What I find most interesting about the U.S. is this idea of

“What I find most interesting about the U.S. is this idea of equality. That’s what I’m trying to do with immigration. If what the founding fathers said is true, that we are all equal, then let’s fight for that.” — Jorge Ramos

In these noble and fiery words, Jorge Ramos speaks as both journalist and pilgrim — a seeker of truth standing at the crossroads of promise and reality. He gazes upon the grand ideal that gave birth to America — the belief that all men are created equal — and calls upon his generation to measure the nation’s actions against its founding creed. To Ramos, equality is not a relic carved in marble, but a living principle that must be defended with courage and conviction. His fight for immigration is not a struggle for favor, but for fulfillment — the completion of a promise written in the ink of revolution and sealed by the sacrifices of millions who came after.

From the earliest days of the republic, the United States proclaimed itself a land where destiny was determined not by blood or birth, but by freedom and merit. Yet, as Ramos reminds us, such ideals have too often been betrayed by fear, division, and pride. The same nation that welcomed the tired and poor has also turned away the desperate and voiceless. The same founding fathers who spoke of liberty lived amidst the contradictions of slavery and exclusion. But rather than condemn, Ramos challenges — he calls upon America not to abandon its dream, but to rise to its own standard, to make its words flesh and its promises real.

This vision finds deep roots in history. When Emma Lazarus wrote her immortal poem, “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,” she echoed the same spirit that Ramos invokes. Her words became the voice of the Statue of Liberty, that towering mother of exiles who still stands watch over the harbor, her torch a beacon to all who seek refuge and hope. Yet, like Ramos, Lazarus knew that the promise of equality must be renewed in every generation — for prejudice, like a tide, always threatens to wash away what freedom builds.

The struggle for immigrant rights is thus a continuation of the same eternal battle fought by every people seeking justice — a battle not of armies, but of ideals. From the civil rights marches of Martin Luther King Jr., to the suffragists who demanded the right to vote, to the workers who fought for fair wages, each generation has been called to prove that equality is not self-sustaining. It must be defended, expanded, and lived anew. Ramos stands in that lineage, his weapon not the sword but the word, his cause not for himself alone, but for those whose voices tremble unheard at the gates of opportunity.

When he says, “If what the founding fathers said is true, that we are all equal, then let’s fight for that,” Ramos becomes both critic and guardian of the American dream. He does not reject the founding vision; he reveres it too deeply to let it decay. In the eyes of the ancients, this would be the duty of the philosopher-citizen — not to destroy what is flawed, but to refine it through truth. For when a nation ceases to strive toward its ideals, it becomes a monument to hypocrisy rather than hope. The fight for equality, then, is not rebellion against America — it is the most American act of all.

Yet Ramos also reminds us that equality is not granted, but earned through struggle. It demands empathy for the stranger, courage in the face of hostility, and faith that justice, though slow, will prevail. The immigrant who crosses deserts, the refugee who endures rejection, the activist who stands against scorn — these are the inheritors of the revolutionary spirit that once declared independence from tyranny. In them lives the same fire that burned in the hearts of those who first spoke the words, “We hold these truths to be self-evident.”

Let this be the lesson carried forward: words are only sacred when lived. The founding fathers gave the world an idea — equality — but it is the duty of every generation to give it life. Do not wait for the powerful to perfect it; build it with your own hands. Defend the dignity of the migrant, the poor, and the voiceless, for in doing so you defend the soul of humanity itself. The ancients taught that a nation’s greatness is not measured by its wealth or armies, but by how it treats the stranger within its gates. And so, as Jorge Ramos reminds us, let us not merely speak of equality — let us fight for it, until the dream becomes the destiny of all who call this world their home.