LUCHA

Living United for Change in Arizona (LUCHA)

Seed the Vote

Ozuel Dolvares

Illegal Alien Voting

An article by Kayla Dwyer posted at the Indianapolis Star dated February 28, 2024 cites Jonathan Diaz from the Campaign Legal Center claiming that a requirement to prove citizenship before voting is "intimidating." "The chilling effect on voters," he said, "I don’t think can be overstated." "It’s legislators wanting to say they are cracking down on illegal voting, even though illegal voting is not really happening," he continued. The Campaign Legal Center filed a lawsuit on behalf of Living United for Change in Arizona (LUCHA), the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), Arizona Students Association (ASA), and Arizona Democracy Resource Center (ADRC) challenging Arizona’s H.B. 2492, signed into law on March 30, 2022, which requires proof a citizenship to vote.

Center for Popular Democracy

As of February 20, 2023, LUCHA is listed as an "affiliate" of the Center for Popular Democracy.

Seed the Vote/2022 Midterms

Axccording to Larry Hendel:

When Seed the Vote formed in 2019, it was an experiment. No plans were made to maintain the organization after the presidential election. But last year they decided to keep the organization going at least through the midterms. Over the last year when the punditocracy was pronouncing that Democrats were destined to lose both the House and the Senate, STV rose to the challenge and started gearing up for the elections in battleground states. Part of the strength of this group is their perseverance and willingness to jump into the work.

UNITE HERE and STV are working together now in Nevada, Arizona and Pennsylvania. Additionally, STV is working again with LUCHA in Arizona; People's Action in Wisconsin; Pennsylvania Stands Up in Pennsylvania; New Georgia Project and the Asian American Advocacy Fund in Georgia ;and Durham for All in North Carolina. All these groups are based in communities of color and do year round community organizing as well as election work.

Reclaiming Our Victories

Detroit Action was live. November 4 2020.

Battleground: Reclaiming Our Victories.

Organizations that have been organizing and let the Get Out The Vote in different battleground states come together to share about the powerful transformation in their states.

• Becca Guerra - Democracy Alliance
• Ale­jan­dra Gomez and Tomas E. Robles, Jr. - LUCHA
• Andrea Mercado, The New Florida Majority
• Art Reyes, We The People Michigan
• Brianna Brown and Michelle Tremillo, Texas Organizing Project
• Nse Ufot, New Georgia Project
• Branden, Detroit Action

Organizing Updgrade

Host Xiomara Corpeno talks with Gina Mendez (field director) and Stephanie Maldonado (campaign director) about LUCHA's leadership in the struggle in Arizona.

2020 election

Last but not least is Ari­zona, which Trump won by 91,234 votes in 2016. In this state, Seed the Vote part­ners with Liv­ing Unit­ed for Change in Ari­zona (LUCHA), which advo­cates for the rights of the state’s large Lat­inx pop­u­la­tion, and has been wild­ly successful.

In a 2019 New York Times op-ed, LUCHA founders Ale­jan­dra Gomez and Tomas E. Robles, Jr. state that Democ­rats ​“have long treat­ed com­mu­ni­ties of col­or as instru­ments of some­one else’s pow­er rather than core pro­gres­sives who should be instru­ments of their own pow­er.” This is despite the fact that there are 1.2 mil­lion eli­gi­ble Lati­no vot­ers in Ari­zona, mak­ing them a high­ly impact­ful vot­er base.

In the years since its cre­ation, LUCHA has launched a high­ly suc­cess­ful recla­ma­tion of that pow­er. In the 2020 August pri­maries, 14 of the 15 leg­isla­tive and coun­ty can­di­dates LUCHA sup­port­ed were vic­to­ri­ous. In the pri­maries, LUCHA endorsed Sanders. The orga­ni­za­tion hasn’t open­ly endorsed Biden, but its work hasn’t stopped, and the mis­sion is clear: kick Trump out of office.

Lucha Arizona people

Lucha Arizona November 10, 2015;

Today, we made history!

Thank you to all the community, organizations, and elected officials, volunteers but above all, thank you to the brave and courageous workers who are standing up for all workers in the country for the #fightfor15 — with Pita J. Samayoa, , Anabel Maldonado, Yosselin Benavides, Xochitl Rayas, Viridiana Hernandez, Natacha Chavez, Anel Luisa Mercado, Patrick Morales, Andrea Adum, Raquel Teran, Ian Danley, Araceli Becerra, Ken Chapman, Esmeralda Garcia, Richard Andrade, Tomas E. Robles, Jr., Cristina Gallardo-Sanidad, Aldo Gonzalez, Chris Fleischman, Antonio Valdovinos and Michael Angulo at LUCHA - Living United for Change in Arizona.