Nancy Hernandez stood in front of the dome of the US Capitol holding up a sign exhorting “Immigration reform now!” Ms Hernandez, 22, had travelled from small-town Michigan to join thousands of others to urge lawmakers to overhaul the US’s immigration system.
“We need a pathway to citizenship,” says Ms Hernandez, a “dreamer” – the term for young people brought to the US illegally but who know no other home and who want to become American citizens. Her parents brought her and her two younger siblings to the US when she was nine years old, in search of a better life.
After finishing high school, Ms Hernandez could not work or get a driver’s licence, or even a library card, because she did not have the necessary identification. So she worked odd jobs and teetered on the brink of depression.