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Ivett Castillo hadn’t decided who she was going to vote for when producers from Spanish-language network Univision offered her a chance to ask Vice President Kamala Harris a question on national television. 

The economy was weighing heavily on the mind of this mother of five, but something else was troubling her more. Her mother had passed away just weeks earlier, and the searing pain of that loss was compounded by the feeling that she had died without the dignity she deserved. 

Castillo’s mother, Maria Dolores Figueroa, immigrated to the United States more than 40 years ago without legal authorization, making Las Vegas her new home. There, she raised four children and worked for decades as a housekeeper and nanny, essential work done by thousands of undocumented immigrants like Figueroa. Castillo said her mother lived and died in the shadows, suffering from breast cancer and diabetes without the regular health care she needed. She passed away at 67. 

“She worked her entire life here. She supported the economy, and there was no decent treatment for her,” Castillo said in an interview with The 19th. “I don’t understand how somebody could have to die without any dignity.” 

Figueroa was among the 11 million undocumented immigrants currently living in the United States, 70 percent of whom live in households with authorized immigrants or U.S. citizens. 

The impact of their immigrant status ripples out to their families and communities. Castillo, an American citizen, is an example of what the “sandwich generation” effect looks like for a growing number of middle-aged adults with undocumented parents. At the end of her mother’s life, she was juggling the care of her children, ages 5 to 23, and the care of her mother, without supports like Medicaid or Social Security. 

The fate of these undocumented immigrants and their families is a critical issue that the U.S. government needs to address, said Castillo, who is planning to cast a ballot in her home state of Nevada, a critical battleground where Latinx voters like herself make up a fifth of the electorate. When she stood before Harris on October 10, she wanted to know what Harris planned to do, if elected to the White House, to support immigrants like her mother who have lived and worked in the United States for most of their lives. 

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Figueroa immigrated to the United States alongside her husband and her eldest daughter, who was a toddler at the time. Her husband had arrived weeks earlier to prepare for the family’s move. Castillo recounted the family’s story: “It was really funny, because as soon as she saw my dad, she was like, ‘I have something to tell you.’ And he’s like, ‘I already know you’re pregnant. And it’s a girl.’” That girl was Castillo. 

She remembers growing up aware of her parents’ undocumented status, and their efforts to achieve legal permanent residency. Over the years, her mom worked with lawyers to petition the U.S. government unsuccessfully, and when Castillo was 15, her mom received a deportation notice. At that time, Figueroa had separated from her husband and was raising four children in Las Vegas who had no memories of her home country of Mexico. She decided they would stay.

The notice brought fear and disappointment to her mother’s life. Castillo says she watched her mom’s undocumented status weigh heavily on her, bringing on a level of sadness Castillo sometimes felt bordered on depression. She would go on to work for years to sustain her family.

“Everybody, everybody opened their doors to my mom. They loved her because she was very, very Mexican — a very detailed cleaner, a very good cook. She would never sit down. She was always doing laundry. She was always taking care of other people’s kids,” Castillo said. She remembers joining her mom during one her shifts as a nanny to two little girls, watching her juggle entertaining the girls and household chores. 

Castillo says Figueroa had lifelong struggles with her health but never consistent preventative care. She never had regular mammograms, for example, despite having had a lumpectomy in one of her breasts before immigrating.

As of June, only six states — California, Colorado, Illinois, New York, Oregon, and Washington, plus the District of Columbia — have state-funded health care coverage for lower-income adults regardless of immigration status. Illinois has stopped enrolling new immigrants to its program because of a lack of funding, and New York’s program only covers adults over the age of 65. 

The family relied on charity organizations for care on several occasions, which Castillo credits with helping extend her mother’s life. When doctors found another lump in her mom’s breast, a charity group was able to secure a hospital bed, surgeon and anesthesiologist to perform a mastectomy pro-bono. Later, when doctors discovered a mass in her uterus after another ER visit, her mom declined to seek treatment again and signed a do-not-resuscitate order. 

The family found pro-bono hospice care, and juggled other demands to cover gaps. Castillo said it simply wasn’t enough to give her mom a dignified end to her life. 

Figueroa passed away August 18.

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Castillo says she felt Harris’ held her mother’s story with compassion and humanity at the town hall. 

In response to Castillo’s question about Harris’ plans for longtime undocumented immigrants, Harris pointed to President Joe Biden’s 2021 proposal that would have created an eight-year path to citizenship for most of the 11 million undocumented immigrants in the country, blaming Republicans for its failure. She didn’t say whether she would pursue a similar policy.

Putting her hand to her chest, Castillo said that hearing about the legislation, which could have helped her mother achieve legal status, made her angry. “I got a little emotional. Could the outcome have been different? Could we have had more years?” 

Harris quickly moved on to criticizing former President Donald Trump and Republicans in Congress for tanking a border security bill earlier this year. Harris called it “one of the strongest border security bills we’ve had in decades, and it included 1,500 more border agents to go to the border.” The bill would have created a pathway to citizenship only for certain Afghan immigrants. The bill, which was negotiated by top Republicans in the Senate, failed after Trump urged congressional Republicans to reject it.

Trump has promised the “largest deportation in the history of our country,” using the military to detain and mass-deport undocumented immigrants. It’s not clear who exactly would be targeted and how they would be apprehended. Trump blames immigrants living in the United States without authorization for taking jobs away from U.S. citizens, pulling public school resources and housing away from American families, and “poisoning the blood of our country,” language linked to Nazi and white supremacist ideologies.

Ultimately, Castillo said Harris didn’t directly answer her question. “Her answer around policy — I don’t necessarily think that it addressed exactly the question,” Castillo said. Harris didn’t say how she would address the legal status of immigrants like Castillo’s mother, or even their health care needs. 

But Castillo said the humanity of Harris’ response, and her decision to approach Castillo after the town hall to grieve with her, changed her thinking on the race. Before, the rise in cost of living had her considering voting for Trump, thinking, “maybe what we need is a businessman.” She heard recently that Trump was spending time with Elon Musk, which piqued her interest. “As crazy as that sounds, I wouldn’t hate that. I wouldn’t hate a person that knows how to run million-dollar, billion-dollar companies, say, ‘Look, this is how you make all of the pieces come together.’” 

But standing inside the town hall, Harris’ reaction tapped into another side of her. 

“I had a change of heart from that situation. I thought, ‘What would have been Trump’s answer to that same question?’ It would have been something about, well, you know, illegals and, you know, rapists,” Castillo said. 

“What I respect more and appreciate more — I can put my hat in the ring for that person — is that humanistic side. … I trust people that are genuine. I trust people that care about people.”

Beyond speaking with the vice president, beyond appearing on national television, Castillo said the most striking part of her experience was the reaction she received.

Online, she saw several comments calling her an “anchor baby,” a term based on the myth that undocumented parents have children in the United States to achieve legal status. Like in Castillo’s case, it’s actually really difficult for these parents to ever achieve legal status. 

Her father and her mom’s brothers reached out to say they were proud of how she had represented their family. But more significantly, she said, was the reaction from people in her life who have undocumented family members, but had never shared so openly. 

“The best part has been coming back, and even here at work, I’ve been stopped by people who told me they’re in the same situation,” said Castillo, who works in a call center overseeing a team of about 100 people. 

“One of my supervisors, she was like, hey, I saw you on TV. Thank you for representing my parents. My parents also live in the shadows, and there’s nothing we can do about it,” she added. 

“And these are professionals. These are team supervisors. These are hard-working people that I see day in and day out. We’re Latinos. We don’t talk about stuff like that in public. We don’t talk about it with anybody.” 

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