"Latine" will now be recognized as one of the legal terms for citizens of Latin American descent, according to a recently signed Connecticut law.
Democratic Gov. Ned Lamont signed a bill on Monday that confirmed, "on every official communication or form of a state agency relevant to the Latin American community, or communication by a state employee on behalf of a state agency relevant to such community, such communication or form shall use the terms ‘Latino’, ‘Latina’ and ‘Latine’ to refer to such community."
"Latine" has recently emerged as a gender-neutral alternative for non-binary and transgender Hispanic citizens in response to the controversy surrounding the term "Latinx."
The bill itself originally emerged from five Hispanic Democratic lawmakers opposing the term "Latinx" and calling for a ban back in February.
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"If 98 percent of Latinos or Latinas prefer to be called that, we should be worried about offending the majority, not only the minority," State Rep. Geraldo Reyes, one of the bill’s sponsors, told the Connecticut Insider.
However, after the bill’s introduction, Reyes said the meaning of the bill was being misconstrued as an attack on the LGBTQ community. This backlash led to State Rep. Matt Blumenthal confirming that the law would not prohibit any terminology in documents so long as they included "Latino", "Latina" and "Latine."
"I think the word ‘banning’ threw a lot of people off," Reyes said. "Because, at the end of the day, we really don’t want to ban ideology and we really don’t want to ban words."
The bill was introduced one month after Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed an executive order to ban the term "Latinx" from government documents.
"Ethnically insensitive and pejorative language has no place in official government documents or government employee titles," Sanders' executive order stated. "The government has a responsibility to respect its citizens and use ethnically appropriate language, particularly when referring to ethnic minorities."
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The executive order cited a 2019 Pew Research poll that found only 3% of American Latinos and Hispanics used the term "Latinx" to describe themselves. The poll also found that a majority of Hispanics had not even heard of the term.
Reyes previously referred to the term as "offensive" to him as a Puerto Rican.
"This has been offensive and derogatory to all Puerto Ricans, and it’s something that hasn’t sat well with a lot of people here for a while," Reyes said. "When I found out that [Sanders] banned it on her first day in the office, I saw that as an opportunity for me to do the same thing."
Despite backlash from Democratic lawmakers, the Biden administration has repeatedly used "Latinx" to describe the Hispanic community. In 2021, President Biden was lambasted for using the term when describing vaccination equity.
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"It's awful hard as well to get Latinx vaccinated," Biden said. "Why? They're worried they'll be vaccinated and deported."
