When Joe Biden played “Despacito” from his phone to a crowd of Hispanic youth in September 2020, I rolled my eyes and thought the pandering from the Biden family couldn’t get any worse.
Then in March 2021, Jill Biden tried to say “Si Se Puede” to a Hispanic crowd in California and absolutely butchered the phrase. Surely, I thought, this is what rock bottom looks like.
And then, First Lady Jill Biden took the stage in San Antonio and compared Hispanic Americans to “breakfast tacos.”
At that moment, Biden and Democrats diminished my community’s rich and diverse culture in an attempt to pander. It’s dismissive, condescending and disrespectful.
While it might be easy to laugh at Jill Biden, we should remember this wasn’t off the cuff: She read these prepared remarks from a teleprompter. This was a planned speech that dozens of Biden officials saw and signed off on. It’s a revealing window into how this Democratic administration views Hispanic Americans.
We should note that Jill Biden made her ridiculous comment at an event called the “LatinX IncluXion Summit.” The term Latinx is an attempt by Democratic elites to erase the fundamentals of the Spanish language in order to feel good about themselves. It speaks to a broad disdain among many Democrats and their mainstream media allies for the Hispanic community. There’s a reason only 2 percent of Hispanic Americans refer to themselves as Latinx, while 40 percent find it offensive.
I’ll put it this way: This comparison is less surprising when you consider that the far-left is the same crowd who tried to change a thousand-year-old language from the comfort of the safe spaces they created on their college campuses.
I cannot believe I am writing this but: Dear Democrats, we are not a monolithic group looking to be patted on the head with references to our food and music.
We are Americans concerned with the same things that other Americans worry about: filling up our gas tanks, getting a good education for our kids and living in our communities without fear of violent crime. Unfortunately, Joe Biden has made all of these things harder to do. Gas prices are through the roof, far-left woke warriors are pushing radical ideologies on our kids and violent crime is spiking in cities run by Democrats. Democratic failures have made it harder to achieve the American dream that so many Hispanics — like my parents — came to this country to pursue.
I am hopeful, though: there’s a wave of Hispanic Republicans flipping the script on the very Democrats that have taken our votes for granted. Take Rep. Mayra Flores (R), who recently won an election in a deep-blue part of the Rio Grande Valley in Texas. She ran on the oh-so-radical platform of “Dios, Familia y Trabajo” — God, family, and work. The New York Times promptly labeled her a “far-right Latina” for daring to discuss her values. This is the same kind of dismissive labeling that Biden and Democrats have gotten so good at.
Give us competent leadership, not twenty seconds of “Despacito.” Under President Trump and Republicans, Hispanic unemployment rates hit record lows, the economy boomed and Mexico was using its own military to guard and secure its own border. None of that is the case now. There is a reason that only about 24 percent of Hispanic voters approve of Joe Biden’s performance in office: It’s because he has failed us on the issues that matter. Biden could drill in America to drive down gas prices, respect parents who raise concerns about their kids’ education, support our police, and secure our border.
Sadly, he is probably more likely to call me a churro than do any of that.
I look forward to helping elect Republicans to turn our country around and deliver real results for all Americans. If any shell-shocked Democrats want to understand why they’ve lost the trust and respect of Hispanic Americans, I’m happy to grab lunch and explain.
Tacos will be on me.
Danielle Alvarez is the Republican National Committee’s communications director.