We started our “border trip” in Worthington, the county seat for Nobles County, which experienced the state’s largest increase in people of color between 2010 and 2020. Forty-three percent of the county’s population is now people of color, many of them immigrants from Mexico, Central America, several African nations, and Burma. When I visited Worthington for the first time in 2019, this diversity was apparent as I sat outside of the ILCM office when the school day ended at Worthington High School and a veritable United Nations of young people departed. 

During the trip this November, I was inspired by the work of so many immigrants in Worthington, including Joyce Bennett Alvarado, ILCM’s Worthington staff attorney, who assists immigrants and refugees on their pathway to citizenship every day; Mariana Gutierrez, the manager of the Our Lady of Guadalupe Free Clinic; and Andrea Duarte Alonso, a teacher in Worthington Public Schools and leader of the city’s cross-cultural committee. I was both heartbroken and uplifted as I listened to the stories shared at United at the Table—an effort to bring together diverse Worthingtonians to share a meal and their immigration stories. I was also more determined than ever to fix our broken immigration and social safety net systems after visiting our partners at Our Lady of Guadalupe Free Clinic—a clinic created by faith communities in Worthington to provide primary and specialty health care to the uninsured in Southern Minnesota, the vast majority of whom are undocumented immigrants.  

We then traveled to Austin, which is popularly known as “Spamtown USA,” and is also one of the most diverse cities in Minnesota.  Over 50 different languages are spoken in the Austin Public Schools, the most common being Spanish, Karen and Karenni (languages spoken in Burma), Anuak and Nuer (languages spoken in South Sudan and Ethiopia), and Pohnpeian (a language spoken in Micronesia). I dare say there are few cities in the nation that can boast such geographic diversity among the top languages in their district.

We heard many of these languages as we met with students and administrators at Riverland Community College and administrators at the Woodson Kindergarten Center. We also had the privilege of meeting with many of the immigrant and refugee leaders who are contributing to the richness of Austin, including our partners City Councilman Oballa Oballa, Riverland Community College’s Miguel Garate, Austin Public Schools’ Santino Deng, Mower County’s Nitaya Jandragholica, and United Way’s Karem Salas Ramirez. And it was a tremendous privilege to hear one of our former clients speak about how the assistance of our Supervising Attorney Sara Karki and Legal Assistant Maylary Apolo had made U.S. citizenship a reality for him. 

I am so grateful to have been able to return to Worthington and Austin and to have met with so many of the immigrants, refugees, and allies who are working to ensure that Southern Minnesota is a vibrant, prosperous, and welcoming home for all. And I am so proud that ILCM is a partner in these cities to ensure that immigrants and refugees can obtain lawful status and citizenship and be safe and secure in their ability to stay, participate, and prosper in the communities they are making home.  

With gratitude,