How Badly Will Trump Hurt Republican Candidates with Latino Voters?

Babies In Cages-- Donald Trump Child Immigrant Detention Center by Nancy Ohanian

Let me begin by going out on a limb. None of these freshman Democrats in Congress today-- Katie Hill (CA-37.3%), Xochitl Torres Small (NM-52.9%), Lizzie Fletcher (TX- 30.6%), Laura Underwood (IL- 11.7%), Lucy McBath (GA- 12.5%), TJ Cox (CA-72.9%), Jeff Van Drew (NJ- 15.5%), Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (FL-69.5%), Kendra Horn (OK- 15.4%), Gil Cisneros (CA-33.6%), Jennifer Wexton (VA-12.7%), Tom Malinowski (NJ-11.8%), Collin Allred (TX-26.8%), Donna Shalala (FL-72.7%), Max Rose (NY-16.2%), Ben McAdams (UT- 16.2%), Jason Crow (CO-19.8%) and Josh Harder (CA-41.7%)-- would have been elected without support from the Latino community. All of them flipped red districts by winning narrowly, each with strong support from Hispanic voters in their districts. The percentage shows how much of the population in each district is Latino.

This week, Latino Decisions released a poll-based report, What do Latinos really think of Trump? If you guessed they're overwhelmingly not fans... well, that's pretty easy. However, there are still congressional districts with huge Latino populations supporting Republican incumbents. In part because the DCCC was too stupid and pig-headed to run a Latino, a good example is TX-23, which has a 69.6% Latino population. Republican Will Hurd was reelected, narrowly-- 103,285 (49.2%) to 102,359 (48.7%). Only the DCCC has the ingrained knack for losing a district like this. In fact, they plan to run the same closing candidate again in 2020. What an amazing organization-- and this cycle with their worst leader, Cheri Bustos, in history.

The data from Latino Decisions is far more relevant and accurate than anything you're picking up from the national polls at this point. Why? Matt Barreto pointed out in a post about the report that "Given the growth in the Latino electorate, which is expected to surpass African Americans as the second largest group of voters in 2020, many polling organizations now report out subgroup results for 'Hispanics.' They shouldn’t. Their sample sizes of Latino voters are woefully small, typically 80-150 in size, and their methodology continues to overly-sample more conservative and more acculturated Latinos who are more likely to be U.S. born, third generation, English-dominant, college educated and live in the suburbs. We have proven this factually true in more than a dozen analysis of existing so-called 'mainstream' polling when examining their Latino sample on closer inspection. In order to get a more accurate understanding of the Latino electorate heading into the 2020 cycle we can examine the April 2019 national survey of 606 Latino registered voters conducted in partnership with the NALEO Educational Fund. Not only is there a large and robust sample, but it is demographically reflective of the true underlying Latino population with the correct proportion of immigrants, second and third generation, Spanish-dominant, bilingual and English-dominant voters, and does not over-sample acculturated suburban-dwelling households, but at the same time does not under-sample them. Instead, based on both the underlying sample, and the post-stratification weights, it is an accurate portrait of the national Latino electorate."

So what do Latinos think of the Trump administration and national politics five months after the historic midterm elections of 2018?  Overwhelmingly, Latino voters remain angry, frustrated and feel disrespected by Trump and the Republican Party as a whole.

Exhibit A: The Republican Party is now seen as openly hostile towards Latinos. A majority of Latinos now believe the Republican Party is being hostile towards the Latino community. In 2012 when Romney was the nominee 56% of Latinos said Romney does not really care about the Latino community while 18% described him as “hostile” towards Latinos.  In 2019 those numbers have changed significantly with 51% now saying Trump and the GOP are hostile towards the Latino community and an additional 29% stating Trump and the GOP don’t really care about Latinos.  Taken together, that is 80% of Latino registered voters who think Trump and the GOP don’t care or are hostile towards Latino interests.

Exhibit B: Access to health care remains the number one policy issue and Trump is trying to end Obamacare. When asked to choose the top policy priority for their community, the top issue was lowering the cost of health care, cited by 37%. This is consistent with polling during the 2018 midterms which found increasing access to affordable health care the top pocketbook issue facing Latino families. Latinos made major gains in access to health insurance under Obamacare, but still, Latinos have the highest rates of being uninsured or under-insured of any racial group in the U.S. Now, the Trump Department of Justice wants to stop defending Obamacare altogether in lawsuits. When asked if they agree or disagree, a strong majority of Latino voters (72%) said they disagree with the Trump DOJ decision to stop defending Obamacare in the courts.

Exhibit C: Trump’s decision to continue bashing immigrants is seen as racist and strongly rejected. Immigrant bashing started on the Trump campaign trail in 2015 and resurfaced as the primary campaign issue for Republicans in 2018, and now in 2019 Trump and Republican have not let up in their attacks, especially those targeting Central American migrants. In addition Trump’s delusional quest for his mythical border wall with Mexico continually turns off Latinos. Overall, 33% of Latinos cited protecting immigrant rights or stopping racism against immigrants as their number one issue, surpassed only by lowering the costs of health care (37%). When asked about the bipartisan legislation in Congress which blocked Trump’s national emergency spending spree on the border wall versus Trump’s veto, fully 82% of Latinos said Congress was right to block Trump from redirecting federal money for his wall. When asked about asylum policy at the Southern border, 77% of Latino voters said the Central American migrants are not a security threat and should be allowed to apply for asylum. Finally, when asked about the rise in racism, the poll found that 81% stated that racism against immigrants and Latinos in general was a problem in the U.S. today.

