‘I Don’t Recognize My Country Anymore’: Gloria Estefan Speaks Out on the U.S. Political Crisis
Gloria Estefan has lived in the United States for 65 years. She lived through segregation. She remembers the civil rights movement. But in a recent interview with Jorge Ramos, the Cuban American singer said this is the most divided she’s ever seen the country.
“I don’t recognize my country anymore,” Estefan said. “Never in the sixty-five years that I’ve been here… I lived through desegregation [and saw] the horrors that African Americans experienced during that time, trying to stand up with Martin Luther King. I lived through that, saw it.” She added, “I was a child, but I saw everything. I’ve never seen anything like this.”
Gloria Estefan warns about threats to democracy
Estefan’s interview aired on the digital show Así veo las cosas, where she spoke about the fear that grips her today as she watches political norms unravel.
“It really scares me,” she said, referring to recent political developments. “It also scares me when the division of government, the three branches of government, are ignored. When suddenly a law is passed, and it’s not enforced. It makes me feel like… remember that I came from Cuba.”
Her reference to her upbringing under a dictatorship is intentional. Estefan emphasized the fragility of freedom in the U.S., pointing out how quickly democratic institutions can erode when power goes unchecked. “Freedom must be defended,” she said. “People in this country don’t realize how fragile it is. I hope that’s not the case. I pray that I’m wrong… but we have to be careful because that’s not what history shows us.”
She witnessed a mother and child separated on a plane
Estefan’s warning is not abstract. She recalled a disturbing experience she had on a domestic flight from Las Vegas, as reported by People en Español.
“There was a woman two rows behind me with a baby, and they took the baby from her,” Estefan said. “The woman started crying, and the baby started crying. Then more agents came and took the woman away.”
She described watching both the mother and baby being taken off the plane separately. “When I left, they had her sitting with the officers and the baby in a separate car. Why was it necessary to take the child away from his mother if they were both going to leave anyway?”
According to La Prensa Gráfica and Diario Las Américas, this incident happened during a Trump-era immigration enforcement operation. For Estefan, the memory still lingers. And the message it sends haunts her. “I don’t understand why we have to lose our humanity in order to keep what we have.”
Gloria Estefan sees a dangerous pattern repeating
The music legend warned that many Americans are underestimating what is happening. “I have faith in this country, I have faith in the judicial system,” Estefan said. “But we must be careful. Democracy is a living, breathing entity, and if you don’t give it oxygen, it can die.”
She added that a third of voters didn’t participate in the last election. “In the last elections, 31% of voters did not vote. What does that mean? It means that 30% said, ‘I’m not going to have an opinion.’ Because sometimes it’s easier to close your eyes.”
Estefan referenced her song “Close My Eyes” to illustrate the danger of political apathy. “If I could just close my eyes / See just what I wanted to see,” she quoted.
With “Raíces,” Gloria Estefan is making music with purpose
While Estefan insists that she and her husband Emilio are not politically affiliated, she believes in using her platform to promote reflection, healing, and cultural pride. “My fans are on both sides of the political spectrum,” she said in an interview with People en Español. “Emilio and I are not affiliated. We always have been.”
Her latest album Raíces was born out of the same urgency. “That’s why it was important for us to put something positive out into the world with our music,” she said. “Highlighting love, connection, roots, being proud of who we are, and shouting it from the rooftops with music in Spanish.”
Estefan also said that her heritage and experiences as an immigrant child from Cuba are central to her identity and to this new project.
She’s using her voice because she knows silence is dangerous
Estefan’s message is clear. She does not want to be silent about what she sees happening in the country she’s called home for over six decades.
“I’m scared by what I’m seeing,” she said. “I hope the courts in this country uphold the law… The three branches of government have equal power.”
And if anyone thinks this doesn’t affect them, Estefan disagrees. “They are not criminals,” she said of many migrants who have lived in the US for decades. “They are people who have been here for decades, contributing to the country with their children who were born here.”
