Franklin Camargo: I Fled Venezuela to Fight for America | Stories of Us

Venezuela was the fourth largest economy in the world in the 1950s, because we had a lot of resources, a stable republic and free markets. My name is Franklin Camargo and this is my story. I was born in Venezuela. I grew up in a wonderful family. My dad is an economist and also a businessman. My mom, on the other hand, she was the moral compass of my family. And my brother, he's my best friend. And I had a wonderful childhood, but I was born into a world where everything around me was slowly crumbling and being destroyed by socialist policies. My grandparents had the opportunity to see a different Venezuela and even my parents. Venezuela was the fourth largest economy in the world in the 1950s, because we had a lot of resources, a stable republic and free markets. But then everything started to change. The government grew its size. They built a huge welfare state. They started to take control of the economy. People took for granted the success that we had. And that opened a space for Hugo Chavez in 1999. When I was six years old, we had the opportunity to come to the U.S. for vacation. As a kid, I remember stepping off the airport and witnessing the results of a free society. Advanced technology, newer cars that it almost felt as being in the future. And from that moment, I knew that I wanted to live in a prosperous society. With Hugo Chavez in power, our success and happiness as a family turned into a struggle for survival. We didn't have enough food to feed ourselves. We're just eating rice and beans every day because it was the only thing that my parents could afford at that moment. Since I was a teenager, I was very interested to know why is the United States successful and Venezuela is not successful? What are the differences? And now I can say that the difference was the capitalistic system. And that was the biggest motivation I had to start with my political activism. I led political protests. I participated on radio and TV interviews in a country where freedom of speech is not allowed. And I even traveled to several states in my country to give a speech called Defending Capitalism. But I also liked the idea of becoming a doctor, a physician. If you want to graduate as a doctor, you need to go to a public university. And something that is important to know is that the government has the monopoly of medicine in Venezuela, especially in education. Authorities of those colleges are basically political activists. So while I was pursuing my third year of med school, I had a debate with a professor. The class was physiopathology, so it doesn't have anything to do with politics. So this professor, he was mentioning that Venezuelans who had escaped the country to try to find a better future in other places are stupid. So I felt really angry about what he was saying, and I wanted to debate about it. The reason why they escaped Venezuela is because of political persecution and because there isn't any type of opportunity to succeed in a socialist country. He took me out of the classroom. He grabbed me by the arm. He took me to the director's office. They expelled me from college. They said, with these specific words, that I was a terrorist and that if I don't leave right now, they would call the National Guard. When you receive a comment like you're a terrorist and the government is such as the Venezuelan one, you need to be scared. I received the notification by two different people that I was going to get arrested. I would honestly rather die than going to prison in Venezuela. You would be tortured. There are politicians who have been killed inside of prisons in Venezuela. So my mom and my dad, they both thought that the best decision to take was to try to hide in a different location. No one knew where I was, and I didn't tell anyone, just my family. I think about crossing the border in Colombia, but Colombia is not a safe country neither. And in the past, they had collaborated with the government to expel political dissidents from Venezuela back to Venezuela, and then they were sent to prison and tortured. I managed to sell as many goods as I could in order to come to the U.S. When I was in the airport in Venezuela and the flight got delayed 10 hours, and I knew that I could be stopped in the airport and being sent to jail. Thankfully, I wasn't. So I managed to make it to the U.S. And I tried to seek asylum, which later I got my asylum and then my green card, which I'm very proud and happy for. But once I made it to the U.S., I was very worried, scared, and concerned about the safety of my parents. Something that happens in Venezuela is that if they cannot go after you, they might go after your family. So I made sure to tell my parents to come here as soon as possible because I knew their life was in danger. And shortly after I arrived, my parents and brother made it to the U.S. too. I didn't know any English when I first came to the U.S., but I knew that I had to learn. My first year here in the U.S., I was washing dishes in a restaurant, and that was the best academy, the best classes that I could take. I was forced to speak English every day. It was a huge challenge. Right now, I just got my degree in political science, and I'm working as a political commentator at Univision, talking to the Hispanic community about how grateful we should be to be living here in the U.S., and how important it is to guarantee that the future generations have the same blessings that we have had. The United States of America gave me everything and all I needed in order to achieve my dreams. And it was freedom, the freedom to think, the freedom to work, and the freedom to keep the fruits of your labor, the freedom to pursue your own happiness. There is a reason why Latinos immigrate to America, and because this is the land of opportunity. They want to work hard, and they want to achieve the American dream. They are looking for the American dream. Hispanic values are about family, faith, working hard, and they don't want the government involved in any type of decision that they make. And that's why it's so important for me, as a Latino, to talk to them and remind them how valuable this country is, and the reason why they chose this country, and that it contradicts tremendously the socialist system. I had this desire to see my country free and successful. After years of disappointments, right now I'm very hopeless. People wanted socialist policies and an authoritarian government for a while. They had it, and when they wanted to change direction, and they wanted freedom again, it was too late. Something that I always told my community is that there is a reason why we left our countries. And it's because those countries are right now in a very bad situation, a result of economic policies. Policies that right now are being proposed by a political movement here in America, and it's the left, to not vote for the same ideas that destroyed our country. It's a very dangerous movement that we need to stop, and immigrants need to stop it. Because we don't want the U.S. to be more like Venezuela. I don't want that. We don't want the U.S. to be more like Cuba. We want the U.S. to be the United States of America, a nation that gives opportunities for everyone. I have met so many young people that were born here, and that they think the United States of America is evil, and that we need to change this nation entirely and completely. I didn't have freedom of speech in Venezuela, and I still decided to speak out, and I paid the consequences of that. But I'm proud, because I'm not going to let anyone, and you shouldn't either, let anyone dictate what you should think. The best way that I have to pay back what this country has done for me, is to fight for the principles and ideals that founded this nation. And I'm going to be proud to call my kids Americans. Thank you for watching this video. To keep PragerU videos free, please consider making a tax-deductible donation.