In a videoconference on Monday, Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard announced a new institution to protect and promote the Spanish language in the U.S. The César Chávez Digital Institute will also encourage research and be a sounding board against racial discrimination and hate crimes, and was announced on the anniversary of the 2019 El Paso shooting, in which a gunman killed 23 people, considered as an act of domestic terrorism and a possible hate crime against Hispanic and Latino Americans.
“I am certain that if (the killer) would have gotten to know us, learn who we are, I don’t think he would have been capable of (the act),” El Paso County Judge Ricardo Samaniego said at Monday’s unveiling of a plaque with the names of the 23 victims of the shooting.
Ebrard said in a statement that the institute will aim to “disseminate the Spanish of Mexico and its culture to dignify Mexican communities abroad, rescue and disseminate their cultural expressions and promote academic research on trilingualism.”
“Culture is and has always been the Mexican tradition in foreign policy because we understand that the political imaginary is always organized on the basis of culture. All of humanity’s great battles have begun in the struggle of culture,” said Ebrard.
Although the new entity will initially operate only in the U.S., the intention is that it will be active over time in other regions.
