Democratic candidate Catalina Cruz is now the first former Dreamer ever elected to the New York state Assembly and the third in office nationwide.

Cruz, 35, won Tuesday night in a race against incumbent Ari Espinal and Reform Party candidate Bobby Kalotee for New York's 39th Assembly District, which includes the neighborhoods of Jackson Heights, Corona and Elmhurst in Queens, a borough of New York City and one of the country's most diverse areas. "I never thought I would ever get to vote — let alone for myself," Cruz wrote on her Instagram account.

There are approximately 2.5 million migrant and seasonal farmworkers in this country. Rarely acknowledged, these hard workers do much of the strenuous labor to feed us. These workers are essential to our national agriculture sector, which is valued at more than $130 billion, and a food sector valued at more than one trillion dollars. They hand-pick our fruits and vegetables, muck out our dairy barns, and tend our orchards and vineyards.

As one of thirteen siblings in a family of migrant farmworkers, Bobby Herrera woke up at 5:00 a.m. to harvest the fields for onions, potatoes, and sugar beets. "Growing up, I thought it was normal for every kid to work ten hours a day, six days a week," Herrera told me. 

The National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals (NAHREP) is disappointed with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) decision to officially deny Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loans to Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients, provided in a letter to U.S. Representative Pete Aguilar (CA-31) on June 11, 2019. In the wake of this decision, NAHREP calls on Congress to swiftly pass the Homeownership for Dreamers Act. 

Marches are underway across cities in the U.S. to protest the Trump administration's immigration policies. Hundreds of thousands of protesters could attend more than 700 marches in cities from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C., and New York City. Dozens of progressive groups planned the "Families Belong Together" protests on Saturday including the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, Move On and the Women's March. They are demanding the Trump administration end family separations, end family detentions and reverse its "zero tolerance" policy.

Just a few hours drive from the tech mecca of Silicon Valley is another Valley, with the second highest rate of extreme poverty in the nation. Fresno, California — the Central Valley midpoint between San Francisco and Los Angeles — has a 42% concentrated poverty rate and has historically been viewed as a city of lack, despite its cultural richness with a bustling population of over 100 nationalities.

“Logos set the tone for an organization and have a significant impact on public perception” said NAHREP Co-Founder and CEO Gary Acosta. “Our original logo helped establish our brand in the market as an important housing advocate. As the organization evolved and further defined its role in housing and economic empowerment, our board felt it was time to modernize our logo in a manner that reflected our broader focus while maintaining a strong connection to our roots.”

If you’re making a salad to go along with your dinner tonight, you should probably thank the farmworkers in California’s Salinas Valley, who produce about two-thirds of the country’s lettuce and much of its strawberries, tomatoes, and broccoli. When they head home to meet their families this evening, many of them won’t have the space to cook their own meals: A long-standing housing crisis has likely pushed tens of thousands of farmworkers into cramped and dangerous living conditions without adequate access to kitchens and bathrooms, according to a housing survey released Thursday by the California Institute for Rural Studies (CIRS) and the California Coalition for Rural Housing.

Salinas’ annual Cesar Chavez march looks to take on a new meaning this year in light of the national debate over immigration policy and enforcement.

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The Salinas branch of the United Farm Workers of America hopes to draw hundreds of thousands to the city on April 8 for a "mega march" in the name of Cesar Chavez and against President Donald Trump, said Lauro Barajas, regional director for UFW.

If the children of immigrants somehow disappeared from the U.S., America would suddenly be in a serious science talent deficit.

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That’s the conclusion that can be drawn from a new report from the National Foundation for American Policy, a non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to public policy research on trade, immigration, and education.

LAS VEGAS — After a close race fueled by record outside spending, Catherine Cortez Masto, a Democrat, won the Nevada Senate contest on Tuesday to become the first Latina senator. She defeated Representative Joe Heck to fill the seat of Senator Harry Reid, the Democratic minority leader, who is retiring after three decades in the Senate.

The first few months of the new year offer a fresh start for most of us. The first quarter presents opportunities to get things accomplished as a mortgage originator that you didn’t get to last year, but vowed you would pursue in the year ahead.​ New opportunities are always a good thing, but we still have limited resources. The resources that are the most scarce are usually time, money and people. 

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With finite resources, we have to choose our activities, including business-development initiatives, wisely. What will be worth the investment of these resources for the best pay off in the long run? This question is important to answer before choosing where to focus your business-development activities in 2018. What business-development opportunity offers all of these factors? The answer: the minority homebuyer market. If your 2018 business strategy isn’t inclusive of diverse markets, you are missing a huge growth opportunity.