YouSaid · the spoken record

Jose Antonio Vargas

lines on the record: 112
first: 2018-11-24
most recent: 2018-11-24
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Which were very welcoming. It's shifted really. Which is why for me, they call it a global migration crisis. I would rather call it a natural progression of history. So if you drew up a map of the world, so for example, there are 4 million Filipinos here in the United States. We're the third largest immigrant group. It's Mexicans, Chinese, and then Filipinos, right? When I was doing this book actually, the publisher was asking me why does my name Jose doesn't have an accent on the E”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“There's nothing more natural. That's how the whole country was founded on. Unless you're Native American and African-American, you came here from somewhere So I think. How do we get the tech community to understand that? I used to be so offended by this term global citizen. Because I always thought it came from this privileged place. If I can just go wherever I want to go this weekend, kind of thing. According to the UN, right? Who welcomes them where they get to be a citizen, right? That to me is one of the questions.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Right? Like, I mean, this iPhone can be manufactured in China, delivered to Cupertino, end up in New York where I bought it on Fifth Avenue. This iPhone can go to more places than I can as a human being. So, and given your audience, I wanted to make sure that I really say this, I think it's really wonderful that tech optimists want to open up the world and want to connect and want to provide tools for people to connect. Absolutely.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Right? I mean, I think in the tech community, there's an easier answer there. We need jobs, right? But even when I was stuck in that jail cell with those boys, what was interesting was most of them were wearing shoes. They're either Adidas, Nike, or Rebuck, right? American brands. Right. I mean, I find it so fascinating that this iPhone right here can actually go to more places than my mother and I can.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I don't know that yet. But the thing is my grandmother who raced me just turned 81. She's Mountain View a couple of miles from Google. And I don't know. I just can't bear the thought of my leaving here and then whatever happens and then what? Right? Yeah. Because, you know, I've heard horror stories from people who watch their”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“No more coming. That's a winner. That's it. No nothing. No more. No, so even if I do that because you're for fraud, you commit to fraud. So it's really a private bill or a pardon from the president or I leave or immigration reform passes and then you have immunity. So those are the four options on the table.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, which is why it's dangerous to say that they're the good kind of immigrants and the bad kind of immigrants. What does that mean? Or to call people, I remember this is the thing that's really gets at me. Low skilled labor and high-skilled labor. I'm sorry, I come from a family of farmers. You know, I remember in the Philippines, you know, harvesting rice. There's nothing low scaled about harvesting rice. Right, right. Right.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You have to be for all of them. What about all the nannies? Right. What about all the farmers? And, you know, I mean, to his credit, Forward is actually way more inclusive than a lot of the other kind of tech firms trying to get immigration done.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“About my parents Which typically is about dreamers. I always say that. They're like, I had an interesting talk with a bunch of them and they were like HP1B. I think, what about everybody else? You have to be for all of them.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Right? Meaning like solving the Dream Act is not enough. What about my parents? So, meaning whatever they put out, I remember when Mark was starting forward, they didn't even have a name yet. I said to him, that's great that you're getting into this, but Mark, please make sure that the moment you come out and support immigration, that it's not just about H1D visas, which is not about dreamers.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That was the last girl, but I think a lot of it has to do with how willing There is now the tension between what these, not just tech groups, but like a lot of advocates and lobbyists want versus what the undocumented community actually want. Because guess what? The X factor is, social media. Right. I mean, I would argue The dreamers, right? We're really the first kind of social media oriented young activists, meaning they were the ones who started going into those offices of the senators and the congressmen and the congresswomen saying, wait a second, you're not just going to like, what about my parents”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And to me, which therefore means what? It means legality has always been about power. It has always been about who gets to define that for whom. And so, of course, I applaud all of these organizations. It's not just Mark, it's Michael Bloomberg. It's like all these tech people who are like, let's just pass immigration reform and this will solve itself. I would certainly hope that the Trump era is showing them that passing a bill and passing a law is not enough. No, right? We have in this country right now. We have 43 million immigrants in this country, 11 million of whom are here undocumented, right? 