Eyes on the Latino Prize

Biden must not take this huge voting bloc for granted

According to the press, President Biden’s re-election team is worried about younger voters who see him as too old, and progressives who dislike his support for Israel’s war on Hamas.  In the next few weeks, I intend to discuss, either written or on the Pod, the flawed logic in requiring Anti-Israel left votes and my lessons from the GOP. For now, what Democrats seem to be forgetting is the bloc of 35 million potential votes in America’s Latino communities.

For decades politicians who know that numbers are destiny have eyed the Latino vote but failed to capture it fully.  With Latinos’ deep concern for the welfare of immigrants from the South, Democrats have been their default choice. Why? Because historically, they have shown more compassion toward immigrants and don’t say the demeaning and racist things Donald Trump says about the people who cross the border. Latinos don’t vote solely on immigration, but it is a way to show and force interest in courting the population. They are however, concerned with border security as evident by the number of Republicans, or security focused Democrats, that are elected in border areas.

Border security is about more than simply “they’re bringing their rapists..” garbage spewed by Donald (I’m told by Mary Trump, he hates being called Donald). I’ve worked the border, there is a massive issue. The cartels are better funded than our own border patrol, and they profit on trafficking human beings, and treat them like cattle. Immigration will be further discussed in a future post, but its important to set this table as we discuss the politics of the Latino vote.

Since the day I arrived in Congress, this has been the prize for the GOP. Almost every political discussion either centered on, or at some point touched on, how we could attract the Latino vote. While the GOP was aggressive in courting them, the Democrats took them for granted. This is evident by the results in 2020, showing Trump gaining with Hispanic voters.

If history is any indicator, Biden will let a small outreach organization led by prominent Latinos take responsibility for inspiring the Latino base. The campaign will produce and air some Spanish language radio and TV spots and make sure their guy’s message, translated, pops up on certain websites. If he follows this boring pattern, Biden will leave millions of votes on the table, at his peril.

As always, enthusiasm and turnout are key to a voting bloc’s power. (Just look at the enthusiasm the evangelical Right brings to the GOP.) Here the Democrats fail to inspire at the very start of the campaign process – getting people registered.  In the last presidential cycle, only 61.1 percent of Latinos were registered, compared with 72.7 percent of voters overall.

The math here is quite simple.  So many Latinos fail to register that come Election Day, their communities fail to show their potential power. Democrats suffer more because of this trend because, on most issues tested by pollsters, Latinos are naturally more blue than red. Consider these numbers from Pew Research, which are based on surveys of both registered and unregistered Latino adults…

61 percent of Latinos believe that racism is often not recognized.

57 percent support some form of legal abortion. (This is despite the strong influence of the Catholic Church.)

73 percent believe in regulating gun ownership.

72 percent are either neutral or supportive of gay marriage.

60 percent say the Democratic Party serves them well, compared with 34 percent for the GOP.

Of course, the aggregate numbers are only a general guide to Hispanic politics. Within this large population, some subgroups like the relatively wealthy Cuban and Venezuelan Americans, skew Republican. Concentrated in the state of Florida, with its rich electoral vote prize, these Latinos are refugees from left-wing dictatorships and respond to GOP efforts to paint Democrats as socialists, with a bit of memory of perceived sympathies to Castro from the Dems of old. On the other end of the political spectrum, the much larger Mexican-American community considers Democrats to be welcoming and more supportive of the social services and public education systems their families rely upon.

Mexican Americans are most powerful in the West and Southwest where swing states like Nevada and Arizona offer valuable electoral prizes. But did you know that Latinos have a strong presence in battleground states like Georgia and Wisconsin? Dig into Congressional races and you’ll see that Latinos could make a difference in specific districts from Texas to Virginia.  

What can Biden do to raise Latinos’ enthusiasm level, getting them to register and vote for him? When it comes to issues he should consider doubling down on the Trump threat to democracy. The vast majority of Latinos have roots in countries where strongmen, or one-party rule, have often crippled the democratic process. They came to America seeking a life in a true democracy. Given Trump’s overt authoritarianism, including his plan to use the courts against his political foes, it should be easy to communicate a sense of urgency about stopping him.

More importantly, Biden should go to Latino communities and commit substantial resources to a campaign “ground game” in these places, which means opening offices, assigning paid staff, and organizing registration and get-out-the-vote drives. There is no substitute for this kind of effort. In 2020 the Trump campaign did it in Nevada and increased Latino support for the GOP by 4 percent. This success, limited as it was, should motivate the Biden campaign.

To put it bluntly, if the Biden folks make a big push for Latino support, they will discover that the other side is making a similar effort.