(Ezekiel Loseke, Headline USA) President Donald Trump gained significant ground with Latino voters in 2020, and recent polling suggests those gains may be permanent.
President Donald Trump matched or outperformed recent Republicans with the Latino vote in 2016, but in 2020, he made significant gains with Latinos, per FiveThirtyEight, which hosted a podcast entitled, “Will Trump’s gains with Latinos last?”
Recent Telemundo polling suggests that it may, indeed, last. Axios reported that Democrats have a 21-point lead in the up-and-coming midterms. However, “The same poll saw Democrats enjoying a 42-point lead in 2012, a 34-point lead in 2018, and a 26-point lead in 2020.”
In other words, the Democrat lead with Latinos has been cut in half in the past 10 years.
The real-world results of those Republican gains shocked pundits in June when, for one example, Republican Mayra Flores beat Democrat Dan Sanchez and flipped a U.S. House seat in Texas that Democrats have controlled for nearly three-quarters of a century.
The polling gets even worse for Democrats when it comes to the president. Axios reported, “Overall, about 51% of Latino voters surveyed said they approved of the job President Biden is doing compared to 45% who said they disapproved.”
On the issues, only 49% of Latinos approve of Biden’s foreign policy, only 42% approve of his management of border security, only 41% approve of his economic policy and a dismal 35% approve of Biden’s handling of the cost of living.
Unfortunately for Brandon, Latinos tended to rank his lowest-performing categories as the most important. Axios reported, “Asked to rank the most important issues facing the country, 23% said the cost of living, 20% said “threats to democracy,” 17% said jobs and the economy, while 11% said immigration and the situation at the border.”
Politico and Axios both emphasized that there was no Latino vote and that “Latinos are just like any other ethnic group. It’s important where they live, it’s important their age, where they come from, how they go to this country.”
