2022 Texas Poet Laureate Lupe Mendez's Book "Why I Am Like Tequila" banned in North Texas.

As book bans become fashionable and favorable vs just outright discrimination, one of our own Librotraficantes has been deemed too controversial for K-12. Lupe Mendez, 2022 Texas Poet laureate and award winning author, has had his book "Why I Am Like Tequila?" banned at a Texas Panhandle school along with other BIPOC and LGBTQi+ books. Tony Diaz speaks with our hermano about why this happened, what this means, and what the next move is in the Librotraficante movement. Originally from Galveston, TX, Lupe Mendez (Writer // Educator // Activist) is the author WHY I AM LIKE TEQUILA (Willow Books, 2019), winner of the 2019 John A. Robertson Award for Best First Book of Poetry from the Texas Institute of Letters. He is the founder of Tintero Projects which works with emerging Latinx writers and other writers of color within the Texas Gulf Coast Region, with Houston as its hub. Lupe earned his Masters of Fine Arts from the University of Texas @ El Paso. Mendez’s work can been seen in print and online formats including the Kenyon Review, Gulf Coast Journal, the Texas Review, the L.A. Review of Books, Split This Rock, Poetry Magazine and Poem-A-Day from the Academy of American Poets. Mendez is the 2022 Texas Poet Laureate. Follow Lupe on Twitter, at @thepoetmendez and on Instagram, at @ellupis. Tony Diaz Writer and activist Tony Diaz, El Librotraficante, is a Cultural Accelerator. He was the first Chicano to earn a Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of Houston Creative Writing Program.In 1998, he founded Nuestra Palabra: Latino Writers Having Their Say (NP), Houston’s first reading series for Latino authors. The group galvanized Houston’s Community Cultural Capital to become a movement for civil rights, education, and representation.When Arizona officials banned Mexican American Studies, Diaz and four veteran members of NP organized the 2012 Librotraficante Caravan to smuggle books from the banned curriculum back into Arizona. He is the author of The Aztec Love God. His book, The Tip of the Pyramid: Cultivating Community Cultural Capital, is the first in his series on Community Organizing. * This is part of a Nuestra Palabra Multiplatform broadcast.* Video airs on www.Fox26Houston.com.* Audio airs on 90.1 FM Houston, KPFT, Houston's Community Station, where our show began.* Live events. Thanks toRoxana Guzman, Multiplatform ProducerRodrigo Bravo, Jr., Audio ProducerRadame Ortiez, SEO DirectorMarc-Antony Piñón, Graphics DesignerLeti Lopez, Music DirectorBryan Parras, co-host and producer emeritusLiana Lopez, co-host and producer emeritusLupe Mendez, Texas Poet Laureate, co-host, and producer emeritus Writer and activist Tony Diaz, El Librotraficante, hosts Latino Politics and News and the Nuestra Palabra Radio Show on 90.1 FM, KPFT, Houston’s Community Station. He is also a political analyst on “What’s Your Point?” on Fox 26 Houston. He is the author of the forthcoming book: The Tip of the Pyramid: Cultivating Community Cultural Capital. www.Librotraficante.comwww.NuestraPalabra.orgwww.TonyDiaz.net Nuestra Palabra is funded in part by the BIPOC Arts Network Fund. Instrumental Music produced / courtesy of Bayden RecordsWebsite | baydenrecords.beatstars.com