43 million. According to Pew, in the next 50 years, 88% of the total U.S. population growth is going to come from those 43 million people.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Or, like, you know, I had this young man from San Juan Puerto Rico a few months ago when I was writing the book. He emailed me and said, hey, I know that you're not a citizen, Jose, but I'm a citizen. I'm Puerto Rican, but it doesn't mean everything, man. Look at how they're treating us”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I'll never forget. I did this event in North Carolina and this elderly black woman came to the event. I guess she saw me on PBS or something. And so she brought this old piece of paper and then she afterward the event she came over to me and she said, Mr. Vargas, I'm not an immigrant. My ancestors were brought here, right? Slavery. And then she opened a piece of paper. It was a bill of sale. I'd never seen one before. And you know, she said to me, she goes, can you connect the piece of paper that my great, great grandmother got to the pieces of papers that you and your people can't seem to get?”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That's because what President Clinton signed into law. We have met at the Fine Americans so many husbands and wives. Wives were married to Mexican immigrants who have crossed the border more than twice, so therefore they're banned for life. So even though they're married, they can't adjust their status. So, meaning this has been from a policy standpoint, from Clinton to Bush to Obama to Trump. So Trump is the manifestation of all of these policies that have really made no sense at all. Right.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I've been trying, but when the Obama, when Obama was still in office, but this has been a bipartisan mess. Let me explain something really, really important here. So in the mid-90s, when we were doing, when Bill Clinton was fighting the war against welfare, right, was the same time we started fighting the war against quote unquote illegals. So around that time in the mid-90s, he signed immigration bills. So for example, if I were to leave this country, I would face this called a 10-year bar.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The crime. I've already broken those laws that I wasn't supposed to break in terms of employment and fraud. And that's the other thing, by the way, is to telling people that being here illegally is actually, it's not a crime, right? It's a misdemeanor offense. But we are so used to tying criminality with this issue. Right. Which is why I remember when I got, you know, in the book, I ended up talking about what it was like to be detained in Texas. And I just never forget sitting in the cement floor of this jail cell looking at these boys from Central America and thinking this is how morbidally corrupt we are. Like we actually think these kids are illegal.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It was time. And then two years later, Will and Grace, the number one show on television. I mean, to me, the word that GLAD has done, right, is like, how do you change this issue that is so, I mean, I remember back then in 2004, 2003, when, you know, gay marriage was still quote unquote, just a political issue. It wasn't a cultural conversation. So when I came out, I started this organization called Define American. And the whole goal is, how do we humanize this thing and make it actually about people? Right.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“He said nothing. They said nothing was going to do it. It doesn't work. And for me, though, from the very beginning, it was like, how do we kind of change the way we talk about this issue? You know, I mean, I remember when I was in high school, Ellen Degeneris on the cover of Time Magazine was like, yeah, that cover was like a big deal. And I think two years.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Over the wall, and but here's what I find really ironic about this the DACA solution or the Dream Act solution is supposed to be quote unquote the most palatable thing, right? Like, I mean, the narrative was these are our kids. They went to school here. If we can't even forget what to do with them, how are we going to address their parents?”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Explain the Dream Act. So the Dream Act was introduced in 2001. Actually, the first hearing was supposed to be in September 11th, 2001, and they canceled it, of course, COVID 9 11. And it was supposed to give permanent legal status to people like me who were brought here as children. Right. Right, and it was a bipartisan bill, Orin Hatch, and the senator from Illinois and blacking out in his name. It's going to come to me pretty soon. That was introduced and it never went anywhere. Like right now, there's no Dream Act, right? Since 2001, this has been introduced. And right now we have this thing called DACA, right? Which is what President Obama did in 2012. By executive order, which is temporary. I have probably heard from what”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Most we didn't Well, I mean, there were so many different options in terms of if I left, right? Because I think a lot of lawyers were just thinking, why don't you just leave and you can just like, you know, come out when you're in the Philippines. You can do a book. Clearly, I didn't do that. What about”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Migration status. The moment you do that, we can't help you. Because the moment I do it, I actually admit to everything I did, commit fraud, break law, right? But again, as a journalist, if I'm not going to tell.