PHOENIX (AP) — Jocelyn Ruiz remembers when her fifth-grade teacher warned the class about large-scale patrols that would target immigrants in Arizona’s largest metropolitan area. She asked her mom about it — and unearthed a family secret.
Ruiz’s mother had entered the United States illegally, leaving Mexico a decade earlier in search of a better life.
Ruiz, who was born in California and raised in the Phoenix area, was overcome by worry at the time that her mother could be deported at any moment, despite having no criminal history. Ruiz, her two younger siblings and her parents quietly persevered, never discussing their mixed immigration status. They lived “as Americans,” she said.
More than 22 million people live in a U.S. household where at least one occupant is in the country without authorization, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of 2022 Census data. That represents nearly 5% of households across the U.S. and 5.5% in Arizona, a battleground state where the Latino vote could be key.