Hello dear friends and family,

Wow, what an honor it is having you all here to learn more about my wonderful family hailing from beautiful Nicaragua. Thank you for being here, for being a huge part of my life, and for considering helping my sister and the family that has given me so much over the last 14 years. (More on our long history together below).

Let’s show my sister what it means to be a part of our community of support. Let’s prove that this country is filled with more immigrant advocates than Desantis’ and Abbotts. Let’s help her get a strong start in this new life she’s earned for herself here in the U.S. 

While Kyla and I will ensure all basic needs are met with food and housing, it’s important that America (pictured on the left) sees a pathway to independence and autonomy over her American life. General donations are welcome and will go straight to her new bank account we started up. If you prefer your dollars go to something more specific, like immigration legal frees, just say so and we’ll redirect those dollars to a separate account!

More than the money, I want America to know how many people have her back and are part of her community. We’re the only people she knows here in the U.S., but not for long.

Love you all more than words. Thank you for being a part of one of the most amazing gifts and joys of my life.

Austin and Kyla

Longer version (shared with permission from my Nica family): 

My connection with Nicaragua can be traced back to my grandma, Ann Bright, who was a fervent advocate for Nicaragua throughout the US-funded civil war during the 1980s. She organized trips to DC, held protests in opposition to the brutal Contra squads (the paramilitary groups trained in Georgia before being released to commit atrocities back in Nica), and even lived and worked in rural Nicaraguan communities at the peak of civil unrest. She was and remains my role model for so many things in my life.

In 2009, after wrapping my work for the Obama campaign, I began feeling this tractor beam pull to get back to Central America, where I spent my spring semester of college back in 2007. After months of searching for a job opportunity in Nicaragua, I was selected to join forces with an amazing and emerging nonprofit, created by a group of 8 mothers on an archipelago of islands on the south end of Lake Nicaragua - a magical and mystical place called Solentiname. I worked and lived alongside the main director, Esperanza Rosales, who served in two functions: nonprofit leader and…my mom. Esperanza and her husband Luis took me in, fed me, patiently refined my Spanish, and showed me a love that truly looked and felt like the very specific brand of love I’d grown accustomed to in the Bright/Buchan household. 

Luis and Esperanza had six kids living under one roof (seven including me) as they worked more than full-time, splitting work life between launching a nonprofit to enhance the local education system and managing their crops (mostly bean, rice, and plantains). I fell in love with this family instantly, and that love and connection has endured since our introduction in 2009. Not a week has lapsed without connecting with at least one of my parents or siblings down there. 

Fast-forward a decade and nearly all of the six kids hold a bachelors degree from one of the best colleges in Nica, with Roxana - the oldest of the fam - serving as the first inspiration and trailblazer. My Nica siblings and parents are the exclusive reason I applied to College Forward in 2009, having demonstrated the power of a college education matched with the enduring resilience and spirit of students. 

While their individual accomplishments have been a showcase in human potential and endurance, the realities of Nicaragua - the second poorest country in the western hemisphere - have prevented my siblings from realizing the lives they’d worked so hard to build. 

About three months ago, I received a message in our family group chat notifying me that one of my younger sisters, Xochill América (pronounced soul-cheell), was seriously considering immigrating to the U.S. I knew what this meant, and so did they. A perilous voyage across several hostile borders; a potentially violent U.S. border and ICE experience; the likelihood of not seeing her own family for years; a potential undoing of everything she’d work toward in Nicaragua; and so much more. You’ve all read the headlines, and so had they. 

Xochill goes by América these days, but I only ever call her by the name her parents use: XOCHILL. She was only about seven years old when I was living with her and her family down in Solentiname, but I knew this kid was special from the day I met her. And I knew we’d be best buds quickly thereafter. Xochill had this goofy, offbeat, kinda sophisticated humor you typically don’t see outside of someone in their late 30s - someone who’s seen enough shit in their lives to refine their sense of humor into something a little edgy and dark but still grounded in optimism. I freakin’ loved this kid. She was a kindred spirit, a loving and empathetic tomboy, constantly in trouble, almost perpetually carrying an injury, and always, ALWAYS smiling. A real scamp, through and through. Watching her grow up during my year there and over the past 13 years since has brought me so much joy. It’s the type of love and privilege only oldest siblings get to enjoy in life. 

After a group family call in late September, América (Xochill, damnit!) made the final decision to move forward, with both eyes wide open to the risks and consequences. Esperanza and Luis lovingly but wistfully gave their blessing, and so began the process of safely getting América to America. 

The journey began in Managua on September 29th. We’d been told the entire trip would take anywhere between 10-20 days, depending on the number of setbacks she and her group of about 30 fellow travelers faced (one of whom, thank god, was her best friend and college roommate, Ali…more on her later). The plan was to make their way to the Eagle Pass border in Texas and surrender themselves to Border Patrol agents, claiming asylum - a legal process that would ideally increase her chances of being released legally into the U.S. 

One day at a time, paso a paso, they trekked by bus, foot, trailer, open-air truck, and boat from central Nicaragua to northern Mexico. You all know how the story ends (beautifully!) but we truly had no idea what the outcome would be, even with daily correspondence from América notifying us whenever she hit the next checkpoint. 

On the evening of Saturday, October 8th, I received a phone call from a Mexican area code. A choppy connection made it nearly impossible to hear who it was. Had she been detained? Deported back to Nica by Mexican officials? Something worse?

