Women and People of Color Deserve Better from the Second Amendment

Today, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in U.S. v. Rahimi—a case which will determine the fate of a federal law which keeps firearms out of the hands of domestic abusers. While some predict that the Court will find a way to uphold the law, no matter how the case is resolved, women and people of color have already lost.

This is because last year, in a landmark gun safety ruling, the Supreme Court froze the terms of the debate somewhere between 1789 and 1868. According to the Court’s tortured ruling in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen, if a certain type of gun regulation didn’t exist in this early period of U.S. history—an era where Black people were considered property in many states and married women had no legal identity independent of their husbands—it is presumptively unconstitutional.

It bears emphasizing that the Founding Fathers’ vision of the Second Amendment explicitly excluded women and people of color. In 1791, the nation ratified the Second Amendment, which linked the right to bear arms to a “well-regulated militia.” The following year, Congress defined the militia to consist of “white male citizen[s].”

Against the racist, sexist backdrop of history, advocates on both sides of Rahimi have advanced problematic arguments. Rahimi’s legal team argues that the statute is unconstitutional because legislatures in the 1800s did not pass laws to disarm domestic abusers—ignoring the fact that until 1850, only one state had passed a law against domestic violence. Meanwhile, in defense of the law, the U.S. government notes past state governments’ willingness to disarm various classes of individuals who were not deemed “law-abiding, responsible citizens,” including “tramps” and “vagrants.” This argument omits the long history of states using facially-neutral, discriminatorily applied vagrancy statutes to target Black Americans after the Civil War, and to the present.

Both arguments—encouraged by the current Court’s extremist ideology—threaten to exacerbate disparities in who is able to exercise their right to bear arms and increase the overall level of gun violence in the present. Today, white men are more than twice as likely as women or people of color to own guns and are three times more likely than women of color to own a gun. Nevertheless, regulations criminalizing gun ownership are overwhelmingly applied to Black and Hispanic people. According to analysis in support of Rahimi, although Black people make up only 18% of New York’s population, they account for 78% of the state’s gun possession cases.

When Black people interact with the police, the mere inference of the presence of a gun can prove fatal, as in the case of Philando Castile, Alton Sterling and so many others. Meanwhile, white armed suspects are frequently captured alive, including the perpetrators of the Emanuel AME Church mass shooting in 2015, the Kenosha, Washington shooting in 2020, and the Atlanta spa mass shooting in 2021. All too frequently, armed white people are treated as “law-abiding citizens,” while (supposedly) armed people of color are presumed dangerous.

At the same time, gun proliferation has hurt women and communities of color. Latinos and Black people respectively are 2 and 12 times are twice as likely as white people to die of gun violence. Nearly 1 million American women have been shot by an intimate partner and Indigenous and Black women are respectively 2 and 3 times as likely as white women to be shot and killed by a partner. Although women and people of color are frequently denied the right to bear arms, they disproportionately bear the burden of America’s gun violence epidemic.

The reality is that the rollback of gun control has hurt everyone. Since 2008, when the Supreme Court first began to overturn gun safety regulations with District of Columbia v. Heller, the annual rate of mass shootings has nearly tripled, from 253 to more than 645, and the annual school shootings has increased tenfold, with more than 300 incidents in 2022. By requiring lawmakers to solve 21st century problems with 18th century tools, the Supreme Court has fueled inequality and exacted a heavy toll on human life.

Instead of parsing who among the population is worthy of gun ownership, or adopting a reckless “more is more” approach, we should work to decrease the overall availability of guns in our society. We might focus on removing categories of weapons from public use and strengthening training and licensing requirements. This approach has been widely adopted by our common law cousins, including Britain, Canada, and Australia, and as a result those countries enjoy much lower levels of gun violence than seen in the United States.

An approach based on universal, rather than categorical restrictions would also find surer footing in the constitutional system developed by the Second Founders after the Civil War. Unlike the generation of 1791, the Second Founders were deeply concerned (although imperfectly), with racial and gender equality, and multiracial democracy. The experience of the war would have laid to rest the extreme idea that the Second Amendment confers a right to armed insurrection. It also underlined the importance of equal protection, and that, to the extent lethal weapons are available, the right to access them must be distributed equitably. Most importantly, having seen the near demise of the constitutional system envisioned by the Founding Fathers, they understood that government needs flexibility to adapt and confront modern challenges.

