Inspiring Voices {Cristina Tzintzún Ramírez}

 Founder of Jolt & U.S. Senate Candidate

Words by Jessi Devenyns Photos by Eric Morales

After the last presidential election, Cristina Tzintzún Ramírez saw a problem that no one seemed to be addressing: voter demographics.

Texas is a majority minority state with the largest minority population by percentage being Latinos. Despite those numbers, Hispanic voter turnout during the last presidential election was the lowest out of all the ethnicities, especially among younger individuals, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. 

Cristina decided to change this discrepancy. “With numbers comes power,” she explains. In her interactions with the community, she finds “that a lot of the young Latinos we work with think we make up 10 or 15 percent of the state’s population.” The reality, however, tells a different story. “We’re 40 percent. We’re half all those turning 18,” she punctuates the sentence with a gesture around the room to indicate the ethnic makeup of those surrounding her desk. 

This passion for young Latinx voters and finding strength through numbers came about through a trial-by-fire route to self-discovery that Cristina herself experienced. With her heritage planting her feet firmly on each side of the southern U.S. border, she remembers that her grandfather used to refer to her and her siblings as “pure bred Irish Mexicans.” 

Despite this division in identity, Cristina found strength through becoming involved and serving her community, and in less time than it took her to graduate college, she became the executive director of the Worker’s Defense project, a non-profit that advocates for improved working conditions for immigrant workers in Texas. The transition happened overnight when she still had two semesters left in college. “I’ll be the first to admit that I was not qualified at all on paper, but I think how I made up for it was because when people underestimate me, it makes me work twice as hard.” Even with that accomplishment under her belt, however, she estimates that it took five years before she felt equipped to own the title that she had already earned. Prior to that, she describes herself as feeling out of place as a leader.

“It was two years into Workers Defense Project that I was like, ‘I’m just going to quit. I’m exhausted, we barely have money and resources to keep the doors open, [and] I’m just not cut out for this.’” She doubted herself thinking, “Maybe I’m not smart enough; maybe I’m not strong enough; maybe I’m not even Latina enough because I’m half white and half Mexican.” Nevertheless, she stuck it out, eventually turning the struggling non-profit into a multi-million dollar driving force behind state and local legislation.

“I like being able to be creative with what I see needs to be done.” 

That evolution changed how she viewed herself and her role in helping the Latinx community find its power. “I realized I like being in charge, and as a woman, people think that’s a weird thing to say. It became hard for me to say for a while, but no, I like being in charge. I like being able to be creative with what I see needs to be done.” 

Cristina’s creativity at the helm of non-profits, however, is taking a backseat for the time being. After nearly three years directing Jolt and staying its course, she is taking a leave of absence to focus on her candidacy for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate. At the same time, she also mentioned that she wants to continue to make time to focus on her son. “I worked six to seven days a week for like a decade from when I was a worker’s defense right, and I would work 12 hour days on the regular,” she remembers. Having a child, however, stopped her mid-stride, but instead of hindering her work, Cristina insists that it has made her a better director and visionary for the future of young latinxes. “I always encourage other people who want to have children that they can… Children will make you set your priorities straight about what’s important,” she advises.