Steve Jobs’s Widow Launches Site To Help Immigrant Kids Find A Path To Naturalization

By

Laurene-powell-stevejobs
Steve Jobs's widow, Laurene Powell Jobs.

The debate over illegal immigration isn’t just about adults hopping the border. Oftentimes, children are caught in the middle: kids who were brought to the United States illegally when they were young, and who are now facing being deported as adults, having never known any other country besides America?

Steve Jobs’s widow, Laurene Powell Jobs, is now trying to put a face on this side of the immigration debate. To help her promotion of the Dream Act, she has launched a new website called The Dream Is Now.

The Dream Act is an act that many people have been trying to get passed since 2001, but has yet to make it through Congress. According to the provisions of the act, it would let immigrants younger than thirty years old earn legal residence as long as they were brought to the country when they were under fifteen and have lived in America for longer than five years.

The Dream Is Now is a website in pursuit of making that act a reality. The idea is simple: a place for the kind of kids whom the Dream Act would help to share their stories. These kids, called DREAMers, can submit videos in which they describe their lives and why they want to stay in America, which other people can view.

Screen Shot 2013-01-22 at 4.25.07 PM
The Dream Is Now.

The site was launched by Laurene Powell Jobs in partnership with filmmaker Davis Guggeninheim, who directed Jobs’ family friend Al Gore’s documentary on climate change, An Inconvenient Truth.

“The documentary becomes a living, breathing petition,” Guggenheim told Yahoo News. “These DREAMers are putting everything on the line. When they come out like this, they are saying, ‘I’m ready to risk it all for what I believe.’”

As for Powell Jobs, she powerfully explains the need for such an act in a way that Steve would approve of: with simplicity.

“They’re our children’s friends. They are people we know. This is a huge national problem that needs resolution,” Powell Jobs said.

 

A few years back, I listened to an episode of This American Life with a segment called Just One Thing Missing about a girl who had lived in the United States since she was a very small child, was impossibly smart and hard working, and who had literally no way to get a legal job. The Dream Act was her only hope, and it’s always stuck with me.

No matter how you feel about the immigration debate, check out The Dream Is Now and listen to some of these people talk about themselves. The lives of people smarter, harder working and more passionate about what America represents than most of us will ever be are at stake.

Via: Yahoo! News

Newsletters

Daily round-ups or a weekly refresher, straight from Cult of Mac to your inbox.

  • The Weekender

    The week's best Apple news, reviews and how-tos from Cult of Mac, every Saturday morning. Our readers say: "Thank you guys for always posting cool stuff" -- Vaughn Nevins. "Very informative" -- Kenly Xavier.