In the short term, a narrow ruling in favor of the government may help to mitigate the damage done by Heller and Bruen. In the long term, only by embracing universal approaches can we secure a future that is both safe and equitable.

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Taonga Leslie is the Director of Policy and Program for Racial Justice at ACS.

 

Attorneys Failing Us as to the Rule of Law: ‘The Big Lie’

Attorneys take an oath, with some variation, to “. . . support [protect, or defend] the constitution of the United States and the constitution of (their home state).” It is an oath very similar to the one taken by our federal officials, including the President of the United States and members of Congress. It is an affirmative oath which calls one to action and places an affirmative duty on the oath-taker. As the oath makes clear, our Constitution is the very bedrock of our rule of law and worth protecting.

In a recent article in The Atlantic, Professor Laurence Tribe and Justice J. Michael Luttig make the case that the Constitution prohibits Trump from ever being president again, based on Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election – the ‘Big Lie’ that Trump won the 2020 election when in fact he did not – which resulted in the January 6th attack on our Capitol. To reach this conclusion they point out that Section 3 of the post-Civil War Fourteenth Amendment “automatically excludes from future office and position of power in the United States government, [as well as state and local governments], any person who has taken an oath to support and defend our Constitution.” This would include our aforementioned public officials as well as attorneys. Tribe and Luttig point out conservative legal scholars, Professors William Baude and Michael Stokes Paulsen in The Sweep and Force of Section Three, provide evidence that supports this understanding of the Fourteenth Amendment making this a non-partisan issue.

Since the attack on our Capitol, political leaders, many of whom are lawyers, continue to spread and amplify the ‘Big Lie’ not as valid political dissent against some government policy, which would be protected by ‘freedom of speech,’ but as cover for those who engaged in criminal acts during the January 6th insurrection and as an outright attack on the fundamental bases of our constitutional government whether it is the peaceful transfer of power or the “lawful outcome of a presidential election.”

As Baude and Paulsen point out, “it is no defense that an individual might claim that his or her conduct does not constitute having engaged in or supported ‘insurrection’ or ‘rebellion’ because . . . Trump in fact won the election[.] The problem is that the premise is simply false. Decisionmakers can and should act on the well settled factual understanding that Joe Biden won, and Donald Trump lost, the election of 2020.”

The public record is clear. There are political leaders who are pushing lies which attack the very core of our Constitutional Government. “All who are committed to the Constitution should take note and say so,” as Baude and Paulsen urge.

Indeed, the legal profession, all Americans really, should pay heed to the corrosive effects of the actions and words leading up to January 6th and since, which destabilize not only our democracy but our government by people who swore to “protect the Constitution.” What is worse, these same people have moved from baselessly claiming an election was stolen to now attacking the justice system which is charged with bringing them to justice with no basis in fact or evidence to do so.

Many Americans do not know that attorneys are self-regulated through individual state disciplinary commissions. If an attorney breaks one of numerous ethical rules, they can be censured or suspended or disbarred by other attorneys. While there already is scholarly debate and work on lawyer lies and political speech, the attorney’s duty to democracy, and the attorney’s role in the subversion and protection of the Constitution, one need not look at ethical rules when we have the Constitution, the attorney’s oath of office, and the general character and fitness to practice law to consider. If attorneys, these politicians appear to lack the “character and fitness” to be representatives of the profession they are a part of as their conduct goes against the very oath to support, defend, and protect the Constitution. Rather than spreading the ‘Big Lie’ or helping spread the ‘Big Lie,’ or silently standing by while others spread the ‘Big Lie,’ attorneys should be correcting the record every chance they get. Otherwise, those ‘Big Lie’ attorneys prop up the ‘Big Lie’ simply by their societal station of being an attorney.

As Baude and Stokes note, Lincoln once said, a “man who stands by and says nothing, when the peril of his government is discussed, cannot be misunderstood. If not hindered, he is sure to help the enemy.”

To be blunt, it's time we attorneys as a profession stop burying our heads in the sand. This is not a case of a politician embellishing or characterizing another politician as “soft on crime” or “in the pocket of special interest,” or a case of ordinary political dissent. It is an extraordinary direct attack on our democracy through lies. Attorneys who violate their oaths should be held to account professionally whether censured, suspended, or outright disbarred. The legal and political processes will sort out whether politician lawyers should hold political office. However, we attorneys should do everything we can to protect the integrity of our profession and the very foundation of our Constitutional government.

