WASHINGTON — Sen. Ted Cruz wants to block federal agencies from using the term “Latinx.”
Cruz, a Texas Republican whose father emigrated from Cuba, said Thursday he was introducing, along with Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., a bill that would prohibit federal agency chiefs and their employees from using it in any official communications or forms.
“Hispanic Americans overwhelmingly oppose the term ‘Latinx,’ and I want to make sure our government does not bow to woke activists in our federal departments or agencies by insisting on ridiculous terminology like this,” Cruz said in a press release. “It has no place in official government communication, and I’m proud to work with Sen. Rubio to keep it out.”
The short bill, which does not spell out penalties for violations, is unlikely to reach President Joe Biden’s desk.
“Latinx” emerged about two decades ago as a gender-neutral alternative to “Latino” and “Latina.”
Proponents of its use say it’s more inclusive, particularly when it comes to LGBTQ individuals. It has grown in popularity, but has not gained widespread acceptance.
Critics deride it as an invention of elite academics, a term adopted by left-leaning activists that most in the Latino community have ignored or rejected outright.
Flashpoint
Among the criticisms is that attempting to strip a Spanish term of gender amounts to “Americanizing” another language and culture.
It’s a flashpoint in the larger political battle between Republicans and Democrats over the hearts and minds of Latino voters.
Republicans say, and even some Democrats concede, that many of those voters are more culturally conservative than the progressive wing of the Democratic Party and have been turned off by rhetoric that includes such terms.
Republicans have cited various times government officials have used the term, including Biden talking in 2021 about the difficulties of getting “Latinx vaccinated” because, he said, they were concerned about being deported.
Garnering more Latino votes could be key to the GOP’s future electoral prospects, particularly in areas such as South Texas.
Republican Monica De La Cruz of McAllen flipped a key House district in South Texas last year, becoming the first Hispanic woman to win the seat.
In her victory speech, De La Cruz told cheering supporters her win represented a “victory for every single Hispanic who loves the Spanish language and does not want to be called Latinx.”
Domingo Garcia, a former Democratic state representative from Dallas and now the national president of the League of United Latin American Citizens, told his staff to drop the term from official communications in 2021.
At the time he said the term was “very unliked” by most Latinos, but that does not mean LULAC is backing Cruz’s proposal.
“LULAC has adopted a policy of not using LatinX, but we do not support creation of federal legislation that bans the word,” Garcia said in a statement when asked for reaction to the Cruz bill.
Garcia declined to elaborate further on his reasoning.
LULAC describes itself as the nation’s oldest “Hispanic civil rights organization,” dedicated to “the advancement of the Latino community.”
In a December 2019 poll by Pew Research Center, just 23% of U.S. adults who self-identify as Hispanic or Latino had heard of the term Latinx. Only 3% of that group said they use it to describe themselves.
Human rights and immigration attorney Martha Menendez wrote in a 2021 opinion piece that the term first started to gain traction in the mid 2000s.
The fact that Spanish is an inherently gendered language means it was bound to hit a wall of “necessary self-reflection” in a world where ideas about gender and nonbinary identities are constantly evolving, Menendez wrote.
“Hence, Latinx appears as a way to circumvent the issue and has steadily grown in popularity over the years to where it was finally added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary in 2018,” she wrote.
Menendez acknowledged that few people are using the term, but wrote that polling has shown it is more popular among young people, even if those numbers remain low, indicating the potential for a generational shift.
“Sure, the word is clunky; it doesn’t roll off the tongue,” Menendez wrote. “My Spanish-speaking, non-U.S.-living cousins and aunts and uncles are going to probably look at me sideways every time I use it in their presence . . . But Latinx is the best we’ve got for now, and if I’m picking a side, I will err on the side of inclusion. Always.”
