In times of fear, nonprofit shines light for ‘Dreamers’
FIEL provides aid, resources for local immigrant youth
Rumors again were swirling online that immigration agents were conducting raids in Houston.
Monica Treviño, who hosts an online Spanishlanguage radio show and runs a Facebook group for Latinas, turned to the only place she knew that could help: The advocacy group FIEL Houston, and its director, Cesar Espinosa. He dispelled the rumors in a Facebook live video, explaining what rights immigrants here illegally have.
It boasted more than 20,000 views.
With the nation embroiled once again in the divisive immigration debate, and the fate of socalled Dreamers — children brought illegally into the country — up in the air, Espinosa and his organization have become a go-to place for such immigrants in Houston.
It’s a grass-roots operation that serves a purpose with which many of those on one side of the immi-
gration debate might disagree. But President Donald Trump’s crackdown on these immigrants has left them with fewer places to turn, and FIEL has filled that vacuum.
“People see them as more like one of us,” Treviño said. “They’re not like somebody famous.”
The group pales in sophistication and fervor compared to similar outfits in Los Angeles and New York. But FIEL is arguably the largest and most vocal such immigrant-run local organization in Houston and the state. Despite its outsized role in immigration, Texas lacks strong advocacy on the issue.
The stories of Espinosa, a 32-year-old Dreamer whose parents brought him to the United States illegally from Mexico as a child, and FIEL reflect the larger national movement advocating for immigrant youth. Over the past decade, they have found a powerful political voice.
Congress once again is at an impasse over their future, with the Senate unable to agree last week on how to replace the temporary work permit program for young immigrants, known as the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA, that Trump rescinded in the fall.
But unlike previous immigration stalemates, there has never before been so many youth unafraid to speak out, in part due to the protections from deportation that Trump has put at risk.
“We’re no longer in the shadows,” said Julieta Garibay, Texas director and co-founder of United We Dream, the nation’s largest immigrant youth-led network. “We’re no longer a nonexisting factor.”
Today that advocacy has matured from a movement focused on youth to a larger drive for immigrant rights, a transformation mirrored in the growth of FIEL itself.
“Immigrant youth have said, ‘We’re not going to be your bargaining chips.’” Garibay said. “Politicians can’t just say, ‘We’ll give you papers,’ and then terrorize our parents.”
When immigration agents arrested Marcela Rivera’s husband in the parking lot of his southwest Houston apartment last month, the young mother didn’t know where to turn. She believed his arrest at dawn had been unjust: Carlos Gudiel Andres was loading tools into his truck when they demanded his identification, ran his name and discovered a deportation order from 2005. Though he had no other criminal record, they detained him.
Rivera called the Spanish TV station Telemundo, but no one returned her message. A friend suggested FIEL. Within hours, the organization announced a news conference. At the group’s southwest Houston office the next day, Espinosa was in a pressed blazer complete with findings from recent national studies on deportations. Volunteers held signs in the background.
This was not just another arrest destroying an American family, Espinosa said. This was the latest in a pattern of federal agents targeting Latino apartments and questioning whomever they encounter, he said, calling it a “fine line between enforcement and racial profiling.”
His suggestion of a systematic practice landed the story in media outlets across the country, and Espinosa made all of the local television newscasts, an occurrence that has now become as routine as his invitations to the White House and Congress. It’s a far cry from the 8-year-old who used to rush out at lunch so that he could scarf down his food before his classmates in Ohio mocked the Mexican delicacies his mother packed.
Espinosa was born in Mexico City, the son of a medical student and a musician, and his parents brought him and his two siblings to Houston when he was 6 .
They lived in an apartment in Montrose at a time when drive-by shootings made for cheap rent. His father played music at Cafe Adobe, a Tex-Mex restaurant in Memorial, then was hired as an entertainer for a restaurant chain in Ohio.
It wasn’t what the family imagined. The cold tore through their Texas clothes, and they were the only Latinos they knew in an unwelcoming state. They moved back to Houston after a year, and Espinosa tested into a gifted-and-talented program at Jane Long Academy, gaining admission to DeBakey High School for Health Professions, one of the city’s best schools.
That he lacked legal status was omnipresent in Espinosa’s life; he
couldn’t give blood or even get a student parking permit because he didn’t have a Social Security number. It fully sunk in when he was accepted into Brown, Cornell and Yale universities after receiving a near perfect SAT score.
At the time, private colleges didn’t offer scholarships for students here illegally, and they still don’t qualify for federal financial aid. Dejected, Espinosa enrolled at Houston Community College and worked cash jobs replacing pool tables and parking cars for valet. He poured his heart into a side gig at the Central American Resource Center, a nonprofit serving Latino immigrants.
