Latino USA

The “virtual wall” across the U.S.-Mexico border is made up of things like drones, sensors, cameras and… surveillance towers.

Both Democrats and Republicans have supported border technology through the years, but advocates and researchers argue that a virtual wall can be as controversial, and deadly, as a physical wall.

On this episode, producer Reynaldo Leaños Jr. travels to southern Arizona where one of the first major concentrations of surveillance towers on the southern border were built, and he looks at what these towers mean today, and for the future of those crossing, and living, there.

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This week Latino USA brings you an episode of the The Burden: Avengers podcast.

Miriam Lewin is one of Argentina’s leading journalists today. At age 19, she was kidnapped for her political activism and thrown into a concentration camp. Thousands of her fellow inmates were executed, tossed alive from cargo planes into the ocean. Miriam survived. Then as a journalist, she waged a campaign to bring her tormentors to justice.

Avenger is a podcast series produced by Orbit Media that tells the story of one woman’s triumphant battle against unbelievable odds to survive torture, claim justice for the crimes done against her and others like her, and change the future of her country.

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Felipe Coronel, aka Immortal Technique, is a legendary underground hip-hop artist known for his skills on the mic and his raw, highly political lyrics. The Peruvian-American rapper became well-known for his first album in 2001, "Revolutionary Vol. 1" and particularly for his infamously brutal song "Dance With the Devil." Tech says growing up in Harlem during the 80's and 90's caused him to harbor a lot of rage—much of his music discusses colonialism, poverty, and corruption. We sit down with Immortal Technique to get a deeper sense of what it was like growing up in Harlem and how his rage has played into his successful music career.

This episode originally aired in 2019.

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In 2001, Nickelodeon started airing "Taina," a show about a Latina teen who attends a performing arts high school in NYC and daydreams of being a star. While the show only lasted two seasons, "Taina" is seared into the memories of many who grew up watching it, because at the time it was rare to see an authentic portrayal of what it was like to be a Nuyorican teen in the early 2000s. In this episode from our vault, Maria Hinojosa talks to the show’s award-winning creator Maria Perez-Brown, who is Nuyorican herself, about jumping into the world of children's television after being a tax lawyer, and the surprisingly long legacy of “Taina.”

This episode originally aired in 2019.

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With DACA and the Dreamers poised to be back in the center of the national conversation, Latino USA revisits this episode about what it means to be young and undocumented in the United States today. In 2013, a group of young undocumented activists known as the Dream 9 staged one of the riskiest protests in the history of the immigration rights movement. They willingly left the U.S. to Mexico, and then demanded to be let back into the country despite lacking legal status. Their efforts landed them in detention—and in the national spotlight.

This episode originally aired in October 2015.

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This week Latino USA brings you an episode of Future Hindsight.

Host Mila Atmos is joined by Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, the Policy Director at the American Immigration Council, a non-profit organization that strives to strengthen the United States by shaping immigration policies and practices. They discuss how out-of-date immigration laws are and why the only cure is comprehensive immigration reform from Congress.

U.S. immigration laws have not changed since the 1990s. The current border enforcement and asylum system dates back to 1996, and in fact, one of the reasons that asylum seekers are living in shelters is because Congress decided in 1996 to make it illegal for them to get a work permit until six months after they apply for asylum. The asylum system is severely underfunded and is a major reason for processing delays.  In addition, there are more than 4 million people who have already been approved for visas but the wait time to get the legal status is decades long.

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Maria Hinojosa sits down with award-winning Mexican actors Diego Luna and Gael García Bernal to talk about their latest projects together—"La Máquina", Hulu’s first original Spanish language series and "State of Silence," a Netflix documentary about the threats and dangers Mexican journalists face while reporting in their country. Diego and Gael also discuss how they foster their lifelong friendship, and how the two create politically powerful art. 

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When Paloma, a second-generation Mexican-American trans woman, was attending Maria Hinojosa’s class at Barnard College, she was using they/them pronouns. Back then, she was downcast and barely spoke a word. Years later, Maria started seeing Paloma’s social media posts as a fabulous and outgoing drag performer. How did that happen?

In this episode, we follow Paloma in her journey to womanhood—a journey that started in her family home in the Bay Area and continues today, after months of Hormone Replacement Treatment (HRT). 

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A week after the re-election of Donald Trump, Maria Hinojosa is joined by ITT all-stars Imara Jones, journalist and founder of Translash Media, and Karen Attiah, Washington Post Opinion columnist. They dive into the far-reaching implications of Trump’s victory for our communities and what it means for the future of American democracy.

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This week, Latino USA brings you the first episode of The Tenant Association, produced by Los Angeles Public Press. 

The series follows a group of tenants who came together and fought back against their landlord. It’s a story about neighbors—elderly, young, immigrant, working class renters. Many of them are Latine and Asian and had lived for decades in an apartment complex in LA’s Chinatown. Until they got a rent increase that was basically an eviction notice… and decided to fight to stay in their homes. They’ve become a political force to be reckoned with, and changed what we think is possible for renters in Los Angeles. The tenants of Hillside Villa have been fighting for six years, and they’re not done.

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