she said she did not know what to expect. Language was a challenge, said Agbede, but did not stop her.

“When Maria came in, she put in a lot of work and she was very dedicated,” he said. “She was able to overcome a language barrier and did very well in her classes.”

Madueño majored in child development. As a full-time student-athlete, mother and wife, her sports career required sacrifices. Family, she said, was essential to her success.

“My family became my biggest support system,” she said. “My husband has always been there for me without hesitation and my children were wonderful.

They sometimes would help me with cooking and the household chores.”

Madueño left Southwestern a legacy of greatness. She was named Pacific Coast Athletic Conference Athlete of the Week twice. She was the 1995 PCAC Champion and placed fourth in the California State CrossCountry Championship.

She won the UCSD Triton Invitational Cross Country Meet in 1996, which elevated SWC athletics to another level.

“She defeated her opponents by a massive margin,” said Agbede.

“She ran almost every race by herself. After Maria came in, our program became a synonym of success. A lot of athletes wanted to run for Southwestern.”

Madueño earned the nickname “Pies Calientes” (Burning Feet).

Opponents said she was so fast she did not touch the ground.

She ran 5 kilometers in 17:01 minutes, 78

“This is about living the moment and

not thinking about anything except the road.”

a state record. It stood for 20 years until SWC’s Aminat Olowora ran a 16:59 in the 2015 State Championship.

After leaving Southwestern, Madueño competed all over the world, including marathons in Barcelona, Berlin, Prague, Boston and New York.

“It was a turning point in my life,” she said. “I was able to become an elite athlete.

Reaching the finish line is like achieving freedom.”

“Winning championships was not my priority,” she said. “It is something that came naturally. I feel a commitment to myself while I am running because it is like the race that is life.”

In 2002, she faced the biggest challenge of her life, a diagnosis of cancer. Her competitive nature helped her to fight the disease and defeat it.

“After spending one year dealing with my sickness, I decided to run one marathon e a ch m ont h ,” s h e s ai d. “Ru n n i ng a marathon is like a dessert for me.”

Madueño’s 2017 calendar includes the Los Angeles Marathon in March, the San Diego 100 Mile in June, the Seattle Marathon in July, the 12,000-foot elevation Silver Rush 50 Run in Leadville, Colorado in August and the GORE-TEX Transalpine-Run, a 7-day ultramarathon that goes through Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Italy.

Tijuana’s über-athlete worked for years as a teacher. Madueño has dedicated part of her life to teaching physical education to children and teenagers. When doing

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that, she said, she could transfer her knowledge and passion for life to the younger generations of aspiring athletes.

She taught at Sebastian Lerdo de Tejada Elementary School, Instituto Pau l a Mont a l , C o l e g i o Nu e vo Amanecer, Instituto Anahuac and Instituto Progreso.

Alexander Soler, an elite Mexican basketball player, is a former student of Madueño. She said Madueño helped her to grow as a person and as an athlete by developing her physical skills and molding her mental strength.

Fight for the win, learn how to lose, and always respect your rival were Madueño axioms, said Soler.

“I remember getting excited when

I saw Professor Madueño entering through the door of the classroom,” she said. “I felt so much admiration for her. You were able to feel her passion for teaching.”

Watching her students become champions is one of her biggest life satisfactions, said Madueño.

“I teach them to cherish their lives,” she said. “I encourage them to find a physical activity that would activate their bodies and free their minds.

There are no obstacles for achieving their goals.”

Madueño said she has miles to go before she sleeps.

“You never know when the time is going to come. This is about living the moment and not to thinking about anything except the road.”

AIN’T NO MOUNTAIN HIGH ENOUGH — After beating cancer in 2002, Madueño vowed to run a marathon a month. She has since competed across the U.S. and around the world.

Mexico’s magical Valle de Guadalupe­ a nearby Napa Valley Story and photos Victoria Gonzalez

Like the Led Zeppelin song, Americans can come to California to smoke their stuff.

