5 Latina Activists Disrupting the Political Status Quo

Empowering graphic showcasing five Latina activists challenging the political norms with their advocacy and action.

First Installment of the “Latinas Who Lead” Series

Luz Media

In a new summer series, “Latinas Who Lead,” we’re highlighting Latinas who are at the forefront of social justice movements in the United States, advocating for change and equality in many different ways. From civil rights to environmental justice to entrepreneurial equity, you can bet passionate Latinas are making a significant impact in their communities and beyond. To give them well-deserved recognition and offer sources of inspiration for your own advocacy and activism, here are the first 5 Latina leaders in our series:


Marisa Franco

Portrait of Marisa Franco

Photography courtesy of Marisa Franco

Marisa Franco is a prominent Latino rights advocate and community organizer based in Phoenix, Arizona who fights for immigrant rights. She’s known for organizing campaigns and protests against deportations, detention centers, and discriminatory immigration policies, such as the #Not1MoreDeportation campaign back in 2014. She’s also the co-founder of Mijente, an online organization that serves Latino and Chicano activists, helping them organize their efforts to dismantle systems of injustice and inequity.

The organization has achieved some significant gains against the prison industrial complex, which makes billions of dollars a year through the mass incarceration of Americans and immigrants. Their #notechforice campaign addresses the predatory ways tech companies are making millions of dollars by violating civil rights and allows communities to support the efforts through petitions and other easy actions. They also have a petition tool where anyone can start their own petition for a cause they want to support.

Alejandra Gómez

Portrait of Alejandra G\u00f3mez

Photography shared by ywcaaz.org

As a daughter of Mexican immigrant parents, Alejandra Gómez realized very early on how broken the U.S. immigration system is. This planted the seed of passionate activism that eventually led her to become one of a cadre of highly effective and dedicated Latina community organizers in the state of Arizona.

In the wake of the disastrous SB1070 law in 2010, known as the “show me your papers” law, that allowed Arizona law enforcement to stop and detain anyone at all just for “appearing” to be in the U.S. without proper documentation, Gómez joined thousands of activists who refused to allow her community to be terrorized by the state. The law was partially struck down just two years after then-Governor Jan Brewer signed the bill into law.

Gómez continued to focus her efforts on immigration rights and community justice and helped organize large-scale efforts to empower Latinos to vote and understand that when enough people come together, their collective actions are powerful and influential.

As the Executive Director of the Arizona Center for Empowerment and LUCHA, she’s been involved in many high-profile community wins, including the ousting of controversial Sherrif Joe Arpaio. More recently, through organizing efforts, she helped get abortion protections on the 2024 ballot and helped secure 150 million dollars for the Arizona Trust Fund to address the affordable housing crisis.

Ana María Archila

Portrait of Ana Mar\u00eda Archila

Photography courtesy of Ana María Archila

Ana María Archila, of Colombian descent, got a lot of national attention back in 2018 during the confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh when she confronted Senator Jeff Flake in an elevator about sexual assault. She’s a dedicated advocate for women’s rights, immigrant rights, worker justice, and LGBTQ rights. She leans heavily on political engagement and grassroots organizing to empower immigrant communities, low-income communities, and women of color.

She’s led several national organizations, including the Center for Popular Democracy and Make the Road New York, where she significantly increased the influence and presence of their members across the United States. As if that wasn’t enough, she ran for Lt. Governor of New York in 2022.

Archilla is now the Co-Director of the New York Working Families Party, where she’s focused on building a multiracial working people’s political party that can enact an agenda that creates real material change for working people in the U.S.

Carmen Perez

Portrait of Carmen Perez

Photography shared by gatheringforjustice.org

Carmen Perez is a Chicana feminist and a devoted activist fighting for civil rights, women’s rights, gender equity, community policing, violence prevention, and more. She’s the CEO of The Gathering for Justice, a nonprofit focused on ending child incarceration and the racial disparities that plague the criminal justice system in the U.S. Perez was also one of the co-chairs of the 2017 Women’s March, the largest single-day protest in the history of the country for women’s rights. Women’s March continues to this day, organizing events around the country to create change.