Jim Saranteas is a practicing attorney with over twenty years of experience at the trial and appellate levels in civil litigation. His accomplishments include successful arguments and decisions before, among others, the Illinois Supreme Court. In 2012, the Loyola University Chicago School of Law’s Board of Governors chose him for its prestigious St. Bellarmine Award in recognition for his distinguished contributions to the legal community. He was both an adjunct professor and moot court coach in appellate advocacy for Loyola Law. This year, Saranteas is assisting Duke Law’s Moot Court Board as a volunteer appellate advocacy coach. Saranteas received his J.D. from the Loyola University Chicago School of Law, and his B.A. in Economics & Business Administration from Knox College.

 

Beyond Crisis Narratives: Solutions at the Border and Beyond

Early this year, I wrote about the urgent need for the Biden administration to confront its failures—and those of Republican-led states—on immigration policy. For months, Texas, Arizona, and even Florida had been busing and flying newcomers from the border to New York, Washington, D.C., and Chicago. In turn, receiving states and localities had already begun screaming calamity. And once more, newly arrived migrants had become political pawns: the federal government pointed to them to urge congressional reform; Republican-led states continued to call for a wholesale border closure; and Democrat-led localities pressed the need for more federal dollars.

Sadly, the spectacle has only intensified in recent months, to the detriment of our new neighbors and friends. Mayor Eric Adams has taken a page out of extremists’ playbooks to caution that newly arrived migrants will “destroy New York City,” and Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker called the situation at the border “untenable” for Illinois while calling for more federal investments.

Those of us who live and work at the border know a lot about the “yes and” approach. Mayor Adams and Governor Pritzker are right that receiving communities need more federal dollars and other interventions like Temporary Protected Status designations. After all, the federal government is equipped with tools to respond to fluctuating needs at the border and beyond. And, in the absence of a whole-of-government approach and investment, localities need to govern by investing in humane reception and welcoming efforts in partnership with trusted nongovernmental organizations.

In San Diego, we already have a glimpse of what works. What was once an ad-hoc rapid response effort by local groups has become an exemplary infrastructure of local nongovernmental organizations, state government, and health partners that models how to receive newcomers with compassion. The San Diego Rapid Response Network Migrant Shelter provides humane respite sheltering for people released from border custody before they travel on to meet their loved ones throughout the country. Even in recent weeks, when the number of individuals processed and released has far exceeded existing shelter capacity, in part due to the scaling back of state resources, local groups have coalesced to welcome people in as dignified a manner as possible, while also continuing to call for meaningful investments from local government. The same is true in non-border cities too. In Los Angeles, the LA Welcome Collective has turned Texas Governor Abbot’s crisis narrative on its head by pooling local government and nongovernmental organizations’ resources to humanely receive some of the very buses Texas routinely sends in an effort to foment chaos in Los Angeles.

Beyond addressing the immediate humanitarian needs of newcomers at the border, broader solutions might seem elusive, as many elected officials will have us believe. But, once more, we already know what works.

Many who have consumed misleading narratives do not know that earlier this year, the Biden Administration implemented a program with the power to chip away at them. The Parole Pathways for people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela (CHNV Pathways), announced and implemented in January 2023, creates a safe pathway for up to 30,000 people per month from those four countries to seek advance permission to come the United States for up to two years. During that period, they are eligible for employment authorization. The program is modeled after Uniting for Ukraine, which created a similar (though numerically-uncapped) system for people fleeing Ukraine in the wake of Russia’s invasion.

In order to apply to the CHNV Pathways, individuals must have sworn financial sponsors in the United States and meet other eligibility requirements. They have drastically reduced the number of people from the included countries making the dangerous trek to the southern border, and it’s no wonder why: the CHNV Pathways have created powerful incentives for people to use them, and disincentives for other more risky options. At the same time, across the United States, families, churches, and business are eagerly raising their hands to sponsor people through the program. The CHNV Pathways demonstrate the will of communities across the country to welcome newcomers, which sits in stark contrast to the fear mongering advanced by some politicians charged with leading them.

