Last summer, I participated in a fundraiser for Congressman Tony Cárdenas in San Fernando, CA. We raised about $12K from a network of Latino small business professionals. The congressman was pleasantly surprised…Why? Because even though he is one of the strongest Latino advocates in government, Cárdenas told me that more than 95% of his political donations came from outside of the Latino community. Hmmm…seriously?
In September, I spoke with María Teresa Kumar, the CEO of Voto Latino, one of the most effective voter registration organizations in the country. María shared a similar story, expressing to Sol Trujillo and I at L’ATTITUDE, that the funding for her organization also comes almost exclusively from outside of the Latino donor community. My God….
Money is part of the political process. If Latinos want our issues prioritized, we need more Latinos in congress and we need to donate money to candidates who support our issues. While none of this is a secret, it is simply not a discipline that we have acquired. With all the talk about the growing Latino political clout, the reality is we have a long way to go. We may have the numbers, but we don’t know how to play the game. I know a lot of people who consider themselves advocates, who say they’re passionate about our issues, but when it comes to writing a check they go dark. Everyone has the choice on whether or not they want to participate in our political process, and there is definitely reason to be somewhat cynical, but if you don’t express your views with your vote AND your pocketbook, you aren’t playing major league ball, and your viewpoints will never be heard.
Marisa Calderon, my friend and colleague, recently took the bold step of running for congress in her home district, the 53rd congressional district of California. I think she would be an outstanding elected official. She has a large network of Latino professionals, so it will be interesting to see how well she is supported by them. Sol Trujillo and I have both made maximum donations to her campaign and I hope some of you will as well.
If you would like to donate to Voto Latino, you can do it here. If you want to support Marisa Calderon for Congress, you can do it here. Change begins now!
Next week, I will be speaking at a Hispanic Leadership Summit at the United Nations. I was asked to speak on the topic of Unity. The following is a preview of my speech.
The image of Latinos is not just a nice thought; it affects everything from business opportunities and access to capital to how our children are treated at school. Latinos are among the hardest workers and most entrepreneurial of any group in America. However, negativity has dominated the narrative about Latinos for far too long. This one is on us.
We currently have 11 million unfilled jobs in America. Ending illegal immigration will either dramatically increase that number and have massive disruption to our economy, or we will have to...