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, gloss it over. And here I am asking Mark pretty hard questions about. Facebook and where I was going, and I couldn't even answer that simple question. And that was when I was like, okay, I have to stop. I have to stop. And then I started planning if I were to do this publicly. What would it mean legally? So as any good reporter, I spoke to like 20 lawyers and tried to figure out how much trouble I was in. And they're like, you're in a lot of trouble. And you're crazy. You should not think about divulging your.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We were taking a walk on California Avenue in Palo Alto, and he asked me where I was from. Which is a very simple question. I could have just said mountain view, which is true. But at that moment, Where I'm from is that I'm not supposed to tell you where I'm from, right? I'm supposed to just kind of.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, I can, but if I leave, there's no guarantee I'd be allowed back. So that's a question that I have to really consider. And I kind of bring that up in the book, right? I mean, I've been here 25 years. That's a long-ass time. Right.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“What does that tell you about class? Right, right. Now, mind you, if you were like a French woman and she wanted to go see Hamilton over the weekend, she could just buy a plane ticket and poof, she's in New York. And if she wanted, can overstay her visa. I can't tell you how many undocumented white people greet me at Starbucks.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Or I leave. I actually thought about that for a while. I thought, why not just, yeah. Because, you know, I haven't seen my mom since I left, right? So she can't even come here on a tourist visa. She's been denied three times now because she doesn't own property and she's not a college graduate.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Same thing. And then Noman caught me. And then, you know, for me, though, the biggest deadline was the driver's license, that Oregon license. So it was valid from 2003 till 2011. So it was like this ticking time, me knowing that, okay, this thing is expired. It's expiring, it's expiring. At the time I got at the Huffington Post, I was already like 29. So I knew that it was almost over. And then I had to make a decision.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Just taking the money. They're taking the money. So, again, let's be honest about all of this, right? So, again, I'm happy to pay the money, but can you not call us like we're insect off your backs? Can you like acknowledge the fact that we actually have families we have to support? Can you at least let us drive in our country?”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“No, I won't. I won't be getting any of that out. Right. Because you put it in. But think about it though for a second. So the IRS and the Social Security Administration know that this is happening So, are they talking to anybody else in the government?”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I was like, wait, how do they know that I'm right? I mean, they knew my address, and then they told me that I had paid 30,000 into the system. And I'm thinking, isn't the number not valid for work? So how do they?”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So that's why for me, part of my kind of coming out and talking about this is like, wait a second, if we're actually serious about knowing who's here, don't we really want to know? So why was I, you know, in the book, I ended up structuring the book kind of lying, passing, and hiding stages, right?”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Oh, no, no, no. They paid me like they would pay me. So I use my grandfather, ended up getting me a Social Security number that wasn't valid for employment. It says very clearly, not valid for employment. And then he took photocopies of it and the photocopied version is what I always gave employers. And they never checked.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Catch prop on 87 though in California, right? In the mid 90s was an attempt at that. That's right, but that failed. But yeah, so that's how. At that time, though, this was again late 90s, early 2000s, there was no other kind of services.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Oh, it was a municipation card and a birth certificate. Because, you know, in this country, public schools is actually the Supreme Court has decided that people like me can go to school and people don't ask questions. Although there are now some state measures that are trying to prevent that. Of course, in California, Prop 187”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“They just drive anyway. They just drive anywhere. They drive, even though they're not supposed to. They're detained before you know it's deported. Right. So, why would you think so? I'm like Or other things, other basic services. Explain how your grandparents got you into school then.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I mean, how do people get? I'm sorry, is there a subway system I ever ran this country that we don't know about? They just drive anyway, they just drive anyway. They drive, even though they're not supposed to. And by the way, that's how a lot of people ended up end up getting arrested and before they're detained before you know what they're reporting. Right. So why would you say for me when people talk to me about immigration reform, I'm like, can we talk about driver's licenses first or other things, other basic services? Just basic services that like how explain how your grandparents”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The superintendent's assistant all helped me get the license, meaning they actually sent letters to Portland, Oregon so I could have a proof of ID. Now mind you, now Oregon doesn't let people like me drive anymore. In 2014, Oregon made marijuana legal and it took away the right of undocumented people to drive.