If Trump and Republicans continue on this path of bashing immigrants, using racist rhetoric to describe migrant families, as well as disparaging border cities they will continue to alienate the average Latino voter who is sick and tired of being the target of scapegoating, stereotyping and immoral immigration policies. What’s more, on the policy issue most important to Latino voters-- access to affordable health care-- Trump and Republicans appear to be on a path towards repealing Obamacare through the courts, and not introducing any legislation or policy solutions at all. Looking ahead to 2020, it is quite likely that the lessons of 2018 will repeat themselves with an angry, energized, mobilized and Democratic-leaning Latino electorate.

According to Pew Research, Hispanic voters were more engaged in 2018 than in any previous midterm. Everyone concerned can thank Trump's racism and xenophobia. There was the typical problem for Democrats though. Because the DCCC is the single most incompetent organization on the face of planet earth-- even with a Latino chairman at the time, a notorious imbecile and moron named Ben Ray Luján (currently Schumer's pick to be the next docile, ineffective waste of a Senate seat from New Mexico)-- Hispanic voters were less likely than all U.S. voters to say they know about the congressional candidates in their district (47% vs. 59%, respectively). More than 29 million Hispanics are eligible to vote, a new high, up 4 million from 2014. Leave it to the DCCC, which thinks people are motivated to vote because of meaningless DCCC slogans-- to fail to work effectively with a voting bloc like this!

This year’s election comes at a time when most Latinos have grown dissatisfied with the nation’s direction and have more concerns about their place in American society. They also overwhelmingly disapprove of the president’s performance and see his administration’s policies as harmful to Latinos. Even so, not all Latinos feel the same way. Latino Republicans are generally more upbeat than Latino Democrats on these measures. Similar shares of both groups say they have given quite a lot of thought to the upcoming election and say they are more enthusiastic to vote than in previous congressional elections.

Hispanic registered voters affiliate with the Democratic Party over the Republican Party by a more than two-to-one margin. About six-in-ten Hispanic voters (62%) identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party, compared with 27% who identify with or lean toward the Republican Party. These shares have remained steady since the last midterm election.

The party affiliation of Latino registered voters mirrors how they intend to vote in the congressional elections, according to a September survey. If the election for Congress were being held today, 63% of Latino registered voters said they would support the Democratic congressional candidate in their district, while 29% said they would support the Republican candidate.

About half (48%) of Latino registered voters say the Democratic Party has more concern for Latinos than the Republican Party, while a third (32%) say there is no difference between the parties and 14% say the Republican Party has more concern.

However, the Democratic Party has lost ground since 2016. The share of Hispanic registered voters who say Democrats have more concern for Hispanics than Republicans has declined in recent years after reaching a recent high of 59% in 2015. Meanwhile, the share of Hispanic voters who see no difference between parties is up, from 22% in 2015 to 32% today.

A higher share of Latino Democratic voters say their party is more concerned for Latinos, compared with the share of Latino Republican voters who say the same about their own party. About seven-in-ten Latino Democratic voters (72%) say the Democratic Party has more concern, while 24% say there is no difference. Fewer than half (45%) of Latino Republican voters say the Republican Party has more concern for Latinos, while 40% say there is no difference between the parties.

After the midterms, Pew was back with a look at what happened. They estimate that 11% of all voters were Hispanic. 69% voted for the Democratic congressional candidate and 29% backed the Republican candidate. Also-- Latinos "made up a notable share of eligible voters in several states with competitive races for U.S. Senate and governor, including Texas (30%), Arizona (23%), Florida (20%) and Nevada (19%)... Nine U.S. House districts in which Hispanics make up at least 10% of eligible voters changed parties. These include Florida’s 26th and 27th districts, California’s 25th District, Arizona’s 2nd District, Texas’ 7th and 32nd districts, Colorado’s 6th District, New York’s 11th District and New Jersey’s 2nd District. In all of these congressional districts, the Democratic candidate won a seat previously held by a Republican."

So... if the DCCC wasn't congenitally incompetent which are some of the Republican incumbents who would be most vulnerable because of Hispanic disdain for Trump?

• FL-25 (Mario Diaz-Balart)- 70.4%
• TX-23 (Will Hurd)- 69.6%
• TX-27 (Michael McCloud)- 51.0%
• CA-22 (Devin Nunes)- 46.5%
• CA-08 (Paul Cook)- 38.3%
• WA-04 (Dan Newhouse)- 37.6%
• CA-23 (Kevin McCarthy)- 37.5%
• CA-42 (Ken Calvert)- 37.2%
• TX-02 (Dan Crenshaw)- 30.8%
• CA-50 (Duncan Hunter)- 30.2%

Other than TX-23, again, I don't recall that any of those districts are on the DCCC 2020 target list.