Fire work really isn't a good place for politics. One of the big bottlenecks is, and will always be skilled crew bosses, and a good boss keeps his crew alive in touchy situations.
There are moments in fire where you get caught up in the work, and when you look up, you may have very little time to do the right thing, drop and run, find safety in the black, get those fire shelters out and huddle down. Or whatever. Any confusion or delay can mean people die.
Good bosses have experience. Good bosses know how to keep their crew from getting hurt. It's easy to find workers to cut line, but the guys who manage the crews are not just someone appointed. They have training and experience to deal with these things.
No language confusion or delay is good in these situations, this is true. When you have people who don't know English having to have stuff relayed to them, you could put their lives in jeopardy, because of the criticalness. I personally think that everyone out there needs to understand English well enough do deal with these times. The bosses are getting their info in English from the guys managing the crews. Monolinguistics makes it safer for everyone.
I have a second language. I'm not being prejudiced against Spanish. From my POV, I see it as a safety concern, giving up people who have the wherewithal and experience to guide crews in dangerous situations beause someone decided to make political points. I just wouldn't want anybody to die in a life or death situation because of lack of experience on the boss' part or because of a time delay because of language confusion.
Yep, that's why I think injecting a PC agenda into firefighting is a deadly move.