Voces For Change

Latinos were key to president-elect Joe Biden ́s victory, even in places like Arizona and Nevada. However, there won ́t be a honeymoon period and his progressive agenda likely hinge on whether or not Democrats capture Senate control in a runoff election in Georgia on January 5th.
In this episode, Kenneth Romero, executive director of the National Hispanic Caucus of State Legislators, discuss how important it is that Biden names at least 5 Latinos to his Cabinet, and what advocacy groups can to push for pressing issues like immigration reform next year.

In this episode, I explain the scope of this weekly, bilingual episode, where I ́ll introduce my audience to people who are making a difference in their local communities across the United States and Puerto Rico, by volunteering, launching businesses, mentoring youth, or advocating for social justice and social change.

In this Spanish-language podcast, we talk with Arturo Massol-Deya, an environmental activist with Casa Pueblo, who is leading the charge in Puerto Rico to promote the use of solar panels and reduce environmental pollution driven by fossil fuels. After hurricane "Maria" made landfall in September of 2017, practically the whole island went dark. But Casa Pueblo, nestled in Adjuntas, was the only place where people could recharge their phones, medical equipment, and. other electrical devices. Massol-Deya argues that solar panels are a good investment, because, based on what happened in Puerto Rico, outages are actually costlier in terms of loss of lives and economic productivity.

Exactly 8 years ago today, President Barack Obama announced DACA for thousands of undocumented youth and, any day now, the Supreme Court will decide their fate. A leader in the Dreamer movement, Cesar Vargas made history in 2016, when he became the first undocumented lawyer in NY. He later joined the Army Reserves and, on the verge of getting his US citizenship, he is now working in the NYC council helping to draft pro-immigrant legislation. He tells Dreamers they ́re not alone.

In this episode, I interview Robert Lopez, a community organizer with the Texas Civil Rights Project, one of several groups suing the Department of Homeland Security to stop it from detaining unaccompanied minors in hotels and deporting them without a court hearing.
Activists like Lopez charge that the Trump Administration is using the COVID-19 pandemic as an excuse to expedite the deportation of children and asylum seekers at the border. Deportation has long been a lucrative business for private companies under contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), from providing deportation flights to now allowing minors to be housed in hotels.
Activists are calling these hotels "black sites", especially because ICE is not providing information about the whereabouts of children under federal custody.
Since the story broke last week, the Hampton Inn & Suites is no longer doing business with ICE, according to the Hilton hotel chain.