Jean Guerrero knows that the truth isn't always neat and simple. Her quest to understand her own father led her to journalism and to her first book, Crux, a cross-border memoir.

Then she turned her attention to the forces that paint our communities as criminal, as violent,

with her second book, Hate Munger, Stephen Miller, Donald Trump, and the White Nationalist Agenda.

Now, Jean, as an opinion columnist for the Los Angeles Times

is sharing more of herself, her way of seeing the world,

and the truth, however complicated it may be.

Hi, Gene.

Hi, how are you?

I am so excited to talk to you. And there's so many places we could start, but I actually think your most recent piece about your last name is a really good jumping off point for the conversation that I

want to have. And I related so much to it. So, Gene, how do you currently say your last name?

Guerrero.

There was a period of time, though, where that was not how you say. Can I hear how you would say it?

Guerrero. Tell me what happened in your life that that is how you began to pronounce.

Some might say mispronounce your own last name. I grew up on the border in San Diego,

just a few minutes north of Tijuana, which is where my dad grew up.

My dad's an immigrant from Mexico, and my mom is from Puerto Rico.

And Spanish was my first language.

Both of my parents spoke Spanish to me at home.

But this was during an era of intense anti-immigrant, anti-Mexican hysteria in California.

California saw this wave of anti-immigrant policies that preceded what we saw during the Trump era nationally.

So there was a lot of like anti-Mexican sentiment in the school where I started to go. My mom, who is a doctor, she put herself

through medical school by joining the National Health Service Corps. She thought it was really

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