Immigrant Speaks About Immigration

Jose Perez is funny, charismatic and intelligent. He’s an immigrant whose native tongue is Spanish- but don’t think you can pull the wool over his eyes when speaking English around him- he can understand and lip read some English.

His Job is similar to that of a postal worker. He works through any kind of weather condition if he can help it – rain,sleet and snow. Every morning he arrives to work at 8am- where the competition is tough. In this business, you have to be willing to be aggressive -and the payoff: monetary gain. You see, Jose goes to work at a Day Labor site in Denton,Texas. He stands on the site with many others and waits for prospective employers to pull in and hire him for a project. Usually he gets hired for a day but sometimes employers will need him for ongoing projects. For Jose, this is life.

I spoke to Jose about his take on illegal immigration in the United States. This is what he had to say.

Translated By: Katrina Gutierrez, Maximo Contreras, Leonor Sotelo

 

Dallas Residents Voice Opinion

I went to the West End Marketplace in Downtown Dallas to discuss immigration with Dallas residents. These are the views of only several people- there are hundreds of opinions out there. I neither support or oppose these opinions.

I would like to mention some interesting things I came across while conducting these MOS (man-on-the-street) interviews. Those who were willing to talk to me were mostly of the younger demographic. Those who didn’t want to be on camera were mostly of the older demographic. There was also a handful of both the younger and older demographic who stated they had no opinion.

Studies done by the Cato Institute and the National Immigration Forum found that there is a split between views over whether or not people preferred less immigration (immigration in total- not just from the Latino community):

There is an interesting split in thought here, with the
greater voiced opposition apparently being based upon abstract
belief formed by the mass media, and the greater voiced support
coming from personal experience with immigrants

As for myself- this is what I was able to gather after spending the day in the West End Marketplace.