By Josh Hughes
Ray Corona had a hard 2016. As a member of the queer Latinx community, the November election only signified a portion of the hardships he underwent as the year continued. In May, his grandmother, an important guiding figure in his life passed away, and in December, his mother died of a heart attack. At 25, Corona is the first undocumented queer advocate to be appointed to the city of Seattle LGBTQ commission, a cofounder of the WA Dream Coalition, which is the largest youth led organization in the state, and the founder of SOMOS, an extremely new socio-political group for LGBTQ Latinx folks. In his own words, “my mind is always going 1000 miles per hour,” and despite any and all adversities he has faced, he’s not here to leave a quiet impression.
Corona spoke at Western on April 26, giving a lecture co-hosted by the WWU Blue Group — the university’s organization for undocumented students — and the Queer Resource Center. During his two hour lecture, he touched on his upbringing as the only undocumented person in his family, how the impact of his friends and family has helped him in his career and activism, and where he plans to head with his Latinx LGBTQ organization.
After leaving Mexico City at the age of 9, Corona and his family moved up to Everett, WA, and he stayed in the PNW for the rest of his upbringing. While everyone else in Corona’s family had a visa, he did not, though he came through the northern Canadian border, something often overlooked in immigration.
“The southern border is not the problem, it’s the law itself that has not kept up with the times,” Corona said, addressing the larger-than-administration issues of illegal immigration, undocumented Americans and the backward philosophies that remain in place on the issue. He expressed frustration with major news outlets as well, talking about the ways in which places such as Fox and NBC don’t cover the topic of immigration properly, especially how it intersects with other issues.
As a member of the LGBTQ community as well, Corona has lived his life at the intersection of two minority identities, to the point where he has to constantly be coming out to different people in different ways. He jokingly told a story about needing to explain to his partner that he’s undocumented because he saw a poster for this exact lecture, but the sentiment holds true that in the communities that Corona is a part of, he lives in a state of needing to validate and explain himself constantly.
“As undocumented, as queer, it’s a challenge,” he said, before explaining the positive impact that both his friends and family have had on him in his path.
As a first generation college student and graduate from UW, Corona has already made quite a big impact in the Seattle area Latinx LGBTQ community, giving back to the communities that helped raise him with the intent of making the Pacific Northwest a more inclusive, safe space for minority groups.
His current project is SOMOS, a month old, nonprofit organization that he’s still in the beginning stages of getting off the ground. Before SOMOS, there was only one Latinx LGBTQ organization in the state of Washington, and so his goal is to create relevant content for people of color and queer folks in the PNW region.
“I want to build community, I want to cultivate that sense of community between queer Latinx folks,” said Corona near the end of his lecture. While SOMOS is currently entirely a volunteer-based organization, he intends to make it a much bigger project over the years to come. The original goal was to stay active on social media, so SOMOS can easily be found on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, posting original content as well as shared articles that relate to the community.
“If you can ever use this, I’m the plug for this one,” said Corona just before leaving his talk, with a casual, excited demeanor, “Single, bilingual, and ready to mingle — hit me up!”