MITCHELL — Three individuals with unique stories to tell about how they came to the United States shared their experiences with local residents on Monday night, concluding the Dakota Wesleyan University McGovern Center series on immigration and deportation.
The event, titled “Voices of Resilience: Immigrant Stories of Hope, Struggle and Triumph,” showcased a dual citizen, a U.S.-born citizen with parents from Mexico and an immigrant from El Salvador who recently earned his permanent resident card, commonly known as a green card, which allows him to live and work permanently in the U.S.
The event was held in front of about 40 people at the DWU School of Business, Innovation and Leadership. Joel Allen, who is the director of the McGovern Center for Leadership and Public Service, cited the facility’s namesake in opening the conversation.
“To shut the door on immigrants is to shut the door on America itself,” George McGovern said, as cited by Allen. “Our nation has always drawn strength from the courage and dreams of those who come here seeking freedom and opportunity.”
In the case of Nicolas Reinhard, it was the pursuit of both soccer and education that brought him from Germany to the U.S. He came to the U.S. in 2015 to play soccer at Trevecca Nazarene University, which is located in Nashville, Tennessee. After college, he earned an optional practical training temporary work permit to be able to work in the U.S. for an additional year. That led to a soccer coaching job at a university, which was able to sponsor another work permit and he ended up meeting a woman who would become his wife in 2020. His marriage changed his visa status, good for three years before you get a 10-year green card.
“The first three years is kind of like, from the government perspective, it's a trial of, don't just get married to get married,” Reinhard said. “You've got to still be together after three years.”
Reinhard said he was the first person from his family to do something like he’s done, moving halfway across the world at age 17. He said he believes it’s made his relationship with his family in Germany stronger, because of the fewer chances to spend time together or speak with each other.
“I think distance does something really beautiful to relationships because you choose your words more carefully when you get the chance to talk,” he said. “It's been amazing.
Reinhard came to Mitchell in 2022, when he was hired as the DWU women’s soccer coach. He’s spent the last two seasons coaching the Tigers’ men’s soccer program. His experience is helpful with many of his players, considering a dozen of his players on the Tiger roster are from foreign countries.
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He said resilience — the word in the title of Monday’s presentation — was applicable in his experience.
“There is some sort of resilience in terms of having to be patient. I could go down the road of saying, it was crazy what they did. They took eight vials of blood from me, they made me pay so much money and have to wait to work. But everything had a reason. It was resilience in patience.”
Finding community
Esther Garcia was born in the U.S. but her parents came from Mexico illegally. She was born in 1988 and her parents gained their citizenship in the early 1990s. She said the motivating factors for her parents remain true for many coming to the U.S., seeking to get out of poverty and to have a better life.
“The little towns, that’s where the poverty is. That’s where the illegal actions happen,” she said. “People blame Mexico because of drugs or cocaine or this and that. Mexico can’t even produce that kind of drugs. It comes from farther down south. … We are all Hispanic but we are not all Mexicans.”
Garcia provided an example of that racial profiling in an unusual way. She said she was working her part-time job at the McGovern Library at DWU when a man alleged she was a Native American, asking her what tribe she was from. When she told the man she was a Mexican-American, the man wanted to debate her about Mexico.
“I’m like, ‘Do you want to just argue with me about stuff?’ she said. “Because I don’t have nothing to tell you. Just because of my skin color, he was already putting a label on me.”
“I’m an American because I was born here. And then my entire family is from Mexico, and that’s a big part of who I am too,” she added.
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Garcia said she’s been proud of being the first generation of her family to be a college student. She lived in Kansas for a while, but eventually followed her sister to Mitchell, somewhere that’s become home.
Garcia has three children, and she said she’s previously considered moving from Mitchell, trying to give her kids the best possible opportunities.
“I’ve always loved the environment, I’ve loved the people. I’ve loved how the community is and how helpful it is,” she said. “But now my kids tell me they don’t want to leave. … They love it here.”
A long wait for a better life
Alexander Barahona had the most harrowing story to tell. Alex, as he’s known for short, captivated the audience with his retelling of what it was like to live in a country dominated by gangs, saying that by the time he was approaching his 18th birthday, local gangs wanted him to join up. If you don’t, he said, you risk being killed.
A devout Christian, Barahona said he didn’t want to join and the gang gave him 24 hours to make a decision. At that time, his mother told him to leave and loaned him the money to escape. During his pathward north, he was a victim of a kidnapping for more than three months before he finally got free and into the U.S.
He lived in Emporia, Kansas for years, working for a restaurant as a dishwasher for $5 an hour, without a car, and without a winter coat. For much of that time, he said he had to send that money back home to help pay his mother for loaning the money to get him out of the country.
But it was in Kansas that he met his eventual wife, and Barahona recalled having to tell her that he was in the country illegally.
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“I was 100% (feeling) that she would leave,” Barahona said. “And I explained it to her and she said, ‘OK, I don’t care as long as you’re a good person.’”
The marriage just a few months later gave Barahona a path to permanent residency but it would be a long wait to see that through. At the time, he expected a 15-month wait and a cost of $10,000. It ended up being six years and nearly $20,000 in expenses before his green card came through.
In that period, without an ID or Social Security number, there was a lot he couldn’t do, such as drive legally or hold an outside job. His focus was frequently on taking care of his children.
“It’s something that feels impossible,” he said. “And it’s something that some people don’t understand, because they have never been at that point.”
Barahona has now been in the United States for 12 years and in Mitchell for about five years. He told about how fearful he was when he was yelled at in a Mitchell park for speaking Spanish when he was on the phone with his mother, and an elderly woman told him to get out of this country.
Barahona said he finds a lot of peace in his life now that has permanent status. He recalled going to get his driver’s license and being surprised at how well he was treated.
“I was always ready for people to mistreat me, because I lived that way for a lot of years,” Barahona said. "And that became normal, when that happened often. But when I went for the driver's license, I came home very surprised, and I was like, ‘These people treat me with respect, they're so kind, they, I can't believe it. That was beautiful.”
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