La Opinión, which directly translates to “The Opinion”, is LA’s primary Spanish-speaking print newspaper. Serving Los Angeles since 1926, it is also distributed daily throughout six counties of Southern California. Tailoring to Southern California’s Latino/Spanish speaking community, La Opinion has garnered a reputation as the leading venue tackling issues Latinos care about, and as a result is the most read Spanish newspaper in the country. Although when founded it was mainly written for and by various generations of Mexicans and Chicanos, they have diversified and widened their lens to cover issues relevant to the Central American, South American, Cuban and Puerto Rican populations that have progressively grown in Los Angeles.
Although La Opinión specializes in covering cultural or more local issues, this is not to say they are limited by the “Spanish speaking” niche they fall under. Every day, the website and paper has stories on a national level, breaking news, as well as big headlines on international issues. However, La Opinion’s essence is in the culture — issues such as immigration, DACA (recently), big events in Latin American countries, and even Spanish sports analysis and pop culture take precedence.
The reason I chose La Opinión is due to their exploration and articulation of issues pertaining to the “LAtino identity” — something I identify with as a first generation Chicano born and raised in Los Angeles. They’re headquartered in Downtown LA which is an area many Latinos call home, however it caters to all of Los Angeles — not just one specific neighborhood — and the groups of Latino populations living and breathing Los Angeles. La Opinión holds the Latino community down, and when you take a step back it is really informative and says a lot about what it really means to be a Latino in LA.
