S&B’s Exclusive Interview with Dream Walker Felipe Matos

On New Year’s Day, four noble student activists -Juan Rodriguez (20), Carlos Roa (22), Gaby Pacheco (24), and Felipe Matos (23) -began a 1,500-mile march, from Miami, Florida, to Washington, D.C., protesting the desperate need for comprehensive immigration reform and stronger rights for undocumented immigrants.

The walk has been dubbed “The Trail of Dreams,” and it’s scheduled to end up on the steps of the Capitol on May 1st.

The fact is, three of the walkers do not have legal resident status in the U.S. and face the very real risk of arrest, detention, and deportation. One of those three is Felipe Matos, who came here from Brazil when he was 14-years-old looking get an American education, but fell out of status when his tourist visa expired.

Matos ultimately attended Miami Dade College and not only served as Student Government Association president but was named to the USA Today‘s 2008 All-USA community college academic team.

The following is our exclusive interview with Mr. Matos:

Spar & Bernstein: Did all of the original Dream Walkers know each other before this walk?

Matos: We were all part of Students Working for Equal Rights (SWER). We had been working for this organization for several years and SWER leaders help with the logistics of the walk.

S&B: Who came up with the idea for the walk? And what was your first reaction to the idea?

Felipe Matos: (SWER) had already come to the consensus that we needed to do something very different after so many years toiling for change and not achieving anything.

On October of last year, we had an action outside Broward Transitional Center, a detention center in South Florida. Although it was very successful in terms of attendance, we had about 100 students; when we looked inside we saw construction, that is they were expanding it.

That’s when we realized that enough was enough.

Our daily struggle led us to feel hopeless to a system that did not even breathe. We couldn’t let ourselves to continue to live in fear.

Right after this episode, Juan Rodriguez came back from New York City from a conference where he had discussions about a walk that resemble the Underground Railroad to D.C. with an organizer from the Passie Foundation.

This was meant to be a walk where DREAMers would walk city by city being received by other DREAMers and allies to build solidarity and to give hope to each other. When he came back and he told us about the idea we were already at the edge of our seats. We all added new things to what it was going to become the “Trail of DREAMs” and this walk was birthed out of our need to tell the world that we are human beings.

S&B: What prompted you to make such a bold statement about immigration reform?

Matos: We need Just and Humane Immigration Reform now. We were tired of the empty promises and old tactics. This is when we decided to take upon ourselves to build a fearless youth-led movement and walk through the Deep South, which is an emerging immigrant community and yet full of an ugly history of racism and bigotry.

We helped to elect Obama, the four of us registered more than 1000 people with our peers from SWER. We worked so hard in 2008 because we believed in his promise of change and yet we found more despair after he got elected. We, as a community, need to hold him accountable to his promises.

S&B: Are you scared about getting arrested, detained, or deported?

Matos: We are not scared, but we understand the risks we are running very well. However, the present is unbearable. Down in Florida we don’t have in-state tuition, and we can’t get licenses nor jobs. Our futures were also uncertain due to the increase of deportations in Obama’s Administration.

Photo Credit: Palm Beach Post

Matos: In the beginning, I had a lot of blisters all over my feet. It was extremely painful. Later, it became clear that the pain and terror that we encountered time after time in every community we visited was enormously present. This made us realize that our physical pain cannot be compared with the pain of families been separated or young people that cannot realize their full potential and dreams.

S&B: What’s been the reaction from people who have seen you along the way? Has it been all positive? Or has there been some negative comments?

Matos: Ninety-five percent of the people were supportive of us. As matter of fact people feed and shelter everywhere we go. For instance, there were people along the route that were day laborers and didn’t have a job for several weeks and yet collected more than $80 for the walk. Nonetheless, we have encountered resistance. A few people told us to go back to Mexico even though none of us are from Mexican origin.

S&B: How many shoes do you have for this walk? And have you worn out any yet?

Matos: We only have one pair of shoes each due to our lack of financial resources. We wear lightweight hiking boots and none have worn out yet even though we have walked more than 500 miles already.

S&B: What has been the highlight of the walk?

Matos: There were so many beautiful moments, but just recently we went into a small town called Mayo in north Florida.

When we got there the community told us that the local police from a near by town, Live Oak, were neglecting hate crimes. We met with a man that needed five brain surgeries because of an attack right outside his home.

There was a lot of racial tension in that part of the state and the police couldn’t communicate effectively because they didn’t have people in the force that spoke Spanish. To address some of these issues we gave them a workshop about their rights and help to form a group that was going to continue fighting for improvement. We also met with the local sheriff and brought in the Department of Justice to minimize the racial tensions in the region.

S&B: What’s your gut feeling about comprehensive immigration reform happening in 2010? And have you heard anything from Obama or the administration about the walk?

Matos: This is going to be a difficult process, but we can’t achieve any change if we are not willing to fight. We sent a letter to Obama, but he has not responded anything yet.

S&B: If you could change the immigration laws, what would you change?

Matos: We have four principals for Just and Humane Immigration Reform.

1. Pathway to Citizenship: We want immigrants to become part of this beautiful society and help to elect those who represent our community. For too long our humanity has been based a nine digit number, a social security number, and it is about time that all of us can become a full person.

2. Worker’s Right: The current system uses people and then easily disposes of us through deportation independently from our contribution to society.

3. End of Separation Families: Our families have been separated in the middle of the night and that needs to stop now.

4. Access to Education: Our youth talents and dreams are being wasted because of our failed immigration system. We need to create opportunity for personal growth so our youth can be educated and help to rebuild our economy.

FYI: Our walk would not be possible without the help and support from our people and allies. If anyone would like to follow us they can text the word “trail” to 30644 or visit our website at www.trail2010.org.