Innovative Thinker: Maria Hinojosa

Maria Hinojosa is an Emmy & Pulitzer Prize Winning journalist who has collaborated with the most respected networks and is known for bringing humanity to her reporting. Maria understands firsthand how social determinants can influence and damage lives and communities. In this keynote, she relates the history of U.S. immigration policy that has brought us to where we are today, as she shares her deeply personal story to help elevate the conversation around disparities, hoping to make a difference in lives now and for future generations, because this affects all Americans.

Based on her book, Once I Was You, Maria offers a personal and eye-opening account of how the rhetoric around immigration has not only long informed American attitudes toward outsiders but also enabled willful negligence and profiteering at the expense of our country’s most vulnerable populations—charging us with the broken system we have today.