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Continued on, I just continued, and every step along the way, you know, including in the book, I actually ended up explaining how I got a driver's license because I would not have had a career in journalism if I didn't have a driver's license. And at that time, there were only two states that allowed us to drive. I don't know how this happened. You know, like a journalist, I research every state's requirement. It was Oregon and Tennessee.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“They all were not a solution. But you know what was interesting there though? I was lucky that I grew up south of San Francisco and all of those t-shirts and administrators were so welcoming of my being gay because I ended up actually coming out as gay in high school because I couldn't be in two closets at once. I had to get out of one of them. So I figured get out of the gay one. You're out of all of them.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“More because of H The media has no idea how this works. So your grandparents didn't do anything at the time because they weren't trust the system. Nobody in the schools could do something. So people increasingly found out, but nobody had a solution for you.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Grandparents, it's not close enough of a relationship for a grandfather or grandmother to petition. And to this day, as a journalist who happens to be undocumented, the number one question people ask me from Bill Marsh everywhere is why don't you just go fix this thing? Like I'm supposed to like turn off a light switch and like poof. I'm an American stealing your welfare. But it's incredible though how much we talk about this issue and yet how little people know about the process.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Why not? And so then I told my principal that I'm not going to go to college. And then what are you talking about? And that's when I told her. And then she told that superintendent who then told the college counselor and then everybody tried to adopt me. Because they thought, let's just adopt this kid and we'll figure this out. Because, you know, this was in 2000. There was no dream app. There was nothing, right? And then their lawyers all told them he's too old.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You can't get financial aid. So I thought I'll just work, you know, at that time, I was ready to working at the Mountain Boice as a city hall reporter. I was making $10 an hour. Wow. So I figured that was pretty good. I went from like $25 an article to like $10 an hour.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I'm driving you and Matteo Camera. Get a driver's permit. So I told him, and you know, Arvin, Indian family, no, it was like, what do we do? I'm like, I don't know. So we didn't tell anybody. By the time my high school principal found out, I was already a senior and all of my teachers and the people who mentored me at Mountain View High School were wondering why I wasn't applying for college.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Because there wasn't one. But that's the thing, though. I didn't know that. So I was 16, right? I didn't tell anybody. I told the only person I told was Arvin Murthy, who was like my best friend from choir because he was always the one driving me. He was the one who said, get a freaking driver's permit.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And then I confronted my grandfather, of course, after I found this out, and then my grandfather said, Yes, you're not supposed to be here, right? And so that's how I found out. And then I guess his plan was I was going to marry, I was going to work under the table jobs, like his first plan was to flee market on Brayassa Road in San Jose. That was the first thing because his brother, his brother, worked there as a janitor and he thought he could get me a job there. And then he thought that I would just marry a woman who's a US citizen and poof.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That America was like The green card was fake. And then she said, Don't come back here again. You know, the moment she said that, the first thought in my head was, I'm not Mexican. Because back then, even back then, when I was 16, everybody in the news, everybody said that this was about Mexican people. Since my name is so Hispanic, it's of Spanish colonialism. I thought maybe she thought it was Mexican. And so I said, no, no, no, no.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The reason was a better life was here. I mean, you know, Grandparents had been here since the mid 80s. US citizens, as they said A food server, my grandma at NASA, and then my grandfather was a security guard. It all kind of those. Bi So got here when I was 12. Everything was fine, you know, it was 1993 when I got here. Although I have to tell you though, I thought I was in the wrong country when I landed. America was like Baywatch and like Oprah.”
2018-11-24 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Recode Decode: Undocumented immigrants are people, not political props · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT