mayorkas, secretary of health and human services xavier becerra, the small business administrator isabel guzman and the secretary of education miguel cardona. plus emmy ruse, the drerk of political outreach. julie rodriguez, the director of intergovernmental affairs. it is an intimate look at the paths that brought them to the white house. from the classroom and the halls of congress to the fields of texas and the mountains of california. a number of firsts for the shared commitment they say to ensuring that they are not the last. welcome to "american voices: latinos inside the white house." ♪♪ the covid pandemic ravaged latino communities with latinos more than two times as likely as nonhispanic white americans to die of the virus. in many ways the pandemic exposed longstanding barriers to health care access. those challenges now fall to the xavier becerra, the secretary of health and human services. born in sacramento to mexican parents becerra's three decades of public service began in the california state assembly. in 1992 elected to the u.s. house of representatives. after more than two decades in senate, becerra was california's attorney general before joining the biden administration. the scope of his work is broad. touching on boosting vaccination rates, improving health care access and caring for migrant children. we talked about it all during our sitdown in his office in washington. when the story of you and your parents is told it very often captures them in two dimensions. they're immigrants, and they're workers. beyond that, who were they? >> alicia, first, i would say if that's how my parents are remembered i'll be very proud because immigrants in america have built this place. this country's great because of immigrants so if that's one of their titles i'll take it. workers, that really is the 360-degree of my mother and my father. all their life worked. and never had a lot. never got to see the fruits the way others do of putting in so much labor but they were workers. >> in what ways is health care personal for you? what are your personal experiences with health care that shape your approach to this work? >> so i go back to my memory which is now a memory that relates to health care but in those days it was a memory of watching my mother be taken away by my dad bleeding and what we find out later on in life is she had a hemorrhage. she miscarried. but all i knew was that we were told stay put. i think it was my aunt or uncle coming over to take care of us and my mom was whisked away to the hospital. good news, she came back. she's still alive today. even better news is son of immigrants, father with a sixth grade education, mother that didn't come to this country until she was 18 they had health insurance at a time when a lot of folks didn't and compared to today they did. so my dad was able to whisk her away to hospital. come back and we didn't go bankrupt as a result of having gone to the hospital. >> you are the first latino secretary of health and human services but your life is one of many firsts. firsts in your family to get a four-year degree. first latino chair of the ways and means committee. first latino california ag. i have to wonder if you are tired of being the first. >> i am happy when the title goes away because it's no longer a thing to have been the first because there are others who have followed. i was the first latino on the ways and means committee. there are now many who have been on the ways and means committee. i hope i'm not the last secretary of health and human services. >> the share of hispanic adults who say they received at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine reached 73% in september. that's an increase of 12 percentage points. according to the kaiser family foundation survey so that is the fastest increase of any demographic group in the united states. what do those numbers tell you? >> it's no accident that the number of latinos getting vaccinated is going up. the president was very clear. he wanted to see everyone get vaccinated regardless of your income, regardless of your zip code, regardless of your status. everyone. >> meaning immigration status? >> any kind of status. including immigration status. he has made it very clear everyone in america needs to be protected. >> you're up against a number of challenges when it comes -- these numbers are very promising, partly misinformation. we know spanish language speakers are targeted with specific disinformation efforts. we also know that access has been an issue. what do you see as the greatest challenge that remains before you when it comes to convincing latinos or making sure that latinos have access to the vaccine? >> i would say it's two things. one, convincing them that this is actually being done free and there's no gimmick. too many folks in our community have been ripped off. this is free. take it. and then they find out at the end it's not free. this is free and it's good. second is accessing them, going where they are instead of them having to come to us. president biden has been very clear. we're going to do everything we can to reach you where you are instead of making you come to us the government. as a result we have been able to reach folks. we don't just do vaccines anymore at hospitals or doctor's offices or even in pharmacies. we do them now in the community health clinics, through pop-up clinics, school sites. we do it with the mobile van. and we're going to where you are because too often it's tough for you with two jobs, the kids and your responsibilities otherwise to come to us. >> i also want to talk just a little bit about minors in immigration detention centers because there have been a number of whistle-blower reports, reports that kids wandy rodriguez burned with scolded water. kids with no clear underwear. allegations of sexual misconduct. what has accountability looked like in those instances? >> we investigate every reported allegation where a child may not have received the kind of service you would expect, but they are allegations and what i can tell you is after thousands of children coming into our care and custody i tip my hat to the work that's being done because it is not tough and all you have to do is think back less than a year ago to the memories or the news reports. children dying in government custody. children are not only surviving. they are getting vaccinated, they're getting health and mental support, we are placing them with responsible custodians. we're doing everything we can to make you and every human being feel proud that our government understands what it means to be a child. >> it begs a bigger systematic question which is in an immigration system that's fair, orderly and humane should children ever be kept in detention? >> that's the question i wish everyone would pose because you just touched -- you hit the cord on what the issue is. we have a broken immigration system that leaves in the hands of the department of health and human services the care of children. where in -- you have two kids. would you ever want to see your children outside of your arms? no. so we have a broken immigration system that has put us hhs in this position. >> i understand that part of your argument there is legislative. rests in the hands of congress. there are others who contend part of what you are talking about is a result of title 42. why use title 42 -- why apply title 42 uniquely to migrants seeking refuge and not to other people who intend to travel into this country? >> title 42 simply says the federal government can take action to protect the health of the american people and title 42 is there to make sure that we don't allow an infectious virus to come into the country and put the health of americans in danger. so title 42 is being used to make sure we are protecting those in the u.s. what it does say essentially for those trying to come into the u.s., we have a right to make sure that what we're doing is not putting the health of americans in jeopardy. the courts would -- the courts are ultimately going to dictate what we do but again title 42 is a provision that lets the federal government protect the health of the american people. >> when you have been a public servant as long as you have, when you have spent a large portion of your adult life shuttling back and forth from washington d.c. to california, how do you stay in touch with the communities and the very things it was that brought you to washington in the first place? >> it is not difficult to go back and see how life is for folks who aren't secretary of health and human services but at the end of the day for me what i think helps me most is that i learned -- i tell people the word -- you'll understand the word ganas. but i always tell people don't look it up in the dictionary because the definition never hits it on the mark. i always tell people guts, grit and game. that's ganas. so it helps to go home because you see ganas everywhere. when you see the farm workers getting up in the morning to pick the food you and i eat, the meatpackers working through the covid at a time when they weren't given the protection they needed you have to have ganas where you go in and may get infected, to go to work and someone may pick you up and deport you and never see your kids again. you have to have ganas if you're a dreamer and get the college degree. it is all over the place. it will drive this country. it has driven this country. it is a different word in english but it's still ganas. >> of note recently when asked about title 42 dr. fauci chief medical adviser to president biden said excelling -- expelling asylum seekers is not the solution and that immigrants are absolutely not driving the covid surge. ahead my conversation with white house staffers, how they're turning the life experiences into policy inside the biden administration. plus education secretary cardona's push for free two-year community college and my interview with the first latino secretary of homeland security. how the son of immigrants is now shaping america's immigration policy. we have a big hour ahead. you are watching "american voices: latinos inside the white house." someone else... i appreciate that liberty mutual knows everyone's unique. that's why they customize your car insurance, so you only pay for what you need. 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>> well, i kind of grew up over the place a little bit. i was born in delano, colorado. california. a small rural town, as well. mostly agriculture. grew up in the farm worker movement and as a union brat you move all over the place. >> emmy, your parents emigrated to the u.s. from mexico right before they started a family and you have said everything that i am is because of their example. what was that example? >> i think i look back and i see that we were poor but we never felt that way. my mom worked for many years, more than 30 years at the local levi's and on the weekend she would sew scrubs to go to the best doctors. you know? my dad was a laborer. he built his farm with my brothers from the ground up. they would kill themselves working so that we could have an education and maybe we wouldn't have to work as hard. but truly everything i am is thanks to them. >> julie, you come from a family of outside agitators and yet you have built a career playing an inside game. was that a conscious choice? >> it wasn't necessarily sort of a path that i anticipated and sort of set out early on. i think once, you know, i mentioned just, you know, being inspired by president obama who, you know, was the community organizer, and i saw just such an opportunity to frankly get on the inside and understand it better so that then i could be a better advocate on the outside. i was out at in virginia at an enrollment fair and an elderly woman with parkinson's was, you know, shaking and trembling and she had just signed up for health care for the first time and her premium ended up being something like $25 and just, you know, really affordable, and she comes up to myself and this woman lillian who was working and she said, gracias, and she's, you know, sort of trembling. and lillian responded to her, no, gracias obama. but it was just such a beautiful moment of being able to see people who are getting access to health care for the first time with a condition like parkinson's that's affordable and the certainty and ability to now get the services that they need and deserve. >> it struck me preparing for this conversation and knowing that i was sitting down with both of you that, julie, you come from a legacy of people who advocated for people like your parents to have the rights and protections that they had as workers and to build their political power. what does it say not that you are in the white house or that you are in the white house but that the two of you work together in the white house? >> well, let me just start by saying that julie's legacy continues. right? without julie i would not be sitting here. without julie so many people across the country i think knowing the external work and all she learned inside government and all the different levers that can be truly utilized to help people to make them feel whole. i mean, that is still continuing. and i can tell you i get to see the fruits of her labor day in and day out, and so i just think it's really important to know that it's true. the work that her family did, my brothers who are still farmers today, right, and their workers, the fruits of that labor are continuing to multiply and a beautiful thing about organizing. i have seen it firsthand in my life and in the impact that she's made with me. >> it was my dream to work with emmy. in all honesty. we had a chance to first work together during the primary. when we were together on vice president kamala harris's campaign. and it really was like a dream come true. and i can't think of a better person to be able to lead our political operation here in the white house than emmy given, you know, her personal experience but the values and kind of the north star that really guides her work and it just -- yeah. it's been really remarkable and i hadn't thought about it in that context, though, in terms of the -- i think the generation that we both come from and have grown out of and are still very connected to. >> on the days when the administration makes decisions that you yourself do not agree with, what is it that allows you to stay and show up the next day? >> look, i think that there are many times where the president, the vice president, our agencies have to make really difficult decisions. and i think what keeps me here is i know that they're making the best decision that they can with the information that we have and the problems that we have to solve. i believe and i trust president biden completely, that he is doing the best that he can to deliver for our communities and our families and sometimes the decisions that have to be made at one hour does not preclude us from losing sight from our big picture goals and what we are trying to accomplish for our communities. and i try to never lose sight of that. you know, i signed up for the big picture. i signed up for the hard work. i signed up for the disagreement because i believe that as a whole we are doing everything we can to move our country forward and so i really try to stay focused on that. >> yeah. i agree. i think that really looking at what are ways that we can continue to improve our communities and how do we really hone in on i think the impact that we are having when we look at things like the child tax credit and the opportunity to cut childhood poverty among latinos by 45%, that's what keeps me here. when we think about the opportunity to continue to provide affordable health care to the latino community and to be a part of decisions that are being made about how we reach our community or what resources are getting to our community. that's what keeps me here. next, secretary cardona, his bilingual background. and why his experience gives him a unique edge running the department of education. also homeland security secretary mayorkas. i asked the son of political refugees if he sees his parents in the migrants coming to our borders today. an inside look at how the white house is celebrating hispanic culture. stay with us. hey google. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ there are beautiful ideas that remain in the dark. but with our new multi-cloud experience, you have the flexibility you need to unveil them to the world. ♪ bipolar depression. it made me feel like i was trapped in a fog. this is art inspired by real stories of people living with bipolar depression. i just couldn't find my way out of it. the lows of bipolar depression can take you to a dark place... ...and be hard to manage. latuda could make a real difference in your symptoms. latuda was proven to significantly reduce bipolar depression symptoms and in clinical studies, had no substantial impact on weight. this is where i want to be. latuda is not for everyone. call your doctor about unusual mood changes, behaviors, or suicidal thoughts. antidepressants can increase these in children, teens, and young adults. elderly dementia patients on latuda have an increased risk of death or stroke. call your doctor about fever, stiff muscles, and confusion, as these may be life threatening... ...or uncontrollable muscle movements, as these may be permanent. these are not all the serious side effects. now i'm back where i belong. ask your doctor about latuda and pay as little as $0 for your first prescription. 