Every year, many folks are confused by Hispanic Heritage Month starting on September 15, not the beginning of the month like most other commemorations.
Allow me to explain.
September 15 marks the day of independence for five Central American nations who declared their independence on that day in 1821. They are Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. In addition, Mexico celebrates its independence on September 16, Chile on September 18, and Belize on September 21.
Background
Hispanic Heritage Month originally began as Hispanic Heritage Week which was established by legislation and signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson in 1968. The idea was to recognize the contributions and influence of Hispanic Americans to the history, culture, and achievements of the United States.
Hispanic Heritage Week would later be expanded upon in 1988 when legislation was presented to former president Ronald Reagan and he signed it into law. September 15 was chosen as a starting point because of the independence days shared by the five countries.
Presidential proclamations for Hispanic Heritage Week were issued by Nixon, Ford, Carter, and Reagan between 1969 and 1988. President George H. W. Bush was the first president to officially issue a proclamation honoring National Hispanic Heritage Month on September 14, 1989. Every president has issued proclamations to mark Hispanic Heritage Month ever since.
Now here we are.
If you’re proud to be of Latin American descent, this month is for us to celebrate our culture, heritage, and contributions. It’s also a time to share our food, music, and folklore with our friends, neighbors, and colleagues. It’s a time to reflect and continue the fight for Latinos in the U.S. regardless of where our families are from.
Because in the United States, we are categorized as one.
A Texas Perspective on the Current Environment
Republicans have decided to treat Latin Americans and Caribbean Islanders seeking sanctuary like vermin. They use our friends, family members, and fellow Latinos from our homelands as political pawns to score white power points. Frankly, it’s disgusting.
Two years ago, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was prepared to send asylum-seekers all over the country. When word got out that his intentions included Cubans, many in South Florida expressed their outrage, leading DeSantis to table the idea.
However, he later began fulfilling that promise — but instead of sending Cubans to the Northeast, he sent Venezuelans all over the country, playing to the anti-Venezuelan hatred that is often shared by media personalities and influencers. The fact that he separated those migrants from their friends and families in Florida echoes the inhumanity of Trump-era family separations.
Scoring racist political points for them is more important than human lives. Like most politicians, their only concern is staying in office. But only one political party is demonizing immigrants while promoting their hate across the country: Republicans, Christian white nationalist conservatives.
A group fighting their asses off to convince others that whiteness is an ethnicity on their quest to create an ethnonationalist state in the United States like Israel is in the Middle East.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is even more guilty of demonizing and shipping asylum-seekers all over the country than DeSantis or Trump. Abbott has taken money from other programs in the state to fund his pointless political theater dubbed “Operation Lone Star.” Texas police departments, fire departments, mental healthcare facilities, and schools have all lost funding due to Abbott’s policies.
While Republicans screamed about Democrats wanting to defund the police, the reality is that the only people taking money from cops are Republicans. A report by the Texas Tribune showed both Abbott and former Gov. Rick Perry reallocated funds meant to upgrade communications equipment in small towns like Uvalde — equipment that would have undoubtedly assisted in the response to the mass shooting at Robb Elementary three months ago.
Growing Hate
Now we find ourselves on the first day of Hispanic Heritage Month watching Republicans getting their rocks off by treating Latin Americans and Caribbean Islanders like dirt. Has anyone noticed that the only migrants trafficked across the country are Latinos? That’s not by accident.
Republicans once used the word “Mexicans” when talking about people crossing the southern border. Now, it’s “illegals” because, to them, it’s a catch-all term to target Latinos while making it seem like Latino migrants are the only ones coming to the U.S. They ignore the diversity of cultures seen at the Southern Border because xenophobia against Latinos is more acceptable than outright racism against asylum seekers from Africa as they gloss over those from Ukraine.
We all know why they won’t demonize any Europeans at the southern border. Make no mistake, many in Latino communities and other nonwhite communities are just as insufferable. Listen to AM radio in Florida or Texas and you’ll see what I’m talking about.
But what is fascism without hypocrisy, right? Truth is, Latinos like those represented on those airwaves exist everywhere in the United States. And like the Cubans in Miami who want to overthrow the Cuban government and install a white-centered far-right fascist regime, anti-immigrant beliefs are found among many Latinos in California just as in South Texas or Florida.
Such beliefs aren’t new, but as Republicans spread their hate unchallenged — particularly across Spanish-language media — the number of Latinos expressing the same hatred continues to grow. Maybe some Latinos don’t realize they’re buying into Klan-like language from white politicians who hate them but I find that hard to believe. Anti-immigrant hatred among Latinos is as intentional and conscious as what bigoted white politicians are doing.
As former Uvalde Schools Police Chief Pedro “Pete” Arredondo and many others like him found out, the white power structure will throw you under the bus before anyone else. Former Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo discovered that too. So has Enrique Tarrio of the Proud Boys and a host of others. They were all made scapegoats over serious issues.
It’s only a matter of time before all the other Latinos who align with white supremacists learn the truth as well.
Next Steps
So, this Hispanic Heritage Month, it is incumbent upon all of us to come together and shut these racist clowns down. Because at the end of the day, we can’t celebrate Latino heritage while we demonize those who come after our families did.
The only thing Latinos can count on is white people never considering them white, no matter how white-appearing they are. The last time I pointed that out, the wannabe whites came for me, and I’m okay with that because it’s the damned truth. Even white Cubans who came to the U.S. decades ago were treated like dirt, along with every other Latino group.
But hey, welcome to the United States, right?
¡Adelante!
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