Updated 08:00 AM EDT, Fri, Mar 29, 2024

Latino Celebs Sign Letter Imploring People Not to Vote for Any Republican Candidate

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Latino celebrities have signed a letter urging their fellow Latino voters not to elect any Republican candidate for this year's presidential election.

The letter was drafted and posted online by the advocacy group, People for the American Way, or PFAW. Among the 22 signatories of the letter are Zoe Saldana, George Lopez, America Ferrera, Aubrey Plaza, Steven Michael Quezada, Carlos Santana, and Ivonne Coll, PFAW's website listed.

PFAW President Michael Keegan said that the letter addresses the anti-immigrant policies planned by the Republican presidential candidates, led by Donald Trump and followed by Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and Jeb Bush.

"From accusing Mexicans of being rapists to kicking Jorge Ramos out of his press conference, Trump has spent the entirety of his presidential bid stoking unfounded anti-immigrant fears and deeply offending our communities," the letter reads.

"We must not, though, let Trump's xenophobia overshadow the extreme policies being pushed by every single one of the GOP's leading presidential candidates. Latinos should understand that Donald Trump embodies the true face of the entire Republican Party. Sadly, he speaks for the GOP's anti-immigrant, anti-Latino agenda."

Civil rights leader and PFAW board member Dolores Huerta said it sickens her "to hear them paint immigrants as terrorists, commit to deporting DREAMers and separating families, and ignore the critical contributions of Latinos and immigrants to our nation," the group's website added.

Puerto Rican actress Coll condemned Trump for comparing Mexicans to rapists and Rubio for depicting immigrants as budding terrorists. The letter also criticized Bush for using the term "anchor babies," which goes along with his belief that all immigrants should not be granted paths to American citizenship, saying that the United States "should not have a multicultural society."

The letter went on to decry Rubio for ruling out any path to citizenship or legal status if he gets elected as president, and Chris Christie for suggesting that immigrants should be tracked like FedEx packages.

Ferrera urged young Latinos to register and vote in the upcoming elections.

"We have the numbers and potential to make a difference," the "Superstore" star said, as quoted on PFAW's website.

Huerta, a Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient, has served as an advocate for the Latino community since the 1950s. She told Huffington Post that she has never seen such rampant racist and blatant views about immigration like what she's seeing now among national political candidates.

A report released by the Pew Research Center last month revealed that eligible Latino voters have reached 27.3 million in number. 44 percent of these potential voters are millennials, which are adults with ages ranging from 18 to 35.

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