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(woman) yeah, y-you did. ♪ we are farmers. bum-pa-dum, bum-bum-bum-bum ♪ (music) ♪ i think to myself ♪ ♪ what a wonderful world ♪ (music) ♪ i think to myself ♪ ♪ what a wonderful world ♪ as legislators wrangle over what stays and what goes from the build back better act a lot is on the line for students and teachers. among the benefits for schools substantial investments in early childhood education, better systems to prepare educators and improve school nutrition. all of it is part of the legacy of education secretary miguel cardona. born in connecticut to puerto rican parents, i asked the former teacher about his journey from public housing to the presidential cabinet. i want you to take me back to your first day of school. your parents had moved to the u.s. from puerto rico as children. you were living in public housing. you spoke spanish at home. what was that first day of school like? >> as a 4-year-old, i was intimidated. i didn't want to be there, and i remember going home early that day because i couldn't make it and saying i never want do go back and i have never left school since. >> how do you go from being the kid who's crying in the nurse's office to the kid who loves school to the top education official in the united states? >> never giving up. never giving up. having great teachers. by that i mean, you know, my parents were great teachers. right? i always say parents are the most important teachers. and i really mean that. i had in my life as a 4-year-old i was afraid of, you know, going back and they told me i was going to be okay and i trusted them and they were right. i continued. i went back and then i fell in love with education. i fell in love with serving others. >> i imagine over the course of that life and that career you have learned how to do a lot of code switching. what has that looked like for you? >> it's interesting. not only code switching with language and code switching is a term i think anna salas coined that. code switching. where you go from one language to another but i always say i'm the same person from the barrio to the briefing room. same values, i'm still the same person and my success i believe is due in large part to my ability to connect with folks, connect with whomever i'm in the room with. >> there is a demographic mismatch between the students in america's public schools and the educators in the front of those classrooms. about 50% of students in public schools are students of color. only about 20% of the teachers are teachers of color. in your lived and professional experience, what does that look like? what does it mean to be a student of color who has a teacher of color? how does that change your educational trajectory? >> i can tell you as a student i remember walking into the classroom in second grade. i had mr. o'neill as a black teacher and having that feeling i want to be like mr. o'neill and then even in college i had some professors that were latino or black professors and i felt -- there was a level of connection with the lived experience that i -- it really connected with me. as a country, we need to do more. we have a lot of work to do but it starts with making sure that the students that we have in front of us that you said are so diverse see themselves as potential teachers in the future. and i have to say in the build back better agenda there is a plan to put funding there to make sure we're creating good pipeline programs so that the students that are in the classrooms now see themselves as the teachers leading the classrooms in the future. >> when it comes to the push for free two-year college what do latinos specifically have on the line? >> mucho. the build back better agenda and i'll speak specifically about college but you know we talk a lot. it's great in speeches to say education is the great equalizer. we're close to the finish line on something that could really level the playing field. universal community college for all? that's a game changer for the latinos. it means knowing that they'll continue. two-year colleges lead to four-year colleges, they lead to better preparation for workforce. it leads to 21% on average, 21% better income for graduates of two-year schools versus high schools. >> when do you and the president plan to make a decision on student debt cancelation? >> i'm going to tell you what we are doing. we are going to revamp and fix the public service loan forgiveness program which is a mess. since march until now our department has forgiven over $9.5 billion in student debt. $9.5 billion in 6 months because we recognize for far too long the system wasn't built around borrowers. the system wasn't set up to serve borrowers. we're changing that and aggressively. and part of that is examining student loan forgiveness. >> can you point to a time for me when your personal experience as a latino, as a kid who showed up for the first day of kindergarten not speaking english, has informed a specific decision or choice you made as an educator, as a distribute administrator, as the u.s. secretary of education? >> you know what i'll do is flip it a lit ill bit. i have a fourth great teacher