But the CHNV Pathways are now in the crosshairs of one of the chief peddlers of crisis narratives: the state of Texas.  In a pending lawsuit, Texas and 20 other Republican-led states are seeking to block the CHNV Pathways altogether, and thereby block one of the few programs that, by nearly all measures, works. Together with attorneys from Justice Action Center and RAICES, I represent seven courageous program sponsors who embody its immense benefits and are fighting back against Texas’s attempt to end the program for the whole country. But they remain in jeopardy due to Texas’s lawsuit. This summer, we went to trial in the case, Texas v. DHS, No. 6-23-cv-7, and are awaiting a decision that will determine the fate of at least 1.5 million people waiting for their opportunity to sponsor their global neighbors.

The success of the CHNV Pathways—and the perils of ending them—are reminders that so long as instability exists abroad, no policies, no matter how punitive, will keep people from coming to our doorstep in search of safety, stability, and family reunification. What is within our control is what the process will look like. Do we want safe and systematic pathways to the interior of the country, or dangerous treks, confusing apps, and harsh penalties at the border? Respite sheltering, travel coordination, and work permits to stabilize newcomers; or rhetoric that vilifies and further marginalizes people who need a helping hand to get on their feet?

The more states/localities advance crisis narratives instead of investing in solutions, the easier we make it for Texas et al. to hold good immigration and border policy hostage for the whole country. Border communities—and other communities across the country—know what it means to celebrate newcomers while calling for more permanent investments. It’s past time for leaders on both sides of the aisle to take note.

Monika Y. Langarica is a senior staff attorney with the Center for the Immigration Law and Policy at the UCLA School of Law where she focuses on litigation, policy advocacy, and strategic communications related to asylum and border policy.

 

All In: Latinx/a/o Families & the Battle for Educational Opportunity

Eight-year-old Sylvia Mendez, the daughter of plaintiffs Gonzalo Méndez and Felicitas Mendez. Their California case Mendez v. Westminster overturned racial segregation in education in California and set a precedent for the eventual Brown v. Board of Education case. (via Wikimedia Commons.)

From time immemorial, our nation has struggled to fully overcome its horrid historical treatment of people of color – a history that is rife with violence, subjugation, inequitable opportunity, and denial of the ability to fully participate in our multiracial democracy. Despite the past and ongoing struggles, the fight for equitable opportunities and treatment continues and Latinx communities have often been at the forefront. This is especially pronounced in education, where Latino families have challenged the segregation of students and more recently have helped defend affirmative action in higher education and diversity admissions in K-12.

Mendez v. Westminster School District is one of the more well-known, earlier education cases involving Latino families challenging school segregation. Gonzalo Mendez and four other parents filed a class action challenging the segregation of children based on their “Mexican or Latin ancestry” in four school California school districts. The districts, in part, claimed that the segregation was necessary because the students did not know English. The evidence showed otherwise. In a precursor decision to Brown v. Board’s reversal of Plessy v. Ferguson, the federal district court held that the segregation caused feelings of inferiority upon the students and enjoined the segregation.

But well before Mendez, Latino families were fighting segregated schooling. Among other places, families in Alamosa, Colorado, Lemon Grove, California, and Del Rio, Texas, filed lawsuits challenging assignment of their children to “Mexican schools.” Similar to the defendants in Mendez, many of the schools attempted to use the children’s English proficiency as a proxy for the segregation. The Alamosa case, Maestas v. Shone, et al., was perhaps the first successful case. There, the state district court received evidence of the impact of the segregation on the children and the children testified in English to demonstrate their English proficiency. Following trial in 1914, the judge found the school board in violation of a state law prohibiting racial discrimination in schools, holding “In the opinion of the court … the only way to destroy this feeling of discontent and bitterness. . . . is to allow all children so prepared, to attend the school nearest them.”

More recently, Latinx students have been co-leading the national defense of racial diversity in both higher education and K-12. Latinx students participated as intervenors and amici in both the UNC and Harvard affirmative action cases reaching the Supreme Court. Represented by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Law, Latinx, Black and Asian American students testified in both cases about the challenges they faced in high school, where they often had to fight to be placed in advanced courses. They also testified about the social and academic benefits of being educated in more diverse settings. Although the Supreme Court rejected Harvard’s and UNC’s affirmative action programs, the critical testimony of Latinx students and their peers on the importance of race and ethnicity in shaping their experiences may have influenced Chief Justice Roberts’ opinion in holding that students may continue to lift up, and have considered, their racial experiences in their applications.

