<div>All funds go to Alberto Castañeda Mondragón. Recent news coverage <a href="https://people.com/immigrant-says-ice-agents-beat-him-up-agency-claims-he-ran-into-brick-wall-11902133" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">here</a>, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/immigration-enforcement-minneapolis-hospital-ice-beating-assault-4e77742e0629fc7f127c0aa38b3d2a70" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">here</a> and <a href="https://apnews.com/article/immigration-enforcement-minneapolis-hospital-ice-beating-assault-529f0a080d5de5c35382c540d1c2124e" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">here</a>.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>Below is a translation of his own writing.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div><strong><em>I don’t mind suffering myself if I see them smiling and well.</em></strong>
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>My name is Alberto Castañeda Mondragón. I am asking for your help to pay for my medical bills and short-term expenses so that I can return to work and support my family. I entered the United States legally with a work visa and have worked ever since. I never had any issues with law enforcement, until last month, when ICE crushed my skull.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>Ever since, I have lost many memories, precious ones that my daughter, my parents, my brother, my sisters and my friends have had to remind me of, and also painful ones like the injury itself. I don't know why ICE did this to me. They did not detain me after the hospital, I am not a criminal, and the doctors say they were untruthful about how the injuries occurred. But I prefer not to fight, I only want to recover, pay my bills, and go back to work.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>The Associated Press has written stories that you can read with more details about what happened, but here is my story about who I am.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>Life gives you great places to enjoy life, like the place where you were born, where you lived your life, where you’ve experienced good moments and low ones, but always searching for a better future. Tlapacoyan, Veracruz — a city with great tourism, a major producer of oranges and bananas.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>Going back to my childhood, I am the 3rd of 4 siblings. The oldest are my two sisters, then me, and last a brother. I only finished secondary school and went to work in the fields with my father. My sisters, being older, led more peaceful lives. My younger brother finished school. <strong>I preferred to work with my dad.</strong> He would give me good scoldings sometimes for not keeping the production of dominico bananas in order.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div><strong>I learned from every word of his</strong>, and always fair at work — just as there were scoldings, there were also phrases of joy for seeing my improvement and the growth in my homeland.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>My mother, a person whose advice and words changed my life. Days when, exhausted from work, I didn’t want to go to the fields — she would say, “Don’t you want a more peaceful life as an older adult than what you work now? But when you get married, thanks to fighting as a young man, you’ll have something more, and your family and you will be more at peace.”
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>My life is filled with much good advice, but above all, lessons. <strong>Respect before everyone. Lessons from people who sometimes want to humiliate you — it’s better to ignore them and show what you’re worth.</strong>
</div>
<div>This brings into your life the best of everything — a daughter who makes it worthwhile to give her honesty, responsibility, and humility in life.
</div>
<div>A better economic life, but that sometimes makes us travel far from them, to take distance to another country for a better life for your parents.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>Due to an illness my father had, which was quite serious, and a big downturn in the fields where the prices of products had fallen, I had to look for another way to move forward.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>Without fear of fighting in whatever job, wherever it may be — a friend supported me with the suggestion of being able to go to the United States. <strong>Without a doubt, inside, this makes your life shake and feel pain, but you also feel that if you don’t fight for something, what he fought for you, one day you’ll see it by your side.</strong>
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>Without a doubt, life gives you bad moments during a bad time — that’s what a person believes when saying goodbye to the people they love.
</div>
<div>It’s a long journey when leaving your town. The slow hours, the urge to cry, missing the people who hug you every day, who support you. <strong>Inside you carry that pain, but on the outside I try to smile, because showing I am weak has always made me think that there will be people who will try to take advantage of you.</strong>
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>Arriving to work in a new city, an unimaginable job, traveling from city to city each week, and unfortunately the little communication with your family makes your life tremble for a second, but noticing when you can that they are already doing better makes you smile.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div><strong>And I don’t mind suffering myself if I see them smiling and well.</strong>
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>As the months passed, I arrived in the city of Baker, Minnesota with the company, and on opening day my neighbor from the ranch showed up — someone who had left the town years ago. He came as just another customer to my job. He wanted to talk with me; because of my work, he waited until closing time.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>A conversation about how I was doing, whether my job was hard, led to another topic — for example, my salary, which unfortunately was very low. He proposed that I leave there and go work with him. What I earned in a week, he earned in a day. Maybe people will say he no longer wanted to return to his town, that’s why he left that company.
</div>
<div>That’s not how it was. <strong>That split my life in two, but only that way was I able to help my father get ahead faster.</strong>
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>Life perhaps turns around on its own, and indeed that does happen — you don’t let it destroy you even if you’re missing at least a “how are you” from the person who is important in your life.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>Time and courage achieved that in my new job, despite being new, I became one of the best. <strong>The construction of a house in my town, a better life for my daughter — being my pride, at her 10 years she has shown it.</strong>
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>Notes for GoFundMe compliance
</div>
<ul>
<li>My full name is Andy Dreyfuss. I am working with Feliza (the co-organizer here) to provide emergency humanitarian support to families around the twin cities impacted by Operation Metro Surge.
</li>
<li>We were connected to Alberto through Jack Brook from the AP and have been supporting his humanitarian needs, including short-term living expenses.
</li>
<li>We are working to add Alberto as a co-organizer, delay is due to technical issues. We had hoped to wait to publish this but Jack@AP was ready to publish his article before we were ready. So we rushed because we wanted to make sure his article said “has a GoFundMe” in it instead of “has a GoFundMe planned”
</li>
<li>The funds are for covering medical care and living expenses until he can begin working again. Alberto has significant issues due to the documented injuries but we are hopeful that $100k should cover his needs. The head injuries may prevent certain kinds of work, but he is very skilled both physically and mentally, as you can see from his writing.
</li>
</ul>