and celebrating three kings. looking at different cultures and had a paranda at putnam elementary school. it was like a first or second-year teacher and i remember the joy in the students' faces. latino students and nonlatino students. i remember how that brought people together to learn about a different culture through music. through nose values that i was raised with. i remember how the music and the food and the culture created a sense of community in that school and that shaped me. significantly because i know schools are more than places where people learn how to read and write. or physical activity. schools are families. schools are communities. that experience through that bicultural lens allowed me to recognize that when we can see students for who they are, what they bring to the table and look at that as assets, we're more likely to create a community where we want our children to attend and we're more likely to create students who are prepared to go out and lead in a manner that brings people together. and that experience as a fourth grade teacher, bringing a paranda in and doing typical puerto rican music taught me a lot about not only bringing people together but about leadership and about how we share the same goal of helping children succeed. >> did you play the bongos for them? >> i did. >> i did. all right. for the next conversation i spoke with homeland security secretary alejandro mayorkas about a host of issues including title 42 and efforts to end the remain in mexico policy. but within days the biden administration shared updates on both programings so today we'll share the part of the conversation about his family fleeing cuba and coming to the u.s. in search of a better life. we spoke at a naturalization ceremony on citizenship day so you are going to hear an orchestra in the background. what were the messages you got growing up about what it meant to be cuban and american? >> my father had tremendous pride in being cuban. he always had envisioned raising his family in cuba. and there was no one more of an american patriot than my father. we grew up having a deep sense of pride in our origins and a profound sense of gratitude to this country. we grew up as kids rooting for the united states in the olympics. and no one was a close second. >> is there a moment in your life that you can pinpoint where in addition to understanding yourself as cuban and understanding yourself as american you came to understand yourself as hispanic, as latino, as part of something even bigger? >> when my father spoke in english, he tended to be a rather serious person. when my father spoke in spanish, there was a joy of life in his voice and in his mannerisms. and through that contrast i understood very profoundly not only my heritage and its importance and the fact that i am part of a particular community in america, but it also spoke of the impact of displacement and what it means to lose one's country of origin. >> when you see migrants coming to our southern border, do you see your parents in those migrants? >> i see people wanting a better life for themselves and their loved ones. and no different than my parents. it's not a monolithic group but we are speaking of the vulnerable who are seeking a better life who very well might not qualify for humanitarian relief. are they adversaries or are they people searching for a better lifer and the laws do not permit them to stay? i would argue vehemently with my heart and with the thought of my parents in mind that they are the latter. >> you know and i know that there are other latinos who -- other americans who will see an inequity in that differential. >> in what differential? >> in the circumstances of your parents being able to emigrate to the united states and the way in which we regard refugees who are currently showing up at our southern border. >> i would take issue with that. we accept so many individuals here in the united states. we do address the asylum claims. we're in a very unique position right now addressing a global pandemic. and the public health imperatives. this is quite unique. and so, i would say that the differential that some might think exists i would say is not necessarily a differential of our humanitarian embrace but rather a differential born of the circumstances that our country and the world is confronting right now. >> next the first latino name to the biden cabinet. my conversation with the head of the small business administration isabel guzman, how she is working to help business owners bounce back from the pandemic. salad! good choice! it is. so is screening for colon cancer. when caught in early stages, it's more treatable. hey, cologuard! hi, i'm noninvasive and i detect altered dna in your stool to find 92% of colon cancers even in early stages. early stages. it's for people 45 plus at average risk for colon cancer, not high risk. false positive and negative results may occur. ask your provider if cologuard is right for you. 