With looming fears of detainment by immigration officers, some local communities are cancelling annual Hispanic Heritage Month celebrations.

But Julio Ricardo Varela, an MSNBC columnist and founder of The Latino Newsletter who describes himself as “the biggest skeptic of Hispanic Heritage Month ever,” says celebrating this year is more important than ever for the Latino community.

“This is a moment as to who gets to define what American identity is. And we would be foolish as a community to deny our existence here,” Varela said. “We’re going to have to uplift each other. We’re going to have to say that you don’t understand who we are as a community, and we’re going to tell you. And part of it is speaking out against the fear that is so real.”

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Alongside fear comes anger toward ICE as it continues its sweeping enforcement of the Trump administration’s immigration policies throughout the country. Protests in Chicago and New York have led to arrests of city and state officials, and details continue to emerge regarding a shooting at a Dallas ICE detention center that killed one detainee and injured two others. There’s also been a recent surge in ICE activity in the region, which has immigrant communities and advocates worried and fired up.

“People are very concerned about people being racially profiled because of the color of their skin, because they’re brown, because they are Black, because they have a certain kind of name that is associated with possibly being an immigrant, like Garcia Rodriguez,” said Cristina Silva, managing editor for local news at the Boston Globe. “There’s a lot of anger and fear that’s happening here in Massachusetts, in Rhode Island, across New England, in our Latino and immigrant communities. And so I don’t think this is going to go away.”

Federal immigration policies and crackdowns could also be factoring into why Latino voters are starting to lose faith in President Donald Trump, as detailed in a new poll from Somos Votantes. Silva said the economy is also playing a role in how Latinos view the president, including those who voted for Trump in the 2024 election.

“A growing number of polls are showing that Latinos are starting to question Trump’s policies,” Silva said. “Latinos are a growing part of the electorate in many important states, such as Georgia, Arizona, Nevada. And so we’ll see how this shapes up in the future with elections that are critical to the Republican party.”

ICE and detainment fears are also leading global superstars away from the United States mainland. Puerto Rican pop and reggaeton singer Bad Bunny recently announced he would not be including any U.S. stops in his upcoming international tour, which kicks off in the Dominican Republic in November, because of American immigration policies.

Despite a lack of American tour dates, a record-breaking number of Bad Bunny fans around the world tuned in to an Amazon Music livestream to witness the final date of the singer’s final performance of his Puerto Rican residency on Sept. 20. Varela said he’s most taken by how Bad Bunny and his music has encouraged global interest in Puerto Rico.

“It’s groundbreaking. It’s historic. It was a moment for the island in terms of what he was able to achieve. So as a Puerto Rican, I’m deeply proud of what Bad Bunny has done to put us even more on the global map,” Varela said.

All this and more in this week’s Latinx news roundtable!

Guests

  • Julio Ricardo Varela, MSNBC columnist, founder of The Latino Newsletter
  • Cristina Silva, managing editor for local news at the Boston Globe

Stories in this week’s roundtable

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