The last 10 days have been tense in Los Angeles, where an immigration crackdown spearheaded by President Donald Trump's administration has led to protests in the city and beyond. Those protests have been met with unusual force, including the deployment of 700 Marines.
On Saturday, the singer Nezza made a simple statement in support of the city's substantial Spanish-speaking immigrant community—singing the United States's little-known official Spanish-language version of "The Star-Spangled Banner" before the Los Angeles Dodgers' 11–5 win over the San Francisco Giants.
That statement, however, appears to have been met with pushback from the Dodgers. After the game, Nezza posted video in which a Los Angeles employee appears to instruct her to perform the song in English.
“I didn’t think I’d be met with any sort of no,” Nezza said in another video via Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic. “Especially because we’re in L.A., and with everything happening. I’ve sang the national anthem many times in my life, but today, out of all days, I could not. I just felt like I needed to do it. Para mi gente."
The Dodgers, long an identity symbol for Spanish-speaking Angelenos, have taken substantial media criticism over the last week for declining to address the federal government's actions. Longtime Los Angeles infielder and outfielder Kike Hernandez personally expressed support for the immigrant community Saturday, writing on Instagram that he "cannot stand to see our community being violated, profiled, abused and ripped apart."
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Singer Performed National Anthem in Spanish Despite Dodgers Asking Her Not To.