In this episode of Words on a Wire, host Will Rose sits down with Jazmine Ulloa, national political and immigration reporter for The New York Times, to discuss her powerful new book, El Paso: Five Families and One Hundred Years of Blood, Migration, Race, and Memory.
Ulloa traces the lives of five families across more than a century to tell a sweeping, deeply human story of migration, identity, and belonging. Through these interwoven narratives, she repositions El Paso—not as a peripheral border city, but as a central force in shaping American history and immigration policy.
The conversation explores Ulloa’s own journey from a high school newsroom in El Paso to the national stage, as well as the formative reporting experiences that shaped her approach to storytelling. She reflects on covering the 2019 El Paso Walmart shooting in her hometown, a moment that became the emotional and intellectual catalyst for her book.
Drawing from years of reporting and archival research, Ulloa reveals how today’s immigration debates are rooted in a long and often overlooked history—one marked by cycles of enforcement, resistance, and resilience. Throughout the episode, she brings a journalist’s rigor and a storyteller’s sensitivity to the question of how borders shape not only policy, but people’s lives.
This is a conversation about history, memory, and the enduring role of migration in defining what it means to be American.
Originally aired on April 26, 2026
