Here in Hollywood: From Idol to AGT, Jessica Sanchez is back

Jessica Sanchez gets the golden buzzer. Screen grab: America's Got Talent

“What I'm really excited to bring now to the table is to really show everybody who I really am, and not to fake it, not to pretend, not to put on a show, but to just be Jessica.” 

Six days before her triumphant "America’s Got Talent" audition aired, Jessica Sanchez sat in front of her phone’s Zoom screen in a modest studio space in her home in Texas talking about starting early in singing competitions, coming of age, coming to terms, and coming back on the big stage. 

Jessica Sanchez gets America's Got Talent's golden buzzer; reveals pregnancy

I asked what she learned from years of intense work in her youth and how she reacted when things got slower. 

It was 20 years ago that she first competed on "America’s Got Talent," and 13 years since emerging as "American Idol" season 11 runner-up. Long hair tied up neatly, makeup faint, her face bright, she has a kind of glistening gratitude that would surface often in the conversation but also a voice of hard-earned experience. Her responses bloomed into laughter at times, slipped into teary reflection at others. Now, nearly 30, her voice, both musically and philosophically, is clearer than ever.

“It’s hard, because I feel like there's a standard in the industry, especially back then, the checklist of what they're looking for. And you have to meet the mark, especially as a woman. I'm not a white woman. I'm a woman of color. So it's like you're trying to meet these markers that sometimes you just don't meet. And for me, I'm not a super outgoing person. I'm very introverted. I like my personal space. And so trying to learn how to be true to myself and navigate through the industry without selling out, it's been really difficult. But I have realized that being authentic and you know having a good foundation is the most important thing. Being authentic to myself is the most important thing,” she explains about life after "Idol."

Photo from Jessica Sanchez's FB page

This is the first time that we’re meeting again since 2012 when I extensively covered her "American Idol" journey. It was a wild time. One day I was covering the "Idol" press tent as the first and only Filipino reporter to interview her, and then the next days as she advanced, more Filipino stringers and even non-media types asked for credentials to get near her. She had the community’s solid support, even when at times it turned into a bit of a circus. At one point, the job became so difficult that I almost stopped covering. A publicist that I’ve been working with for three "Idol" seasons told me she’d never seen anything like it. Jessica ended up losing to Phillip Phillips, but her fight for a rightful spot on top felt personal for many Filipinos at the time.

This week, following the broadcast of her "AGT" audition, audiences seemed to fall back in love with her as her audition video went viral. She is older, wiser… and visibly pregnant. 

“I feel like everything is God’s divine timing,” she said, a little stunned by the reality of it. “It couldn’t have happened at a better time.”

It was a line she repeated more than once, not for effect, but as if reminding herself. Divine timing. For a career that once flared under the white-hot spotlight of "American Idol," it’s a phrase that lands with the weight of someone who has lived long enough in the quiet to understand the value of stillness, the cost of fame, and the rare grace of being seen again.

Photo from Jessica Sanchez's FB page

Before the TV cameras, before the "Idol" finale, before the viral duets and the standing ovations, Sanchez was a little girl with a microphone in her grandmother’s living room in San Diego, California. She sang for visitors, for family friends, for anyone her lola or mother could summon. They would beam at her, clap proudly, and tell her she had “it”: that slippery, intangible quality that made strangers lean in and listen.

“I really grew up in a strong Filipino culture,” she said. “We had a little karaoke system, with the words lighting up and the magic mics. Every family gathering, I was singing.”

That living room training ground led to local competitions, then national ones, and finally a stage where millions watched her prove, with each belted note, that a Filipina-American girl could stand toe-to-toe with anyone. She was 16 when she became a finalist on "American Idol," a time she describes now with an almost protective tenderness.

“I was so young,” she said. “I didn’t really know who I was as a young lady, and especially as an artist. I feel like I was just kind of being tossed in the wind.” 

Fame is a peculiar thing in the way it lifts fast and vanishes faster. After "Idol," she found herself in rooms with important people, signing deals, performing to packed crowds. And then, like the echoes of applause, it quieted. She was still singing, still recording, still working, but the momentum that once pulled her forward asked more of her.

Photo from Jessica Sanchez's FB page

For years, she tried to mold herself to fit the industry’s shape. She smiled when she felt uncertain. She quieted parts of herself to stay in tune with what she thought others wanted. But now, sitting in her home studio with her husband occasionally playing bass nearby, she speaks with a quiet defiance learned not from defying others, but from finally no longer defying herself.

“I was trying to be somebody that I wasn’t,” she said. “I sold myself short a lot. The biggest lesson I’ve learned is to be authentic to myself. People will love you for you.” 

She did not plan to be pregnant when she auditioned for "America’s Got Talent" again. She discovered the news just days before stepping on stage. At first, she considered whether the timing was wrong, and whether the growing life inside her would require her to pause the one she was rediscovering for herself.

But something steadied her. 

“I felt peace,” she said. “No anxiety. No second guessing. I just thought, I’m going to do it.”

And she did. She walked out under the stage lights, revealed her story, sang her heart out, and received the Golden Buzzer. In the swirl of gold confetti and adrenaline, she felt everything all at once: joy, shock, disbelief. Later, backstage, Sofía Vergara hugged her and rubbed her belly. “She was just so loving and so sweet,” Sanchez said. “I can’t wait to see her again.”

Simon Cowell came too, fulfilling a lifelong dream for Sanchez.

“Ever since I started competitions, I really wanted to sing in front of him,” she said. “That was a huge, bucket-list thing.”

Photo from Jessica Sanchez's FB page

Born in San Diego, she has been living in Texas for four years now. Her father, who is of Mexican descent, is originally from there.

“When people ask me what kind of music I do, I didn’t really know how to answer,” she admitted. “I can’t say I’m like Ariana Grande or Billie Eilish. They’re in their own lanes. And I want my own.”

In the silence between past fame and her recent return, she’s been in the studio, building that lane. She’s making music, exploring vulnerability, and keeping her faith.

She’s preparing not just vocally, but also physically and spiritually. “I’ve been working out, preparing my lungs,” she said, smiling. “I’ll be eight months pregnant when I’m on that stage.”

Her husband, a quiet force behind the scenes, helps her hold that balance. “He doesn’t want to get in the way of anything,” she said. “He’s just there to help me through everything. He’s my biggest supporter.”

Photo from Jessica Sanchez's FB page

There is a moment in our conversation when Sanchez sounds emotional. She’s recalling the people who have stayed with her. The fans who followed her from "AGT" to "Idol" and back again. The Filipino community that watched her rise and rooted for her, loudly. Even non-Filipino fans who, every so often, post her past Idol performances and marvel at her voice.

“Sometimes I have to take a step back and read the comments and allow myself to receive all this love,” she said. “Sometimes I feel like I’m living in a dream.”

But it is not a dream. It is very real. She is looking forward to giving birth — not just to a child, but to a new chapter. She doesn’t know exactly what the future holds. “I’m excited to see what God’s going to do,” she said. “I don’t know what’s going to happen. But I’m ready for it.”