Enrique M. Buelna

Enrique M. Buelna is a faculty member in the History Department at Cabrillo College. He specializes in Chicano history with an emphasis on class, race, labor, radical activism, civil rights, immigration, culture, and identity. He is the author of Chicano Communists and the Struggle for Social Justice (2019). Dr. Buelna earned his doctorate in history from the University of California, Irvine, and holds an M.A. in Public Administration from the University of Washington, Seattle.
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Trump Can’t Win The Battle for Los Angeles
The idea that Trump can intimidate, criminalize, and remove us with a wave of troops and tanks is not only absurd—it’s offensive. We’ve seen soldiers in unmarked uniforms rolling through neighborhoods as if they were patrolling Fallujah. But this isn’t a war zone. This is Pico Union. This is Boyle Heights. This is Huntington Park. These are our homes. Our neighborhoods.
Opinion: Donnie TACO and the War on All Things ‘Mexican’
The irony of the T.A.C.O. acronym is that it appears to have caught Trump and his MAGA supporters off guard. Like a magic trick—presto—the tables have turned. And now they’re stuck. The mere idea of Trump being linked to a Mexican-adjacent term is infuriating to them.
Opinion: Stranding Kilmar Abrego Garcia In El Salvador Is a Symbol of The Decline of the U.S.
Bukele is not resisting the U.S.—he is helping perform political theater alongside Trump. And Abrego Garcia is the prop.
Opinion: We Must Defend Chicano Studies From Trump’s Attacks …Again
There is no doubt that attacks on courses like Chicano Studies are coming—indeed, they are already here. The assaults seen on Tucson’s Mexican American Studies and the1619 Project will only intensify and spread nationwide. The real question is: Are we prepared to confront them?
English-Only? Even the Founding Fathers of the U.S. Said No
The only thing that would have been odd to the Founding Fathers, many of who were multilingual, was an English-only country.
Why Waving a Mexican Flag at a Protest in the U.S. Is a Form of Resistance
Raising Mexican flags is not an act of anti-Americanism. Quite the opposite—it is an expression of cultural pride, dignity, and resistance in the face of racism and intolerance. In the United States, waving the Mexican flag—or any national flag—can be an act of defiance against oppression, a declaration of one’s humanity and rights in response to relentless denigration by movements like MAGA that seek to marginalize entire communities. Even Trump would agree...