Maria Hinojosa Talks About Her New Book And How She Was Nearly Separated By Immigration From Her Mother

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KEVIN ABOSCH
Maria Hinojosa would hesitate to say the word in front of her father. Chingona is coarse Mexican slang, loosely translated as badass. Yet, its a term the Latina newsroom pioneer feels good about owning.
She deserves it. For the past quarter century, Hinojosa has been the voice of Latino USA, a weekly program on NPR where she serves as both anchor and executive producer. 
Born in Mexico City, Hinojosa grew up in Chicago and attended New York Citys Barnard College. During her career, shes reported for CBS
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, NBC, CNN, and PBS and won many journalism awards, including the Overseas Press Clubs Edward R. Murrow Award.
The four-time Emmy winner is also an entrepreneur, the force behind Futuro Media, a Harlem-based multimedia nonprofit which seeks to amplify voices often missing from mainstream media.
In this interview, the acclaimed journalist shares her thoughts about the U.S. immigrant experience, her new book, Once I Was You: A Memoir of Love and Hate in a Torn America, and how she came to use the word chingona to describe herself.
What role do you think marketers can play in changing the narrative about the Hispanic community?
We live in a consumer society. One of the things we have to recognize is that, in our lifetime, the brand immigrants has been destroyed. 
The marketing has transformed us into something that we are not. Imagine what would have happened over the last 50 years, even 25 years, if the people who ran Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, The New York TimesNYT
, Washington Post and Time had all latched onto the true brand of Latino immigrants. 
What would have happened if, rather than sending the message that immigrants are problematic or immigrants are not worthy and are stealing our jobs, Forbes had published a headline like Salvadoran immigrants are coming to the United States. And they’re going to bring this amazing food called pupusas. And the next day, a headline like, Did you know that Mexican immigrants are propping up the American economy by this percent? or Latinas in the United States are the most brand-loyal consumer. And the next day, Argentinian refugees are arriving into New York. But guess what? They’re bringing tango with them. And the next day, Cubans are leaving the island. But what a boon for us. Because Cubans know how to make anything out of nothingand they’re going to dance while they’re doing it. 
I’m over boarding, but if you understand anything about how we Latinos and Latinas and immigrants spend our money, then it is the silliest thing in the world that this country can’t wrap its head around the immigrants that are here.
Simon and Schuster
You were often the first Latina in newsrooms where you worked.
My first job was in 1985 at the height of another recession. I was just happy to have a job as an American journalist. It wasn’t like, Oh my god, I’m the first Latina. I got that I wasn’t going to blend in. Then, it was definitely like, Bueno [Well ] 
I was definitely being who I was. I was wearing my high heels, my hoops, my hairbecause they’re staring at you anyway. We have a saying in Mexico, taco del ojo [eye taco like eye candy]just give them something to look at. It was also a way in which I was able to process what was going onthe loneliness, feeling out of sorts, being afraid, the imposter syndrome. 
What I realized was that I had extraordinary privilege, this amazing possibility to help change maybe how one person sees Latinas and Latinos because we really were a word that I don’t use anymore: a minority.
It’s not like mi papá [my dad] would say this, but it’s like I could hear him in my head saying to me, No vine a este país  I didn’t come to this country for my daughter to go to a phenomenal college for you to feel like you can’t speak up. I forced myself to own my voice and own my power, which I hope is another message from Once I Was You.
In the book, you write that, as a child you were nearly separated from your mother by U.S. Immigration. What happened?
My father was a medical doctor, recruited by the University of Chicago. We all had our green cards. We were meeting my dad, who was already in Chicago, and we were flying. We were privileged. The way the story was told to me was that something happened when we got to the Dallas airport, but she stood up to the immigration agent, and here we are.
Before the pandemic, when I was out almost every week giving a public speech, I would tell this story about how my mom was this hero, how she stood up to the agent, and that was where I got my big mouth. 
Then the horror started to happen, where we heard the sounds of the children screaming for their mothers and fathers. In the midst of all of this, my mother calls me, and she is crying. That’s when she says to me, It could have been me. 
I’m like, Mom, what are you talking about? 
And she’s like, I could have been one of those mothers whose children was taken away. 
And I was like, Ma, pero, made que hablas? [Mom, but, momwhat are you talking about?]
She was like, Sweetie, it could have been you. You could have been one of the babies that was taken, that’s what they were trying to do to you at the airport.
Then, as we say in Mexican Spanish, se me cayó el veinte, the coin dropped. I was like, Oh, my God. 
It wasn’t a fluke. It wasn’t just one weird immigration agent. There was a policy, actually up through 1964 in the state of Texas, a policy to search over Mexicans bodies to make sure that we were not bringing in sickness and illness.
That immigration agent at the airport was checking my body. I had a rash. He said I had an illness and he was going to put me in quarantine. He said those words to my mother, We’re going to keep her. 
My mother said to me, I realize now I was in a state of trauma. It was fight or flight. She said, The only thing that I had was my privilege, my voice, the fact that I spoke a little bit of English and I had these green cards, and my state of panic that this man was threatening to take my child.
Now, I understand why I do this work. This is the sad part. If I was feeling that traumaand I’m a child of privilege with a green card in an airportthen the trauma of the babies who have been taken, who right now are living in foster care, who are in the cagesthat trauma is going to come up. That trauma is going to come back.
“Chingona” is coarse Mexican slang, loosely translated as badass.
Kevin Abosch
In the headshot your team sent, youre wearing a necklace with the word chingonanot the politest word in Spanish. What does the word mean for you?
I’m from Mexico City, and we’re very bad mouthed there. It’s a word that is bandied about but the first time that someone who I knew and respected used it as an affirmative was Sandra Cisneros, the writer. I interviewed her for an HBO project called The Latino List. I remember Sandra realizing it on her own at that moment. She was like, Yeah, I am a chingona
 and Im gonna own it.
In fact, the chingona necklace is made by Sandra Cisneross jeweler, an Argentinian refugee herself who is now Mexican.
I want to make people feel a little bit uncomfortable. I do. Yet if you look at my eyes in that photograph, I’m actually incredibly peaceful.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity. Listen to the full episode of The Revolución Podcast featuring Maria Hinojosa on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, iHeartMedia, Spotify or by clicking here.read more