LULAC Launches Its Largest In-House Effort to Ensure Voter Access and Defend Voting Rights

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), the nation’s oldest and largest Latino civil rights organization, has launched a voter protection program intended to ensure all eligible voters can cast their ballots free from intimidation. The program is specifically designed for Latino voters, who are among communities vulnerable to voter suppression efforts nationwide.

This voter protection program is the largest effort in LULAC’s history to defend the right to vote. It comes as voters across the country are highly motivated to exercise their right to vote but face systemic intimidation efforts on multiple fronts, including threats to deploy federal agents to polling locations, mass challenges to voter rolls, and attempts to disrupt mail ballots being sent or counted. These threats fall disproportionately on marginalized communities, including millions of Latino and immigrant voters who are naturalized citizens, first-time voters, and voters who rely on mail ballots. Through its targeted effort, LULAC will center the Latino and immigrant community, ensuring they can access help when they need it.

“If you are a legal citizen and an eligible voter, you have the right to exercise your vote without intimidation—full stop,” said Juan Proano, CEO of LULAC. “We are depending on our council leaders to be our eyes and ears on the ground. We have built the infrastructure to track what is happening, and we are prepared to act if and when we need to. Our community will not cower to attacks on our basic rights.”

In partnership with Democracy Defenders Fund (DDF), LULAC will draw on legal expertise, follow up on reported issues, assess potential violations, and pursue legal action or other advocacy where needed, while leveraging a broad network of national and state-based legal organizations and other community partners across the voter protection ecosystem.

At the center of this program is a bilingual, 24/7 national hotline with a robust backend system that tracks reported issues arising across LULAC’s councils and their communities in real time. The English-language voter incident hotline is https://vamosavotar.org/report, and the Spanish-language hotline is https://vamosavotar.org/es/report. The technology recognizes addresses and geographic locations, allowing LULAC National to receive real-time information from local leaders, quickly identify patterns of voter suppression, and respond. LULAC will coordinate its efforts with existing voter protection hotlines and resources. This effort is part of a broader program to protect the vote and is intended to complement work underway nationwide to support voters across all communities.

“Democracy is at its best when civic participation is high for all communities, and people feel empowered to exercise their rights,” said Tianna Mays, legal director at Democracy Defenders Fund. “The right to vote is a cornerstone of our democracy. We are partnering with LULAC as part of a broader nationwide effort to protect the fundamental right to vote.”

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Democracy Defenders Fund brings together a nonpartisan team to work with national, state and local allies across the country to defend in real-time the foundations of our democracy.

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