The Backstory: A Nation of Immigrants

Immigration remains a topic of debate in the 2016 presidential election, and NPR's Tom Gjelten tells the story of the transformation of America's immigration policies in his new book "A Nation of Nations: A Great America Immigration Story." Fifty years ago, the Immigration and Nationality Act was signed into law, and Gjelten says that it "changed America more than any other law in the 20th century... because it opened America's doors to people of color." He describes a dramatic shift from immigrants of European decent to Latin America and Asia and how the number of legal immigrants has tripled in the 50 years following the law's enactment. But with millions of new people entering the country, Gjelten says that the only way for these new immigrants to fully integrate in American society is to "stay true to yourself."