This is 99% invisible. I'm Roman Mars.

John Washington grew up with his family's stories of migration and escape, from hiding in

train compartments and swimming across rivers to the airplane his mother took to leave

Romania for the U.S. as a teenager. But these stories of foraging out dangerously on your own, they seemed to him like tales

from a distant past.

But then I remember when I first confronted it personally, and that was in the mid-2000s.

John was on a camping trip with a friend out in the Anza-Barego desert, just east of San Diego.

This is 99PI producer of Lashmedon, and they're going to take it from here.

John and his buddy were driving down a dirt road, looking for a place to camp.

And we saw a young man step into the road from the shoulder and flag us down.

At that point, I didn't speak much Spanish at all.

We tried to communicate with each other and we understood that he was a migrant and also

realize where we were, which was about 15 miles north of the border wall over really rough terrain.

And he was clearly very thirsty and not in great shape.

They gave him some water, topped him off a couple times.

The man then asked for a ride to the next town.

And in that moment, John didn't know what to do.

Because we knew that it was illegal, but we didn't really understand the implications of if we were to be caught, of what would happen.

John knew that under federal law, it's illegal to help undocumented immigrants into the United States

and that if he gave this man a ride, there was a chance he'd face a federal offense.

So they wished him look and went on their way, got back in their car, and drove off.

And then when we got to camp and we started unpacking,

...