Latin American Diaspora Forum: Democracy, Human Rights, Resilience, and Civic Participation

This is a space for reflection and analysis on the challenges and opportunities facing Hispanic migrant communities in the Georgia region with regard to voting, with an eye toward the midterm elections in November 2026. Our focus is on the Latino communities located in the Dalton region.

CLILA has enjoyed community support for 20 years, during which time it has become a leading organization within the Latino community in Dalton and Northwest Georgia.

The main objective of the forum is to hear about experiences from other countries regarding the democratic processes they have undergone, so that these can serve as examples within the community we work with.

CLILA’s target audience consists of women and men of all ages of Latino descent who reside in Whitfield and Murray Counties, and Northwest Georgia in general.

The main reasons for choosing this area are:

• The city of Dalton (about 35,000 residents), has a unique demographic makeup, with a very large Hispanic population: ~55%. Even though Latinos are the majority in the city, there is no political representation in any of the government agencies or in the decision making entities in the city or county. 
• Whitfield County, Georgia is a notably diverse, growing, and working-class community in Northwest Georgia serving as the “Carpet Capital of the World”, producing about 70%  of flooring and carpet products in the world, where the main labor force is composed of Latino workers. That is the Hispanic/Latino population is about: 38.4% in this county. 
• Our county has an agreement with ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement since 2008, as a result our community has suffered many consequences and have been living in fear, many families have been separated. 
• There is already a grassroots organization, CLILA, mobilizing the community for more than 20 years.
• This is a very conservative area where traditionally white people are in power.
•  is far away from large cities and any resources, and CLILA is the only Latino organization doing civic participation work. Whitfield County is home to over 106,000 residents. 

CLILA has been registering Latinos to vote for 20 years, but there is a need to continue working with voter engagement initiatives, such as this forum, due to Latinos living in Northwest Georgia being mostly first generation immigrants, with now raising second generation that have the potential to be more active. 

There are 13,357 Latino active voters, and 14,337 Latinos registered to vote in Whitfield county. So we have the potential to make changes and gain political power.