William Linsley

Anonymous

Luca Carboni

Garrett Mumma

Anthony Pagano

Ian Gunsolus

Amanda Urban

Alberto Castañeda Mondragón

platform

Platform is iOS

Android

Adyen Google Pay Development Audience

$opt_dummy_attribute

English only

Deprecate Stripe Legacy

dyn_template_ids

Adyen V6 Bene Transfer & MyMoney Campaign Organizers - test01

Bene transfer V6 and AdyenV6MyMoney Campaign Organizers - production

OneTrust next-app audience

fundCountryCode

NextDoor Share Option Users

Fundraisers with Reactions feature capability

fundCurrencyCode

US + Non-charity COs Only

locale

fund country is US and user language is English

personId

comms-internal-person-ids

Enhanced Story Experience Users

Suggested Goal Experience Users

user language is English and fund country: US, AU, DK, FI, IE, NO, SE, CA, GB; 

Poster share - new funds eligible (newest 9/18)

Streaming widgets beta user

paymentProcessor

3DS payment method

user language is English and fundCountry: US, AU, DK, FI, IE, NO, SE, CA, GB; 

GoFundMe Employees

ipAddress

Mark Rieth IP Address

Version 9.2.0 and above

Fund is in English speaking country

desktop

Android v12.11.0 and above

Platform is Android

paymentMethodType

checkoutType

Payment method type group to be vaulted on success

admin pr kit prod

EUR Donation Upsell

Share Text generation Skip Fundraiser

(prod) new funds eligible for amp12 (UGC gallery)

fintrac_cad_idv_form_v2 audience

paymentProcessorAccountId

fallback mode accounts

proCampaignId

p2p legacy startfundraising page

AMP24 New Funds Only PROD (DO NOT MODIFY)

countryCode

charityId

UKCharities

Federated Search Internal Testing

route.pathname community

US Donation Upsell audience 

Auto Thanks Feature Audience

Supporter Comments Eligible Funds

International Only

fundId

braze fundraiser group 

Payment Identity Transfers ATO Risk Check (Targeted) - Production

Test campaigns

Fundraiser Saved Payment Method Rate Limit Bypass (Production)

leaderboard-partner-id-audience-givepanel

Version 9.2.1 and above

AUD Donation Upsell audience

fundraiserCountryCode is US/EN

Active Fundraiser - Smart Default Cadence

DAF Internal

Vault on success card payment method

Platform is iOS v11.0.0 and above

Desktop users

Person ids

United States (US) users

allow yuno fundraisers for test

Mexico country code

Posters INTL

NPO Profile Opted-In

iOS at or above 12.4.0

non-US recurring donors

Canada Campaign Owner Group

Fundraiser Without Meta Link

Scheduler payment tester gorup

charityCommunityId

Charities allow to be claimed unclaimed (PRD)

Canada (CA) users

currencyCode

UC Tipping v20250115 International

pymk_production_xplr_fe_team

Android at or above 12.2.0

Profile photo entry point audience

smart goals (fundraiser/manage) on test01

Activity Tracking v1 Beta Testing

writePath

Stream Notification

start gfm intl allowed locales

Platform is iOS v11.2.0 and above

unclaimed charities

prod_ach_audience

AI Chatbot Audience

amp13 only new funds (prod) (anyword auto)

UC Flow Enabled (Prod)

Payment Identity Beneficiary Verification - Production

shared notification bell audience

Custom users

ach frontend audience

Android v11.0.0 and above

Users Receiving Payments Paused Notifications

smart goals test01

Manage Coach - US English Organizers Only + new funds only

Team EGG - IP Address list

Fundraiser Without Instagram Deep Link

Native 11.4.0 and above

UC Tipping v20250107

Users Receiving Braze KYC Validation Failed

Native 11.3.0 and above

Influencer - Prod

ai_title_page

anyword

openai

control

manual_entry

userEmail

template_id

userId

fundUrl

isCharityCo

email

appVersion

shouldBucketIntoExperiment

partnerId

donationCadence

isActiveFundraiser

isPartner

isMobile

npoProfileOptIn

fundIsLinkedWithMeta

hasSessionDonation

isCampaignOwner

fundHasInstagramDeepLink

Native 11.4.0 and higher

New funds eligible - Video Sharing (PROD)

GB Donation Upsell audience 

Auto Thanks V3 Rollout Audience

Thank you V3 testing whitelist

isRecurringFriendly

Is Recurring Friendly

Excluded funds - Video Sharing

Logged In Users

CH Donation Upsell audience

Android v10.6.0 and above

userCurrencyCode

Localized Currency

v11.5.0 and above

testAudience

pathname

Survicate

appVersion is at or above 12.8.0

Non-charity fund

isChallengeFundraiser

challenge-fundraisers

Payment Identity Launch Verification - Production

New funds eligible - Posters v2

CAD Donation Upsell Audience

Braze Email Tester

NPO Profile Opted-Out

iOS App Version

hasKnownDonors

PYMK has donors

iOS v12.3.0 and above

Alberto Castañeda Mondragón

Still $21,784 to go. Help us build momentum.