The first time that I read the name “Larry Whitten” was a month ago in the Albuquerque Journal. Now, the story of the Taos hotelier, whom some accuse of being racist, has been picked up by the Associated Press.

When Whitten took control of the Paragon Inn in Taos earlier this year, he asked workers to Anglicize their Spanish names. For example, the Journal reported, “Martín Gutierrez was told to go by Martin, without the Spanish accent on the second syllable.”

Whitten claimed that was because when he heard “Martín” he thought he was hearing “my thing” and that guests at the hotel might as well.

“It has nothing to do with racism. I’m not doing it for any reason other than for the satisfaction of my guests, because people calling from all over America don’t know the Spanish accents or the Spanish culture or Spanish anything,” Whitten told the Associated Press.

In addition to asking workers to use Anglicized names, Whitten requested that staff refrained from speaking Spanish around him.

“In Texas, I never asked the Mexicans not to speak Spanish around me, (but) I was pretty sure (in Taos) they would be saying not-nice things about me,” Whitten told the Journal.

Now, protesters stand outside the hotel holding signs that call Whitten a racist for his policies — and with the national attention, things could just get worse.

Whitten appeared on CNN today, a spot picked up by the liberal blog ThinkProgress (ThinkProgress is a project of the Center for American Progress Action Fund). Hispanic host Jane Velez-Mitchell grilled Whitten on the policy, and said, “hope you don’t mind if I keep using the word ‘Velez’ in my name.”

Throughout the exchange, Whitten continued to call Martín “Martin.”

In addition to the trouble with Hispanics working at his hotels, he called one woman who questioned his decision to ask those with Spanish-sounding names to change their names one “of these mountain people that live around here” and “one of these potheads who escaped society” according to the Albuquerque Journal.

According to the 2000 U.S. Census, the town of Taos is 54 percent “Hispanic or Latino.”