My name is Sarah Brenes. I am the program director of the Refugee and Immigrant Program at The Advocates for Human Rights.

Rineke Dijkstra. That one I thought was really powerful… just to see over time and the- how she changed and the surroundings changed, and I think there was a photo with her and her baby. And working at an organization – we’ve been around for almost 40 years, and now continue to connect with clients who received asylum decades ago, and to see how they have woven themselves into the fabric of our community that really underlines the fact that process of seeking protection is just one chapter of a very long book of their lives. And so, I think that one resonated in terms of it’s not just this moment, it’s a longer-term process. 

So, our organization provides free legal services to asylum seekers who are, essentially, refugees who have not yet been legally recognized as such. And so, we work with individuals who … Most of whom have arrived in the United States within a year. And they’re starting the legal process to see if what’s happened to them and what they fear, or the reasons they fear going back to their country, fit within our laws to provide them with asylum protection. People who have come in at the border, they may have come in as students, they may have come in as visitors, and something in their life that already exists, maybe they were fleeing some sort of harm or there’s been some change in their country that makes it unsafe for them for them to go back.

And so, our organization helps people through this process of telling their story in a way that, hopefully, fit within the legal framework that’s been established here in the U.S. (based on both international law and our domestic laws) to determine whether or not we’ll offer that protection to them.