Immigration was again an explosive topic as then President George W. Bush tried unsuccessfully to pass reform. Immigrant youth like Espinosa who had lived practically their entire lives here began to coalesce and get angry.
Inspired in part by national leadership from groups such as United We Dream, Espinosa’s family began running a small advocacy group from their house in Houston, helping students without legal status apply for college financial aid. Counselors were turning away those without Social Security numbers, incorrectly telling them that they couldn’t enroll.
“At the time, there weren’t that many resources for undocumented youth,” Espinosa said.
One of the first Dreamers, the national activist Gaby Pacheco who later served as an immigrant liaison for former Harris County Sheriff Adrian Garcia, recalled that Espinosa always had an impressive business savvy for what amounted to a student organization.
“They have been able to build not only a name and a brand, but also trust in the community,” she said.
Espinosa registered FIEL, an acronym for the Spanish translation of Immigrant Families and Students in the Struggle, as a nonprofit in 2011. But when Rose Escobar turned to them for help that year, they were still very much learning by doing. Immigration agents had detained her husband, who lost his legal status as a teen in a paperwork mixup. She was desperate but alarmed by their youth.
“I know I look young. But I got this,” Espinosa told her. “You’re the second case we’ve taken, and we’re not going to let you down. You can’t be scared. You have to speak up.”
Espinosa launched a media campaign and appealed to politicians in Washington. A few months later, President Barack Obama’s administration released Jose Escobar on a temporary order of supervision, meaning he could stay as long as he checked in with immigration officials.
“They have been able to build not only a name and a brand, but also trust in the community.” Gaby Pacheco, activist
By 2012, activists had focused their energy on Obama, whom they called “deporter in chief.” Espinosa was one of about 30 invited to the White House by Cecilia Muñoz, director of the president’s Domestic Policy Council. Obama assured them that he was going to act.
One month later, in June, the president unveiled the DACA program that Congress now is struggling to replace. Under it, about 700,000 young immigrants with no criminal records and high school diplomas qualified for temporary work permits. Republicans assailed it as an executive overreach, and Trump later campaigned on ending it.
Polls show most Americans support some way for such youth to remain.
At the time, Maria Sosa was a senior at Alvin High School. She and her parents, who came here illegally from Mexico two decades ago, arrived at FIEL’s office at 9 p.m. the night before DACA applications could be submitted. They waited outside so that she could be first in line.
“My husband was very nervous,” Maria’s mother, Leticia, said. “Even the (Mexican) Consulate told us, ‘Why are you in such a hurry to do this? You’re just giving the government your daughter’s information so that they can deport her.’”
But the Sosas trusted Espinosa. Like them, he was here illegally. He was applying for the permit. He wouldn’t deceive them.
DACA’s transformed Espinosa and FIEL into the face of Houston’s undocumented community. For weeks, youth lined up outside its strip mall office, sandwiched between an Indian bazaar and a lingerie shop.
“It was chaos,” Espinosa said. “We weren’t really expecting that amount.”
His stature grew. He began meeting with lawmakers in Austin and Washington. The more immigrants FIEL helped, the more joined its circle of volunteers. Today the group has about 50 who regularly help. Espinosa depends on them, because he is one of only four fulltime employees, including Sosa, who married his brother.
The budget is small, consisting of donations, membership fees and nominal charges for services they offer like helping on DACA applications. They rely on a group of attorneys who do free consultations at their office each week.
One, Raed Gonzalez, said he appreciates their work, in part because they don’t try to give legal advice. He said some wellmeaning immigrant advocates often end up offering wrong counsel.
“What I like about FIEL, and why we support them, is they know their limitations,” Gonzalez said. “They know they can help families with filling out documents, how to prepare for arrests, knowing your rights.”
The group still seems rough-and-tumble, especially when compared to similar efforts in more liberal states. They have, for instance, allowed their tax-exempt status to lapse by forgetting to file the 990 tax return, though Espinosa said they are fixing it.
Two events last year cemented FIEL’s standing in Houston. Trump’s election spurred hysterical online reports of raids nearly every day. FIEL volunteers showed up at the locations, transmitting on Facebook to dispel the rumors.
“We became a beacon of information,” Espinosa said. “People are afraid, but they identify with us.”
Then came Hurricane Harvey. Volunteers trudged through shelters and Hispanic neighborhoods. They urged those without legal status to seek help, promising that federal agents would not arrest them. They gathered donations for immigrants who otherwise didn’t qualify for aid. They publicized apartments where management didn’t make required repairs.
Espinosa thinks the group’s greatest contribution is its advocacy in schools. He recently presided over a financial aid session at Westside High School. Juana Pineda, a senior with DACA, said she is her family’s first to go to college.
“I don’t really know how this whole thing works,” she said. “I’m just going to go to FIEL every year.”