Raised in Oxnard, California, she frequently returns to her roots to help lead or participate in community events that empower local youth and adults alike. She recently told the VC Star, “Good trouble is when you are out there with people that you love making sure that justice prevails.” She punctuated the words with a laugh. “I find myself getting into good trouble often.”

Cristina Tzintzún Ramirez

Portrait of Cristina Tzintz\u00fan Ramirez

Photography courtesy of Cristina Tzintzún Ramirez

As the co-founder of the Workers Defense Project and founder of Jolt, Cristina Tzintzún Ramirez has been a tireless advocate for the rights of immigrant workers and Latino youth her entire adult career. Her activism is focused not only on immigrant rights but also on voting rights, universal healthcare, climate change, economic justice, fair wages, fair working conditions, and more.

She’s led successful campaigns for workers’ protection, immigrant rights, and voter mobilization, driving positive change at a local and national level. Many of these campaigns are notable for their creativity and focus on culture. While at Jolt, she helped lead the #PoderQuince campaign, which helped young quinceañeras use their 15th birthday parties as a platform to register and mobilize Latino voters. It’s well known that quinceañera parties are steeped in culture and community, and by leveraging these gatherings, they were able to register and activate tens of thousands of new Texas voters.

To expand her activism Tzintzún Ramirez co-authored a book, “Presente! Latino Immigrant Voices in the Struggle for Racial Justice” in 2014, and ran for the U.S. Senate in 2020 in her home state of Texas. She’s currently the Executive Director of NextGen America, the nation’s largest youth voting rights organization.

These five Latina activists are contemporary examples of resilience, passion, and dedication. Their efforts are a source of inspiration and empowerment in the Latino community, and they’re leading the next generation of Latinas fighting for justice and equality. Keep an eye out for the next installment in the series and join us in getting to know more of these impactful Latinas.

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Image by Sayuri Jimenez.

Nathalie Molina Niño has never been one to shy away from breaking barriers, and now, she’s focusing her attention on a new mission: demystifying corporate boardrooms for women, especially Latinas. Molina Niño is the President of Known, an asset management and financial services firm, a veteran tech entrepreneur and builder capitalist, and a board member at the iconic lingerie Brand, Hanky Panky, and others.

Like many corporate boards, Hanky Panky hadn’t publicly disclosed its board composition until recently. After the brand survived the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, Molina Niño decided it was time for more women, specifically more Latinas, to know what it means to be on corporate boards.

Coincidentally, the decision to finally be more vocal about this topic aligned with the start of Hispanic Heritage Month, which served as the perfect kick-off to the work.

"Something that rarely gets talked about and I think almost gets kept opaque by design is boards,” she explains in a recent Instagram announcement. “[This Latinx Heritage Month], that’s what I’ll be talking about.” Her goal? To equip more Latinas with the knowledge they need to navigate onto for-profit boards, where they can thrive and build multi-generational wealth.

For-profit corporate boards often feel like an exclusive club. And in many ways, they are, especially for Latinas, who hold the smallest percentage of board seats in Fortune 500 companies compared to other racial groups. According to the latest report from Latino Board Monitor, while Latinos hold 4.1% of these board seats (compared to 82.5% held by white people), only 1% go to Latinas. Molina Niño, a first-generation American of Ecuadorian and Colombian descent, is part of this boardroom minority.

When asked about her experience as a Latina board member during a recent Zoom interview, she said, “It’s been lonely. There’s not a lot of Latinas on boards.” She went on to explain that even serving on boards of Latina-founded businesses gets lonely because, “A lot of the times, people who serve on their boards represent their investors and, as a result, [...] you still don’t see a lot of Latinas on those boards.”