They would be wise, though, to go to Baja California to drink the wine.

Mexico’s tucked-away Valle de Guadalupe has been quietly pro ducing sup erb wine for decades. An hour and a half drive south of the border, the region is accessible by a steep road lined by endemic flora. In the distance the ocean’s rolling swell is breathtaking.

It eventually gives way to a sinuous countryside that, due to rains early in the year, is verdant and fragrant.

Valle de Guadalupe welcomes visitors with a main road lined with houses, small businesses and stands selling fat olives, olive oil and honey. More than 70 wineries with rows upon rows of grapevines lined with wild-looking rosebushes or olive trees wait.

All the wineries share rocky vol c an i c s oi l r i d d l e d w it h granite and clay. They are just the right distance from the ocean to enjoy sunny warmth, but not the triple digits that roast the inland valleys.

César Esparza, who manages the celebrated L a Lomita Winery, said Valle de Guadalupe

is the perfect convergence of temp erature, humidity and nutrients. “ It ’s a m i r a c l e h o w t h e grapevines can grow and extract nutrients from soil filled with ro cks,” he s aid. “Here, t he grapes develop great character and resistance because the soil forces them to struggle and fight.”

Shiraz, Merlot, Tempranillo, Cabernet Sauvignon, Grenache and Chardonnay are some of the varietals of grapes successfully grown in the valley.

Finca la Carrodilla is a new winery developed by the Pérez Castro family, known for its L a L omita Winer y. Tasting manager Andrea Garcia said t he winema k ing pro cess is inspired by Mother Earth and the heavens. Like traditional Aztec art, sunlight coexists with moonshadow.

“In a d d i t i o n t o b e i n g a certified organic winery, we also use biodynamic processes,” she said.

Bio-dynamism is an alternative form of holistic agriculture based on principles of balance, regeneration and harmony.

“The processes follow a lunar calendar that tells us exactly when to water and harvest,” she said.

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The Valle de Guadalupe in Mexico.

Whatever qualities the moon’s celestial powers may bestow upon the wine, the results are otherworldly. For 180 pesos ($9.50) visitors can taste generous portions of three wines.

Canto de Luna (Moonsong), an equal mix of Shiraz, Cabernet Sauvignon and Tempranillo, is medium bodied and fruity. Its name pays homage to la finca’s bio-dynamism. García said it is placed in barrels made of French or American oak for three to nine months to fully develop.

La Finca’s Chenin Blanc, on the other hand, is a light and refreshing choice when chilled. It requires no barrel time, but it is kept in the bottle for a full year before it is deemed ready, said García.

Velvety and full-bodied, the Cabernet Sauvignon also requires a year in its barrel to develop woody undertones.

Like any good wine region, Valle de Guadalupe has matured and in the last few years other parts of the world have begun to notice. Esparza is an ambassador.

“We are starting to make ourselves known in Europe and people there ask things like ‘What is Valle de Guadalupe?’ and ‘They have wine in Mexico? Isn’t Mexico all about tequila?’ Well no, we have very good wine here, too,” he said.

“Mexico has been making wines for more than 100 years, which is something a lot of people don’t know.”

A b o u t 6 0 p e r c e n t o f Va l l e d e

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Guadalupe’s tourists are international, he said, and he has hosted people from all 50 states.

“Before they come to the valley, they think it’s still a little one-acre farm,” he said. “Once they get here, they are amazed because it is not what they expected.”

A dusty, rural valley was what Chanel Smith and Justin Brown, visiting from Los Angeles, said they expected to see.

Brown said he and Smith had visited Baja California as kids, but got the idea to come to the valley after a co-worker mentioned it.

“I told people at work I was coming here and they were like ‘oh, you’re just driving across to Tijuana, whatever,’” Brown said.

“I think people just don’t have a good sense of what it is like down here.”

Smith said the valley’s ambiance was more cosmopolitan and refined than touristy or rural.

