As we all know, the highly-anticipated presidential elections are next week. As millions of Americans make up their minds about who they want leading our country for the next four years, IQLatino brings you this comprehensive guide to familiarize yourself with nominee Joe Biden’s agenda for the Latino community.
Joe Biden recognizes that this country’s diversity and ability to draw and welcome people from all cultures and nations is an indisputable source of strength. He also recognizes that, after four years of the current administration’s constant assault on Latino dignity, some important changes need to be made for our community to recover from the current crisis, move forward and thrive as full members of our society. The changes highlighted in Biden’s plan for the Latino community are as follows:
Invest in Latino economic mobility
Every Latino should be able to work to enter the middle class. Joe Biden’s plan calls for supporting public-private investment through a new small business opportunity plan to address disparities in wealth and access to capital among Latinos and other minorities. This plan includes investing over $50 billion in public-private venture capital into Latino entrepreneurs, expanding access to $100 billion in low-interest business loans by funding programs in Latino communities, and eliminating barriers to technical assistance and advisory services in our communities.
Additionally, Joe Biden is committed to ensuring that Latino workers are compensated fairly and treated with dignity, especially Latina women, who make 54 cents to every dollar a white man ears. Joe Biden plans to increase the federal minimum wage to $15, guarantee up to 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave, and expand protections for undocumented immigrants, farmworkers, and domestic workers. Moreover, the Biden plan aims to invest in infrastructure to make child care, housing, transit networks, water systems and electricity grids better, more affordable, and more sustainable for our communities.
Joe Biden plans to invest in Latino homeownership by helping families buy their first home and begin to build wealth. He plans to do so by spurring the construction of 1.5 million homes and public housing units, creating a new refundable and advanceable tax credit of up to $15,000, calling for more accurate, non-discriminatory, and inclusive credit scoring and by providing housing vouchers to eligible families so that no one has to pay more than 30% of their income on rent.
Invest in ending health disparities by race
Joe Biden is committed to ensuring access to health care during and beyond the Covid-19 crisis, recognizing the fact that Latinos have been disproportionately affected by the pandemic. He will protect pre-existing conditions, and ensure that young people can stay covered by their parents’ plan until the age of 26.
Additionally, the Biden plan calls for the creation of a public option, improving the care of chronic conditions, lowering costs for Latinos enrolled in Obamacare plans, lowering drug prices, reducing the high Latino maternal mortality rate, doubling investments in community health centers, expanding access to mental healthcare, and tackling social determinants of health. Lastly, his plan will invest $70 billion into Hispanic-serving institutions, minority-serving institutions, and historically black colleges and universities to help tackle health disparities.
Expand access to high-quality education and tackle racial inequity
One of the most important ways to improve the condition of our community is by expanding access to education. Under Joe Biden’s plan, Title I funding will be nearly tripled to ensure competitive pay for teachers, access to pre-school, rigorous coursework including STEM, expanding community schools, doubling number of school psychologists, nurses, counselors and social workers, and supporting English learners.
Additionally, the Biden plan will increase college completion by making college more affordable to Latino students and helping them tackle college debt. $50 billion will be invested into workforce training, including community-college business partnerships and apprenticeships, and Dreamers, who have been proven to become valuable and productive members of society, will be provided with additional higher education opportunities.
Combat hate crimes and gun violence
It is important for our communities to be safe. According to the FBI, anti-Latino incidents increased by more than 40% between 2016 and 2018. Joe Biden will unequivocally denounce and fight against white supremacy, and provide the moral leadership that this country needs as an example to treat each other with respect and dignity. Under a Biden administration, hate crimes will be prosecuted and offenders will be held accountable. Additionally, he will invest $900 million into an eight-year initiative to fund evidence-based interventions in 40 cities with the highest number of homicides, which is estimated to save 12,000 lives.
Reform our immigration system and secure our values as a nation of immigrants
The United States is a country of immigrants. Whether our families came here two, 20, or 200 years ago, the contributions of immigrants to this country are undisputable. Joe Biden plans to overhaul our broken immigration system and reverse the harmful immigration policies of the Trump administration, implementing instead a sensible, humane and responsible approach to immigration and protecting our borders. He plans to do so by creating a roadmap to citizenship for the 11 million undocumented immigrants who live, work, and are productive members of our society. The Biden plan will eliminate unfair barriers to naturalization, reform the visa program for temporary workers in select industries, and fast-track the process for those to have been essential to pandemic response and recovery efforts.
Additionally, his plan will protect and expand the existing asylum system, expand the annual visa cap for victims of human trafficking and reinstate, expand, and streamline protections for Dreamers and the parents of American children. He will protect existing Temporary Protected Status (TPS) holders and grant TPS to Venezuelans escaping from an oppressive regime and humanitarian crisis in their home country. Family unity will be prioritized in his immigration plan, and he will end family separation. His plan will also end workplace and community raids and protect sensitive locations like schools, houses of worship, health care facilities, benefits offices, and DMVs. His plan reaffirms enforcement officials’ use of prosecutorial discretion for deserving cases so that resources and manpower may be directed towards high-priority targets and keeping our country safe. More effective and cost-efficient community-based alternatives to detention will be prioritized, and conditions will be improved in detention centers. Lastly, the Biden plan seeks to address root causes of migration by working with and assisting our Central American neighbors to become stronger, more secure and capable of delivering futures of opportunity for their own people.
For more on Joe Biden’s agenda for the Latino community, click here. For his full immigration plan, click here.