Congressman Serrano believes that the federal government must work to provide all Americans with equal protection under the law and to help those groups that have traditionally been discriminated against. He believes we should do more to prevent discrimination at the workplace, and that we must provide extra help for those groups who have been discriminated against both at the workplace and at school. The promise of America is that if you work hard enough, you can succeed. We must bring reality closer to that lofty rhetoric.

Towards that end, Serrano supports vigorous enforcement of the Civil Rights Act, which prevents discrimination on the basis of race, religion, ethnicity, gender, or handicap. In addition, he supports efforts to increase penalties for crimes that are committed against an individual because of his or her race, national origin, religion, disability, gender or sexual orientation (commonly known as "hate crimes"). Serrano is also a cosponsor of legislation to ban racial profiling among local law enforcement agencies.

In addition, Serrano has also worked to ensure that the Bureau of the Census does its utmost to count all individuals in the decennial census- and in particular to prevent undercounts of minority groups from occurring. In addition, he has worked to maintain "some other race" as a valid category on census forms. This category allows Latinos who do not feel comfortable identifying themselves as a particular racial category to preserve their sense of identity.