This lack of representation drives Molina Niño’s determination to increase Latina presence in corporate boardrooms. By sharing her insights, she hopes to give Latinas a roadmap to claim their seats at the table. “If you don’t know where to go, it’s impossible to figure out how to get there,” she says.

The Road to the Boardroom

Getting onto a for-profit corporate board isn’t an overnight achievement, but it’s not an unattainable dream either. People often think you need to be a CEO or have a certain type of background, but that’s one of the biggest myths about boards in Molina Niño’s experience. What they’re really looking for is expertise — whether that’s in finance, marketing, sustainability, or even technology. If you have that expertise, you’re already an asset. It’s simply a matter of which road you should take.

Understanding what boards are and how they operate is key to unlocking opportunities. For-profit boards serve as the governing body for companies, overseeing direction and financial stability, and guiding CEOs and executives in decision-making. But Molina Niño emphasizes that not all for-profit boards are created equal.

“There are two kinds [of for-profit boards] [...]. There’s the publicly traded business board and then, on the privately held side, there are, I would argue, two types of boards [...] the traditional business board and the venture-backed business board,” explains Molina Niño. Traditional businesses are often family-owned or long-established and may only form boards to meet requirements, like securing financing or transitioning through an ESOP. Venture-backed boards, on the other hand, are typically filled by investors who hold major stakes in the company.

According to Molina Niño, understanding the difference between them is how you can create a successful strategy. With publicly traded business boards, the whole world is privy to them, so, “The way that you get in there is a little bit more transparent. Sometimes those publicly traded companies will hire a recruiter to help them find new board members,” explains Molina Niño. For private companies, on the other hand, there’s no legal requirement to make announcements. As a result, most people don’t know anything about them or their inner workings.

“Usually what happens in traditional businesses that don’t have venture-capital investments is that the Founders, Executives, or the board members, if one existed already, they usually go to their friends,” and people they deem experienced to fill board seats. In other words, it’s the founder’s decision, and that’s an entirely different approach than hiring recruiters. When it comes to venture-backed business boards, the seats on the board are filled by whichever investor writes the biggest check.

This is why an understanding of the different types of boards and acknowledgment of their own strengths is what will help Latinas define a sound strategy. Whether that’s working with a recruiter, networking and connecting with founders to build trust, or making the biggest investment.

The Path for Latinas

For Molina Niño, the key to getting more Latinas into corporate boardrooms is education. Knowing what a board looks like and how it functions is how you can position yourself to get on it. In openly talking about this, without the mystique it’s usually shrouded in, Molina Niño is providing women, especially Latinas, with invaluable insights. “If we had Latinas understanding what are the three types of for-profit boards I think that, on their own, they would be able to figure out what their best chance is and adjust their careers to make themselves more competitive,” states Molina Niño.

When asked about the impact of increased Latina representation in boardrooms, Molina Niño flips the narrative. “Boards don’t help Latinas by offering them seats; Latinas help businesses thrive by being on their boards,” she says. “The whole point of sitting on a board is that you have experience and expertise, and as Latinas, you also have some cultural experience that everyone wants. [...] At the end of the day, we [Latinas] have to realize that we have a ton to offer and we have to be selective about where we put that expertise,” she explains.

As demand for access to the Latina consumer rises, Molina Niño predicts that more Latinas will find themselves recruited into boardrooms. But she’s not content to sit back and wait for that moment. By openly sharing her journey and insights, she’s making sure other Latinas know their worth and have the tools to claim their place at the table. “I realized that quietly being on boards that helped me personally is not helping other Latinas. [...] I was lucky enough to have friends who could advise me and share their experiences, so that’s why I’m doing this,” she stated.

With Hispanic Heritage Month as the backdrop, Nathalie Molina Niño’s mission is clear: “My goal is just to give Latinas enough information so they can make a plan for how to eventually get on a board that they’re paid to be on and that will eventually help them build generational wealth.”

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