Top stars in Latin music on Saturday pleaded for tolerance in a concert from the US-Mexico border, taking a stand weeks ahead of a divisive US presidential election.
Thousands of people turned out in the walkway between San Diego and Tijuana, Mexico, for the show put together by Univision, the US Spanish-language network with a strong following among Hispanics, and its English-language, youth-oriented unit Fusion.
Called “RiseUp As One,” the concert was officially non-partisan, but came amid the heated rhetoric of US Republican candidate Donald Trump, who has described Mexican immigrants as rapists and vowed to build a wall on the border.
Photo: AFP
Rene Perez of the Puerto Rican reggaeton group Calle 13 appealed for US voters to pick the “least worst” candidate, in a clear reference to Democratic candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton, and closed the concert with the song Latinoamerica in a powerful duet with the Mexican singer Lila Downs.
Downs, one of the most energetic performers of the evening, appealed to Latinos to prove that the community is “stronger than hate.”
Los Tigres del Norte, a top act from the folksy Mexican-rooted genre of norteno music, opened the concert poignantly with the song Somos Mas Americanos (We Are More American).
“I didn’t cross the border / The border crossed me,” runs one of song’s lyrics in Spanish, a reference to the US seizure of Mexican land in the 1840s.
While mostly consisting of Latin artists, the concert also drew Andra Day, the rising San Diego-born soul singer and protegee of Stevie Wonder.
Outside the music world, stars who appeared included the Mexican actor Gael Garcia Bernal, whose films include Babel and the TV series Mozart in the Jungle.
“Migration is the reason that we’re here on this planet and the reason why humanity has survived,” Garcia Bernal told interviewer Jorge Ramos, the Univision anchor who has entered tense exchanges in covering Trump.
The veteran Panamanian-born singer Miguel Bose encouraged viewers to vote on Nov. 8.
“We’re going to decide if we want progress and dignity or if we want regression and chaos,” Bose said.
“For me as a Latino, I’m very worried and I’ve come to tell you that you have a weapon, and that is your vote and our voice,” he said.
Other major acts included Spanish singer-songwriter Alejandro Sanz, Colombian stars Carlos Vives and Juanes, and Mexican pop singer Natalia Lafourcade, who triumphed at last year’s Latin Grammys with five awards.
And Uruguayan star Jorge Drexler sang Al Otro Lado del Rio (The Other Side of the River), his Oscar-winning song from The Motorcycle Diaries, the 2004 biopic in which Garcia Bernal stars as revolutionary Che Guevara.
“I don’t know where I’m from / My house is on the border / And borders move like flags,” the song goes in Spanish.
Surveys have shown Clinton enjoying a major edge over Trump among Hispanics, who make up 17 percent of the US population and — unless turnout spikes this year — about 12 percent of the electorate.
Wilmer Valderrama, the Miami-born actor of Colombian and Venezuelan descent best known for That ’70s Show, said that the US was defined by immigrants.
“My family and I are the living proof that the American dream can come true,” he said.
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was