For the president to say “go back to your country,” it struck fear in me. It’s communicating the message of, “Hey, everyone, you can go ahead and do the same.” So I fear that when I walk out of my house, I might be called a racial slur or I might just be looked at different. I fear because I have children, and I’m wondering, what will be the future of my children? Are they going to have to go through the same thing that we’re going through right now? And it shouldn’t be— we shouldn’t have to fear where we live. Hearing that you don’t belong, hearing that you’re not from here or hearing that — “go back to your country” — changes the way I speak, has changed the way I speak. It has changed the way I act around other people. I have become very self-aware of my accent. I become very nervous when I speak around people. Because I don’t want to mispronounce something or say something wrong that they might use either as a joke after or they might just, you know, try to correct me. And then it also has changed the way I act around people because I don’t want to feel like I’m an outsider. So I have tried to adjust as best as I can, but you still hear it. Just because I don’t look white. I know I’m from Dominican Republic. I know that’s where I come from. But having to adjust here, it’s like you’re forgetting some parts of yourself and rearranging those parts to become this new person.