“When I think about Tijuana, I def initely think about it being, I don’t know, more rural,” she said. “Just sitting here, I feel like I’m at a winery in Malibu. This is a

lot more like Napa or Santa Barbara than I thought it was going to be.”

Valle de Guadalup e’s allure go es beyond its spectacular wines.

“It’s affordable, amazing and the food is spectacular,” Smith said. “Given the price, it is better than most places I’ve ever been to in LA. Most really high-end places in LA are not as good. It’s insane!”

KEEPING EVERYTHING COOL – La Lomita Winery created fermentation chambers that were carved out of the Earth. Hard volcanic soil makes for a perfect wine cellar that is at least 20 degrees cooler than the outside. Fermenting barrels are made of either French or American oak to create the ambience of its popular varietals. Lava flows from ancient volcanos created the valley and its rich, porous soil.

The two Americans experienced culture shock when interacting with Mexican visitors who were also staying at their hotel.

“We went to breakfast and all of the Americans are wearing sloppy t-shirts and flip flops and looked like Americans on vacation,” Brown said. “But all the Mexicans that were there, even at breakfast, were all very well-dressed in long pants and long-sleeved shirts.”

Smith agreed.

“It is definitely a cultural difference that we have noticed,” she said. “They don’t treat us badly because we look like slobs, but maybe they should.”

Brown said many Americans have the wrong idea about life south of the border.

“I think it’s just a misconception a lot of people have about Mexico and Mexicans,” he said. “They think that it’s a guy who mows their lawn and you come down here and everyone is very welcoming and well-dressed and cosmopolitan. A lot of people do not understand that.” thought about coming back with Smith said she initially friends, but decided the well-kept secret should say that way.

“It’s wonderful,” she said. “It makes no sense. I can’t understand it, but I want it to stay that way, so I kind of want to keep other people out. This is an amazing place.”

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HELPLESS

IIIIIIHAITIANS ST H

undreds of black faces behind the fences wait for an appointment that may never come.

It was long way from Haiti to Brazil. There were long bus rides through Columbia, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala and Mexico. There were long train rides from Chiapas to Tijuana. Many were raped, beaten or killed.

It is a short walk to the U.S.-Mexico border, but the 100 yards from where they stood in Tijuana to the Land of the Free may turn out to be the longest and toughest part of the odyssey.

Kensia (a pseudonym) is a young Haitian woman who accompanied her male cousin to Brazil where he found construction work prior to the Rio de Janiero Olympic Games. When the Olympics were over, so was his work. Brazil’s economy tumbled into recession and the once-sought after Haitian workers were all unemployed and no longer welcome.

Kensia and her group traveled by bus and car over the Equator into Columbia and all the way to the lawless borderlands of Nicaragua and Honduras, where they were dumped. She walked for days over the humid terrain, looking over her shoulder the entire way. She had no food, no water and was surrounded by leering strangers, with only her cousin to protect her.

They were hiding from police who have free passes to shoot Haitians on sight. One man in the group died in Nicaragua. They were forced to leave his unattended body behind. The journey seemed endless.

Kensia had nothing but the salty sweat from her own body to moisten her mouth.

Haitian refugees told this story and others like it to Pastor Bill Jenkins of the Christ United Methodist Ministry Center in Normal Heights. Since May the center has served more than 4,000 Haitian refugees, Jenkins said.

“We got involved because we had a Haitian minister here,” he said. “Little did we know it was going to be as massive as it has become. We became a refugee camp right here in the heart of San Diego.”

Jean Elise Durandisse came to San Diego in 2009 with a group of 20 other Haitians that were part of a gospel music group. When they arrived, he said, they requested religious asylum for fear of Haitian gangs.

“I met (Durandisse and his group) here at the church,” Jenkins said. “Immediately we connected.

They said they were looking for a home and I said you

can have a spiritual home here at this church. We helped them become a part of our family. We gave them food, clothing and connected them with immigration attorneys.”