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>> for every small business who ever walks in that front door, gives you a call is so important to you. they help pay your bills. they keep your family clothed and fed and full of opportunities. and so every client that came in had a meaningful relationship to my dad from that perspective and the small business owners are part of their communities. oftentimes they are the ones who are funding local community centers or local little leagues. and so they become a part of the family in many ways and so that relationship was really intimate and close. >> do you remember the moment where you thought to yourself, i don't just want to be a small business owner, i want to advocate for small business owners? >> i think i got the policy bug and that interest of trying to help businesses at large at a young age. i was interested in government and policy but i got it when i worked first the first time at the sba during the obama/biden administration being able to see how you could affect change nationally that would really impact our small businesses and help them. >> what do you see as the biggest challenge that latino and latina small business owners are up against right now? >> their rates of entrepreneurship in the latino community are high. so they are entrepreneurial and they're so important to the economy as a result but so many of them lack access to capital or networks to really help their businesses grow. >> let's talk about one of the bridges that has proven hardest to build. under the previous administration half a trillion dollars that the sba was responsible for distributing in ppp was entrusted to the same banks that for decades have refused to service communities of color so then unsurprising that those same communities did not have the same access to the ppp loans. one, what do you see as the multigenerational damage that was done? and two, what do you see your role as in fixing that? >> businesses in the latino community are often either underbanked or don't have the strong relationships and hurt them in accessing relief and we are proud that in 2021 the biden/harris administration was able to reverse some of those trends and reach the smallest of the small and more of an underserved communities to get them that relief but nonetheless not being able to access that relief earlier meant more closures, less revenues. that's months of more debt and loss of revenues that affect the future wealth building capacity of those businesses that impacts the communities and the employees. and so clearly we need to continue to try to reverse that and help support them to access markets. >> in addition to the issues distributing the ppp loans, we also now part of what we are seeing is a lot of small businesses carrying the loans as a liability because the forgiveness process has taken too long. i don't need to tell you what that means for a small business and the larger community. where then can sba step in? >> sba has launched a direct forgiveness portal for loans, 150,000 and under to make sure that we could make this process as easy as possible. we have had already over a million applications to date the sba is able to put back $540 billion back into the economy. and that's really important to help our businesses advance. >> how will you know that you have succeeded at the end of your tenure here? >> i really came to make a difference and help president biden and vice president harris deliver that rebuilt economy that's equitable for everybody. i do think that if we can narrow the gaps and create better wealth creation and from all over the country then our economy overall can do better. we can be globally competitive. whatever i can do to reduce the opportunity gaps is what i'm focused on and if we can achieve that i would be so pleased. next a special display inside the white house honoring hispanic culture. we got a tour from a staffer who's making history of his own. stay with us. hi susan! honey? 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>> i probably wouldn't have believed him because when i was growing up, alicia, there weren't a lot of people that looked like me at this level in the government. so, but now when i talk to kids, i think it's so important for them to know that obviously anything is possible if you work hard and follow your dreams. >> i want you to tell me about this hallway. what is this exhibit? >> so this is 2021 heritage month exhibit. we partnered with the smithsonian because the first family wanted to highlight and celebrate the diversity of the hispanic community during this hispanic heritage month. so here, for example, is a piece on the famous salsa queen, as we know her, celia cruz. you might know her? >> yes, cuban, and very proud to see this here. >> that's right. that's right. and here is a sketch of celia cruz in a gown designed by the cuban-american designer narciso rodriguez, another good connection to the white house. the former first lady michelle obama wore a lot of narciso's pieces during her tenure as first lady. here are some shoes that were part of the smithsonian collection that belonged to the queen of salsa. so this is one of my favorite sections. it's the food section, who doesn't love food, right? and food from the hispanic community is so diverse. but this plate here is incredibly personal and special to me. it is a -- it's pottery that's called talavera that's made in mexico, which is my ancestry. and my dear parents, my mom whose name was alicia, may she rest in peace, sent me this 34 years ago when i first moved to washington to start my career. so it is always a great reminder of not only my personal connection to my family, but to my heritage and to where i came from. >> i'm alicia menendez. thank you so much for joining this special hour of american voices. latinos inside the white house. there is more msnbc after this break. as someone who resembles someone else... i appreciate that liberty mutual knows everyone's unique. that's why they customize your car insurance, so you only pay for what you need. oh, yeah. that's the spot. only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty, liberty, liberty, liberty ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ hey google. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ before we talk about tax-smart investing, what's new? 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