I Was a Refugee. Here's What I Know About Borders — and What We're Getting Wrong.

I remember the night a police officer came to our house.

I was a child. My mother needed help. We were refugees — Vietnamese, who came here legally and honorably, sponsored by a Catholic church in the Midwest, still learning the language, still learning how things worked here. We had nothing that would have made anyone feel obligated to show up for us. No connections. No power. No history in this country yet.

But he came. He stood at the door and he helped her. He saw a woman who needed protection and he gave it. That is all. That is everything.

I have never forgotten it. Not the uniform at the door. Not the feeling of watching someone choose to show up for my family. Not the quiet understanding, even as a little girl, that this country could be exactly what it claimed to be.

I grew up as the only person who looked like me in my community. That was hard in ways I still carry. But I was also loved. Accepted. Welcomed by people who looked nothing like me and treated me like I belonged. Public school gave me language and opportunity. My brother went on to serve in the reserves and then into law enforcement. My mother became a nurse. We were a working-class family who gave everything we had to a country that had opened its door to us.

That door — and the officer who stood in it — is why I believe in law enforcement. Why I believe in order. Why I believe in secure, lawful borders. And it is exactly why what I am watching right now breaks my heart.

THIS COUNTRY WAS BUILT BY IMMIGRANTS. THAT IS NOT A SENTIMENT. THAT IS HISTORY.

America has always been the shining city on the hill — the dream that people across the world have risked everything to reach. Not because of our geography or our natural resources. Because of our Constitution. Because of the promise that here, you are free to pursue your own happiness. That promise has drawn the hardest-working, most resilient, most determined people on earth to our shores for over two centuries. Immigrants are not a burden on this country. They are its story. They are the reason this country has never stopped growing.

Now I also hear the concern about our stretched resources and our nation's debt — and I take it seriously. People here at home are working hard, costs are rising, and it can feel like there is never enough to go around. That frustration is real and valid. Now some facts tell a different story than the narrative being pushed. Undocumented immigrants are actually NOT eligible for Social Security, Medicare, or food stamps. Emergency room care is the one lawful exception — and it should be. We do not let people die on our streets. Beyond that, did you know that immigrants are paying into systems they can never draw from? In 2022, undocumented workers paid $25.7 billion into Social Security and $6.4 billion into Medicare — programs they are prohibited by law from collecting. In 2023, undocumented households paid $89.8 billion in total taxes and held $299 billion in spending power that flows directly into our economy. Immigrants as a whole account for 18% of total US economic output — $2.1 trillion in 2024. They are not draining this country. They are helping hold it up.

None of this means open borders. None of this means looking the other way. I came here through a legal process. I believe in that process. Enforcing our immigration laws is the government's right and responsibility. I support secure, orderly, lawful borders. National security requires knowing who enters this country. Bad actors must be identified and removed. These are not controversial positions. They are common sense — and they are fully compatible with treating human beings with dignity.

What is not common sense — what is not lawful, and what is not American — is what we are watching unfold right now.

Over 170 US citizens were detained by ICE in 2025, most due to database errors and racial profiling. At least 38 US citizen protesters were arrested in Los Angeles for peacefully assembling. Two American citizens — Renee Good and Alex Pretti — were shot and killed by federal agents during immigration operations in Minneapolis. And rather than answer for any of this, the administration labeled protesters domestic terrorists, signed $25 million in surveillance contracts to monitor citizens who speak out, and had officials declare that even filming a federal agent constitutes violence. That is not border security. That is gaslighting. It is an insult to every American who understands what this country is supposed to stand for.

Protesting is not a radical act. It is an American act — as old as this republic. The Founders wrote the right to peaceful assembly into the Constitution because they had lived under a government that crushed dissent and never wanted that for us. The First Amendment does not have an asterisk. The Fourth Amendment does not have an asterisk. These are the rights my brother put on a uniform to protect. These are the rights law enforcement honored when they shielded my mother. These are the rights that make this country worth coming to — and worth staying to defend.

HERE IS WHAT I BELIEVE — AND WHAT I WILL WORK TO DELIVER.

I believe in secure, orderly, lawful immigration. That means a fully funded, fully staffed immigration court system that can actually process cases — because right now cases wait years, and that backlog is not justice for anyone. It means technology and personnel at ports of entry. It means working with countries of origin to address the root causes that push people to leave in the first place.

I will also say something that needs to be said plainly: those who have arrived unlawfully within the last four years should self-deport and have the genuine opportunity to get back in line — the right way, through the legal process this country has established. My family used that process. It must be respected. But it must also actually work. That means a fully funded immigration court system that processes cases in months, not years. A pathway that is real, not a decade-long trap designed to discourage rather than welcome.

I believe in a compassionate, functional pathway to citizenship for people who have been here for years — those who have paid taxes, raised families, and built their lives here. Get in line, yes. But the line must lead somewhere. Waiting fifteen years for legal status is not a process. It is a broken promise.

And I believe that the Constitution applies to everyone on American soil — citizen and non-citizen alike. Not because it is politically convenient. Because that is what it says. Because that is what we are. Because the moment we decide that constitutional rights only apply to some people, we have begun to dismantle the thing that makes America worth defending.

My family came here through an open door held open by people of faith and goodwill — legally, honorably, through the process this country established. This country kept its promise to us. My brother served it in a uniform. My mother healed people in its hospitals. I am running to serve it in Congress.

The shining city on the hill is not a slogan. It is a standard. And right now, we are falling short of it.

Ballots arrive May 4th. I am asking you to help me hold this country to what it has always claimed to be.

With gratitude and conviction —
Nina Linh
Independent Candidate, CA-40