In K-12 schools, Latino families and organizations have banded together with Black and Asian American groups to defend diversity admissions programs at specialty high schools in several communities including Fairfax, Boston, and Montgomery County, Maryland. The diversity admissions programs followed examinations by the respective school districts of prior policies that were largely based on unvalidated admissions tests and fees and were leading to the exclusion of Black, Latinx, English learner, and low-income students. To make their schools more inclusive, the districts revised their admissions policies to de-emphasize or eliminate standardized tests, and substituted other, more effective race-neutral policies without considering the race of any applicant. The opposition claims that the districts revised their admissions policies to exclude Asian American students under the Equal Protection Clause, even though Asian American students remain the highest enrolled student population in the schools compared to their overall population. Essentially, the plaintiffs in these cases argue that school districts are prohibited from making changes to existing policies if they have merely considered racial demographics as part of their analysis—even though race is not a factor in admissions decisions.

The Fairfax case, Coalition for TJ v. Fairfax County Public Schools, is pending certiorari before the Supreme Court in a petition filed by the plaintiff, while the other cases are in the federal courts of appeals. To date, none of these challenges has been successful.

These are only a handful of the many impact cases and movements where Latinx community has played a key role. From Rodriguez v. San Antonio I.S.D. to Plyer v. Doe, from Martinez v. New Mexico to Cruz-Guzman v. Minnesota, and so many others, Latinx families and advocates continue to serve as a powerful presence and ally in the pursuit of racial and ethnic justice in education.

David Hinojosa is the Director of Education Opportunities Project at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, where he spearheads the organization’s systemic racial justice work in guaranteeing that historically marginalized students of color receive equal and equitable educational opportunities in public schools and institutions of higher education. 

A Diverse Legal Profession Requires Hispanic Representation

As we celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month, it is undeniable that Hispanics are growing in both influence and population, now nearing 20% of the total U.S. population. That growth continues to shape the community, traditions and culture of the United States, most notably in the areas of food, music, art, and religion.

Less obvious are the significant contributions that Hispanic lawyers are making within the legal profession.  As the ABA found in a 2020 study, the number of Hispanic attorneys grew only 1% over the last decade.  Today, only 5.8% of all lawyers are Hispanic. Though any increase is welcome, there is clearly a long way to go before Hispanic participation in the legal profession begins to approximate the total Hispanic population in the U.S.

Nonetheless, as the newly installed National President of the Hispanic National Bar Association (HNBA), I am heartened by the strides Hispanic lawyers continue to make in the profession.  We are a small but mighty force and the sphere of Hispanic lawyer influence is on the rise. We see an increasing level of access to spaces where Hispanic lawyers have been traditionally underrepresented (if represented at all), such as board rooms, corporate C-suites, judicial roles, and higher-level government positions. With access comes information and the power to influence.  There are many organizations, including the HNBA, who are working hard each day to identify barriers, educate members and provide resources to lawyers, both younger and more seasoned, as they navigate the legal profession.  The most important of those resources is mentorship.  There is no deficit of Hispanic talent; the deficits are a lack of resources and information.

Today, there are increasing challenges to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives in the courts and in the court of public opinion. The Supreme Court’s decision in Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA) v. Harvard is a setback that will undoubtedly and disproportionately affect aspiring Hispanic law students.  History will ultimately be the judge of the motivations that underlie the efforts to curtail DEI programs and I am confident that history will not be kind. As the US Supreme Court recognized in its 1954 decision in Hernandez v. Texas, Hispanics have long been subject to discrimination based on their ethnicity. That discrimination, whether overt or subtle, continues to undermine Hispanic participation in legal and other professions.

At the same time, there are economic and demographic forces that will continue to help propel the interests and representation of Hispanic (and diverse) lawyers forward.  Law firms, corporations, government, and individuals in need of legal representation are calling for diverse representation. There is a demand and a need for more Hispanic lawyers. Universally accepted laws of supply and demand will ultimately help minimize the barriers created by challenges against DEI programs and higher education admissions policies.