About 30 seconds into the choppy call, I made out a little voice on the other end. “Austiiiiin, es tu hermanitaaaa.” (If you’ve had the pleasure of meeting América, you know the exact voice and goofy cadence). She had just crossed the U.S.-Mexico border by way of inflatable boat and was awaiting Border Patrol to claim asylum, just as planned. Mid-sentence, having just said, “I can see someone coming,” the call dropped. I sent a flurry of desperate texts via WhatsApp, but none of them went through. 

Four days would go by with absolutely no correspondence. 

Once again, we feared the worst. It was hard not to let our minds wander. In my mind, América was and probably always will be that 7-year-old version of herself. Picturing her in peril, or hell, even a moderate level of discomfort, was enough to keep me up at night. 

Kyla and I made several calls to ICE and Border Patrol offices to see if we could learn anything at all about whether or not she was in their care (probably a better word to use there…). We got nothing. “Listen, man, we have 2,000 people here at this location alone. If she’s here, it’ll likely be a couple weeks until she’s processed.” Jesus Christ, a couple of weeks?!? 

We tried to fill our time as much as possible to take our minds off everything. And I know Esperanza and Luis were doing the same and feeling everything we were feeling with about a 100x multiplier. On October 11th, Kyla and I went to hit some tennis balls instead of staring at our bedroom wall. I was filling up my water bottle in the kitchen when I got another call from a Mexico area code. “Oh god,” I thought. My heart was in my throat, my eyes were already welling up. I knew two extremes were the only possibility - one blissful, the other heartbreaking. 

Once again, that little voice… 

“Austiiiiin es tu hermanita. Estoy libre hermano.” 

On the afternoon of October 11, 2022, my dear sister and friend had been released legally into the U.S. with only the clothes on her back and a ziplock bag with $20 given to her by ICE to buy a bus ticket north. At 4:00 a.m. October 12, I drove down to random bus stop on Airport Blvd where I found my dear, sweet sister and her best friend, Ali, waiting - exhausted, emotionally-drained, but still smiling. 

We cried and cried all the way back home. We FaceTimed Esperanza and cried some more. 

She’d made it.

[Two months later]

Xochill and Ali have now been living with us for a couple months. They are quite literally, but just shy of legally, part of our family. We’ve joked that we thought we were having one kid, but now have twins! Two perfect little sisters/kids living under one roof with their older siblings. 

It wasn’t until a couple weeks ago that I realized something pretty cool. América is now 22, the same age I was when I was living in the care of her and her family in Nicaragua. To have this chance to repay them in this small way has been a pure joy and mostly a selfish endeavor given how much I love this kid. She and Ali have brought so much life and energy and laughter to a house that was already filled to the brim with love. It makes me cry just thinking about it all. How have I gotten this lucky in life?! 

The past two months have been filled with World Cup parties, a little bit of clothes shopping, playing soccer ourselves on a family coed team, eating too much, gardening, work visa applications, Thanksgiving vacations with the Bright clan, a trip out to our Leakey cabin, more World Cup parties, family movie nights (mostly horror), at-home cooking, Ramen Tatsuya. And more World Cup parties. 

(I have to take quick second to gush about my partner, Kyla, who has been a part of this process exactly as if América were her own sister. A testament to both their personalities, they became best friends and siblings pretty much immediately, having only met one another a couple months ago. I’m beyond grateful for Kyla’s heart, her grace, and her willingness to open up our home to a family she’s never known). 

Just this past week, both Ali and América received a one-year extension on their visas, which enables them to apply for work visas. We’re starting that process now with the help of my other sister, Annie, who, more than conveniently, is an immigration attorney. (I’ve held off on sharing this story with you all until this extension was granted given the tenuous nature of their status).

Speaking of Annie, are you ready for this?! After having the chance to meet América over Thanksgiving, and having just started a new job in San Antonio with an immigration firm, she and her wonderful husband, Cory, are going to hire her as their live-in “au pair” to watch over their new baby, my nephew, Owen. Kyla and I still haven’t processed the idea of NOT having América here, but we’ll get over it! This is a perfect situation that I never could have imagined would fall into place. 

Our larger legal battle seeking permanent residency is just beginning, but we truly believe that life over the next year will look and feel….normal. And normal is exactly what they need and deserve after everything they went through to get here. 

The vitriol surrounding the immigrant experience  that occasionally rears its ugly head in this country is always disheartening, but the recent actions of some of our most heartless politicians have been particularly heinous and emotionally wearing given everything going on with my family. The idea of someone hearing this story and then deciding to trick them into getting on a plane with false promises of opportunity truly makes my stomach turn. I like to think that if people knew the stories behind these often nameless and faceless humans, we’d be in a different cultural place as a country. Re-read this entire story and replace “Xochill América” with “Annie or Brantly or Jackson or Max or Roo” and tell me how you’d react. It is no different. Xochill’s decision to leave her family and her country that she loved to her core was the hardest decision she’ll likely ever make in her life. She risked it all to be here, including her life itself. To acknowledge that fact and have anything but an extreme empathetic response is beyond me.

But enough of the negative. I know you’re here because you care about me and the people I care about. This family changed my life and continues to change my life in too many ways to count. Your support, whether it’s monetary or just being an ally, means more to me than you’ll ever know. 

I love you all infinitely. 

¡Hasta la victoria siempre!

Austin and Kyla