President-elect Donald Trump was backed by 46% of Latino voters Tuesday, surpassing Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush to win the biggest share of the national Latino vote by a Republican presidential contender in modern times, a new exit poll shows.
Why it matters: Trump’s historic gains among Latino voters in a range of demographic voting blocs — particularly men — helped push Vice President Harris to the worst showing among Latinos for a Democratic presidential candidate in 20 years.
- Latino voters appeared to look beyond the racist rhetoric Trump’s used to describe undocumented immigrants in an election in which the economy and inflation were top concerns of many voters.
By the numbers: Trump was propelled by Latino men: 55% said they voted for him, compared to 38% of Latinas, per an exit poll conducted by Edison Research.
- Trump’s overall support among Latinos surpassed the 44% then-President George W. Bush, a Texan, received in 2004.
- President Ronald Reagan took 37% of the Latino vote in 1980 and 34% in 1984.
- Harris won 52% of the Latino vote — tied for the worst performance by a Democrat since John Kerry in 2004, and well below the 64% share that Democratic candidates typically have needed in the past half-century to win the presidency.
What they’re saying: Democrats failed to give Latinos a clear economic message while Trump focused on it in all of his rallies and commercials, University of Houston political science professor Jeronimo Cortina tells Axios.
- “Latinos were saying, ‘I don’t care what Trump says. I want to be able to pay the bills. I want to be able to send my kid to college. I want to pay the mortgage, to afford a new car.’ “
Zoom in: Harris’ struggle to attract Latino voters was particularly evident in some of the politically divided swing states that helped determine the election.
- In Michigan, for example, Trump won a whopping 58% of Latino voters compared to just 39% for Harris, according to the Edison poll.
- Harris and Trump tied among Latino voters in North Carolina and Nevada.
Trump also made further inroads with Latinos in areas once dominated by Democrats.
- Trump beat Harris 51-49 in Hidalgo County, in South Texas — a Mexican American stronghold that Biden won with 58% of the vote in 2020.
- In Cameron County, at the southern tip of Texas’ Rio Grande Valley, Trump beat Harris, 53-47. Biden won the county with 56% of the vote four years ago.
Andrew Smith, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, says South Texans have long been socially conservative and that Trump’s messaging on the economy and immigration landed well there.
- “I think what you’re seeing nationally is something that’s been going on in South Texas for years — this idea that the Democratic Party does not align with their values.”
- For example, ideas such as expanding the social safety net, for a lot of Latinos who “have had to work their butts off to get here, that’s antithetical to them.”
Another UTRGV professor, Álvaro J. Corral, grew up in the valley and says that although he expected Trump to make more inroads with Latinos, he’s surprised by “the magnitude of the shift.”
- “I think this is really a story of the headwinds that were obviously too much to overcome for Democrats structurally (and) with the economy” Corral says.
- He adds that most Latinos in South Texas are in the working class and that “even inflation that’s trending downward is still not good.”
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