Furthermore, the legitimacy of and faith in our democratic institutions requires diversity in the legal profession. According to the ABA, “racial and ethnic diversity in the legal profession is necessary to demonstrate that our laws are being made and administered for the benefit of all persons. Because the public’s perception of the legal profession often informs impressions of the legal system, a diverse bar and bench create greater trust in the rule of law.” The governed must have faith in government and its institutions. Such faith is enhanced when the bench and bar are diverse and empowered.

Decisions such as SFFA will, at least in the short term, surely stunt growth and diversity in the professional world. Organizations like the HNBA will need to work harder and smarter to ensure continued representation in the legal profession in the face of a changing higher education admissions landscape.

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Daniel Mateo is a Partner at Holland & Knight, and currently serves as President of the Hispanic National Bar Association.

The Importance of Hispanic-American Advocacy in the Fight for Voting Equality

As kids head back to school this fall, the weather cools, and we look ahead to Thanksgiving and the holiday season, many Americans are preparing for a different fall tradition.

Hispanic Heritage Month is a time to reflect on and celebrate the history, culture, and achievements of Hispanic Americans from every corner of our country. And like many Americans, Hispanics played a pivotal role in the nation’s fight for equality at the ballot box.

The Voting Rights Act (VRA) of 1965 is considered a landmark bill, and understandably so. The VRA is credited with helping dismantle the Jim Crow policies throughout the American South, and ushering in hundreds of candidates of color to better reflect America.

Many people may not know about the advocacy of Hispanics, Latinos, and Chicanos in passing important reforms in the 1975 VRA extension. A month before President Ford signed the updated VRA, officers from the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission brutally beat farmer and activist Modesto Rodriquez as he stood outside a bar attempting to recruit Chicanos to testify about voting discrimination.

Hispanic and Latino activists joined forces with Black legislators, notably Barbara Jordan, the first Black woman elected from the South to Congress, to push for provisions that would break down barriers for Spanish-speakers at the ballot box. The reforms, passed in 1975, required states and localities to provide non-English ballots and voting materials in states and localities where significant numbers of non-English speaking Americans lived.

Ten years after the passage of the 1975 Voting Rights Act reforms, the number of Mexican-Americans holding county and municipal offices in Texas increased from 353 to 559. In 1977, Congress counted just seven Hispanic members, today there are 62.

Perhaps no one embodies the rise of Latinos in politics more than my friend and mentor, the late Bill Richardson. Governor Richardson was the first Latino to run for the Democratic nomination for president, among many other prestigious positions he held over his career. During his two terms as New Mexico’s governor, he was the only Latino governor in the country. Governor Richardson also spent 14 years serving in Congress, and it was my honor to later be elected to the same House seat in 2008.

Today, Latinos and Hispanics are the second largest voting bloc in the country. In 2020, Latinos cast 16.6 million votes in 2020, an increase of 30.9% from 2016. The 2020 election marked the first time in history when over 50 percent of eligible Latinos cast a vote. Despite these gains, voter suppression laws, aimed at depressing the Hispanic and Latino vote, persist in states such as Arizona and Texas.

And just like in 1975, voting rights activists of today are pushing back. Here in Congress, Democrats introduced the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, legislation that would, among other things, require jurisdictions with high rates of non-English speakers to seek pre-approval from the Department of Justice before changing language assistance voter materials.

In my home state of New Mexico, lawmakers recently passed the New Mexico Voting Rights Act. The bill will automatically register voters at the Motor Vehicle Department, allow for same-day registration, mandate two ballot drop boxes per county, and restore voting rights of previously incarcerated individuals upon release. I believe in these provisions and I think they will make it easier for all New Mexicans to cast a ballot.

So, as we spend this month celebrating and reflecting the enormous achievements of Hispanics, we should remember individuals like Modesto Rodriguez, who even in the face of severe brutality, fought for the rights of his community. We should celebrate the giants of public service like Bill Richardson, who has left behind a great legacy for the next generation of Latino leaders. I encourage all the young Hispanics and Latinos who are fighting for immigration reform, racial justice, and a clean energy economy, to not give up. We will never live in a true democracy until every single American is able to make their voice heard.

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Senator Ben Ray Luján has served as the junior United States Senator for New Mexico since 2021.