Jenkins said an earthquake in 2010 displaced more than 1.5 million Haitians. San Diego County already had an established Haitian congregation with Durandisse as its leader.

“We became the hub of Haitian relief efforts here in San Diego,” said Jenkins.

After the 2016 Olympics, Brazil exploded in economic crisis and nationalist tensions rose, forcing Haitians out of the country.

“We heard word of Haitians massing across the border,” Jenkins said. “So you have 600 to 800 Haitians sleeping on the street, lining up getting ready to come across. They were not sneaking. They were not illegal. They were presenting themselves under humanitarian parole.”

In 2014, the Obama administration established the Haitian Family Reunification Parole Program.

It allows U.S. citizens and permanent residents to apply for green cards on behalf of relatives in Haiti.

Department of Homeland Security regulations say Haitians may qualify for Temporary Protected Status in the case of armed conflict (such as civil war), environmental disaster (such as earthquake or hurricane) or an epidemic of extraordinary conditions.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) require refugees to be interviewed by Customs and Border Protection. Some are detained, and required to wear electronic ankle bracelets with a tracker that allows ICE to monitor their location and make sure they show up for appointments.

Jenkins said that after receiving an appointment, many refugees are cast out to the streets until their appointment date which could be weeks or months later.

“When they would cross the border they would talk to the immigration courthouse,” he said. “They were given a court date, papers and if they were legally in the United States they were told to show up to their appointment four days, four weeks, four months from now and then it’s like “nice knowing you.’”

Jenkins said many refugees did not know where to go.

“They did not speak English,” he said. “They had the clothes on their backs. They had no money

TIJU

S

TRANDED IN UANAIIIIIIII

Story Domonique Scott Photos Renee Conly

MAROONED – Haitians streamed to Brazil to work construction before the 2016 Olympics, but were personas non gratis once the games were underway. Brazilian police and military personnel told the poverty-stricken Brazilian workers to leave the country immediately and forbid them to work.

Thousands headed to Central America and Mexico, but found themselves unwelcomed there as well.

A teeming refugee colony of Hatians now occupies an area just south of the U.S.-Mexico border.

Some have been granted asylum in the United States, but most idle in squalor and poverty in a land where they do not speak the language, do not understand the culture and have no access to work.

and knew nothing of San Diego, so they began sleeping and living on the streets in downtown San Diego at Horton Plaza.”

Jenkins said Durandisse, who is now himself a Protestant minister, was the savior to the Haitians downtown when he showed up because he knew the culture and Creole dialect.

“Someone called our Haitian pastor here and said are you aware that Haitians are downtown,” Jenkins said. “So he (Durandisse) took the van that says Haitian Methodist Church on it. When they saw that word, Haitian, they literally ran to him and he spoke to them in Creole. He said, ‘they thought I was Jesus,’ and I said, ‘well, at that moment you were.’”

Bernard Dogan of the Southwestern College Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society said the campus club has joined Jenkins to help the refugees.

“We are focused on taking action towards peace and war,” Dogan said. “We want to help asylum seekers and refugees with their biggest barriers like housing, unemployment, mental and medical issues, and language barriers.”

Phi Theta Kappa hosted Refugee Awareness Week and organized a donation drive and cultural performances. Jenkins came to speak to students and staff about his experiences.

Not all Haitians are granted asylum and many are being deported. In late September the Department of Homeland Security stopped granting Temporary Protected Status to Haitian refugees, said Katie Tobin, Senior Protection Associate for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Each week two jetliners full of Haitians leave San Diego for deportation flights to Haiti. If the detained Haitians have permanent resident status in Brazil, the U.S. will deport them there, if they wish.

Tobin said she was worried what is happening to the repatriated Haitians and if they are being imprisoned.

Jenkins and Durandisse worry, too, but are powerless to do anything about it. What they can do right now is try to help the Haitian wave that has washed over the South County.

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Salvador Barajas

The government threw me a bad curve.