Nationwide Hispanic Heritage Month Observance, 2023

Completely satisfied Nationwide Hispanic Heritage Month! This 12 months’s theme is “Latinos: Driving Prosperity, Energy and Progress in America.”  That theme has made me mirror upon my circle of relatives’s historical past on this nation and the way far we’ve come.

As a lot of you recognize, I’m Mexican American and a fifth-generation Arizonan, which implies my household has been in Arizona because the 1700s.  My great-great Nana Eduvijes Fontes was a pioneer lady, who lived by way of exhausting occasions in the course of the Despair, witnessed battles of the Mexican Revolution, and traveled a whole lot of miles alongside what’s now generally known as the Arizona-Mexico border serving to information troopers within the Arizona desert. My different great-great Nana operated a meals stand, even promoting as soon as to Francisco “Pancho” Villa, who was a pacesetter within the Mexican Revolution. My household additionally contains my Tata Albert, who was a veteran and a mechanic for the Metropolis of Phoenix, and my Nana Celia, who raised 11 children together with my mother, Eduvijes. 

Eduvijes Fontes

Elevating a big Mexican American household in Phoenix within the Fifties and 60s meant going through discriminatory indicators like “No Canine or Mexicans.” My mother used inform me tales about peering into downtown division retailer home windows, admiring the gorgeous clothes, however by no means with the ability to go inside. She’d additionally inform me concerning the occasions when the household dressed as much as attend mass within the downtown Basilica. My household was by no means allowed within the upstairs pews—however as an alternative, can be pressured to take a seat and pray within the basement of the church. They had been remoted and hidden from the remainder of the church goers.

Eduviges Fontes in The Every day Arizona Star paper.

Remarkably, and a testomony to the “Prosperity, Energy and Progress in America,” my mom’s daughter now runs the Workplace for Civil Rights on the U.S. Division of Well being & Human Companies—only one technology later. My household’s tales, my roots, and our collective experiences form who I’m, and the work I do with all of you. I’m very happy with my historical past and tradition. I take into consideration my household daily in our work—what they’ve skilled and overcame, and the way I obtained right here. I do know every of you’ve got your personal household histories that drive you to advancing the mission of our workplace and civil rights in our nation. I’m ecstatic to have the ability to share mine.

HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra pictured with OCR Director Melanie Fontes Rainer and her mom.

I’m additionally proud to be a part of an Administration that helps and honors the varied historical past of generations of Latinos, who’ve formed this nation. This month, President Biden signed a proclamation on Nationwide Hispanic Heritage Month to focus on the very important contributions that our colleagues, together with our personal head of HHS, Secretary Xavier Becerra, in addition to greater than 62 million Latinos make within the U.S. This Administration has additionally made fairness a Day One precedence, together with rising Latino enrollment in healthcare by roughly 1 million individuals, offering over 7.6 billion {dollars} in funding for 1400 Group Well being Facilities (CHCs), which predominately serve Latino and communities of colour, and enhancing prescription drug protection and reducing prices by way of the Inflation Discount Act.

And this month, I participated in a panel titled “Latinas to the Entrance: Dialog concerning the State of Girls’s Well being” on the first-ever HHS Hispanic Well being Summit. Latinas are notably weak within the reproductive well being area, with 6.5 million Latinas now dwelling within the 26 states which have banned or are more likely to ban abortion. I proudly spoke on the actions that HHS has taken to guard reproductive healthcare, and an summary of civil rights protections that Latinas are coated by, and the assets which can be made obtainable by my workplace. This dialog is essential and wanted available.

Latinas to the Entrance: Dialog concerning the State of Girls’s Well being Panel

The work we’ve finished to enhance the lives of Latinos dwelling in America makes me proud. I’ll all the time use my household’s historical past as motivation in working with all of you to meet the OCR mission. ¡Feliz Mes de la Herencia Hispana!