2 days ago
Pride and community at Sox Mexican Heritage Night game amid immigration crackdowns
There are few things more American than baseball. But on a recent Mexican Heritage Night at Rate Field, it was something more layered, more defiant and deeply moving.
Amid the crack of bats and the roar of the crowd, this sliver of the South Side of Chicago felt like it belonged — completely — to its people. To the vendors shouting in Spanish, the kids in their Sox jerseys, the swaying to mariachi in the stands. The smell of and the sound of Banda music coming from the parking lot.
They were all there to watch baseball and to celebrate their culture despite the newfound fear sparked by immigration crackdowns in the city of Chicago and its surroundings.
In that space, at a Sox game against the Kansas City Royals, for a few sacred hours, joy roared louder than fear.
To be sure, few places feel completely safe for Mexicans nowadays. Many now have strong roots in Chicago, their families are a mix of U.S. citizens and loved ones who are lacking permanent legal status.
That means that most times, everyone is on high alert. For many Chicagoans, deportations are starting to hit home. Just last Wednesday, an estimated 20 people were rounded up during surprise check-ins at the federal agency's Intensive Supervision Appearance Program offices in Chicago. Similar arrests were reported that day in New York, San Jose and Birmingham.
More reports of raids at suburban factories spread through the end of the week.
So for many, it is a strange, almost surreal thing to celebrate their roots in a public arena these days.
In a country where anti-immigrant rhetoric has again tightened its grip, where deportation raids are haunting families like shadows on back porches, where policies continue to dehumanize under the guise of 'law and order,' showing pride can feel like an act of rebellion.
While the White Sox as an organization steers clear of making overt political statements, its commitment is to create an inclusive, welcoming environment, said Sheena Quinn, vice president of public relations for the White Sox.
Quinn said that nights like these are not about politics, but about community — about making sure every fan feels seen, valued and celebrated.
,' as my Mexican grandfather said. The team of the people.
There's a reason these nights matter. They aren't just cultural marketing or feel-good footnotes. They are necessary sanctuaries — moments of unapologetic presence.
In a time when neighbors who lack permanent legal status are being disappeared from their jobs or at immigration hearings, when headlines reduce human beings to statistics or threats, to be seen and celebrated in the open air of a stadium is no small thing.
And the beauty of baseball is that it offers something like solidarity, even if unspoken.
You can sit next to someone you might never talk to on the street — an old-school South Sider, a first-gen college kid, a Polish grandma, a Mexican father with his daughters — and for nine innings, you're all just fans. The field becomes neutral ground. The flags waving — U.S. and Mexican — remind us that identity isn't binary. It's layered, sometimes conflicted, always rich.
There's healing in that. And hope.
Because joy, in the face of trauma, is a kind of resistance. Celebrating your culture in the open, without apology or permission, is its own form of protest. And when a community gathers — not in mourning or defense, but in celebration — it says something powerful: We're still here. We belong.
So yes, the night ended like any other ballgame. Final score posted. Sox won 2-7 and had a majestic fireworks show while '' by Vicente Fernández played in the background.
Fans trailed out to their cars. But what lingered wasn't just a win or a loss. It was a sense of collective breath — a reminder that joy isn't frivolous. It's fuel. It's armor.
And in the face of everything this country continues to throw at immigrant communities, that joy under stadium lights may be the most radical thing of all.
