This is part 2 of Gabriel Buelna and Enrique M. Buelna's essay on the shortfalls of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials. Here's part 1.
The rules of the American political game have shifted profoundly, and national Latino organizations are struggling to keep pace.
This lag is dangerous. We are in the midst of a political crisis unlike any other in our history, and Latinos are at its center – cast as the enemy and attacked on all fronts. Meeting this moment requires more than recycled strategies from the past; it demands bold, reimagined approaches equal to the scale of the threat.
In these times, organizations like the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (“NALEO”) risk becoming irrelevant – or worse, negligent – in protecting and advancing the lives of Latinos in this country. We stand at a critical juncture, and rebuilding our organizing efforts is essential to meeting the escalating threat from the White House and other right-wing sectors wishing to harm our communities.
NALEO was founded in the 1970s to confront the dire need of representation and political power among the different Latino communities. In this sense, the organization was thrust into the trauma and urgency of Chicano and Puerto Rican activism and struggle coming out of the Civil Rights Movement.
But the architects of NALEO, and other such organizations, understood that the trauma went even further back – decades back. Many in our communities still lived with the terrible memories of the mass deportations of the 1930s and 1950s, segregation in housing, education, employment, and public facilities in general, as well as poll taxes, gerrymandering, and a myriad of other voting restrictions. So they needed to act strategically if they were to build capacity and project political power.