{"id":13392,"date":"2023-08-08T15:58:05","date_gmt":"2023-08-08T15:58:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/?p=13392"},"modified":"2023-08-08T15:58:05","modified_gmt":"2023-08-08T15:58:05","slug":"millions-of-latinos-are-trump-supporters-heres-what-theyre-thinking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/?p=13392","title":{"rendered":"Millions of Latinos are Trump supporters. Here&#8217;s what they&#8217;re thinking"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"> <p><em>espite his harmful rhetoric, President Trump&#8217;s policies and fierce attitude have attracted a certain subset of those in the Latino community.<\/em><\/p>   <figure><iframe loading=\"lazy\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" src=\"https:\/\/uw-media.usatoday.com\/embed\/video\/2581229001?placement=snow-embed\" width=\"540\" height=\"350\"><\/iframe><\/figure> Latino voters California are 2020 kingmakers for Super Tuesday      <p><em>by  Ruben Navarrette Jr. <\/em><\/p>   <p>It\u2019s like chickens for Colonel Sanders.\u00a0Why would any  self-respecting Latino vote to re-elect President Donald Trump, arguably  the most anti-Latino chief executive in U.S. history?<\/p>   <p>That\u2019s  what my non-Latino friends want to know. I get that question all the  time, often accompanied by a tilted head and a confused look.<\/p>   <p>In the 2020 election, Trump seems likely to get between 25%-30% of the Latino vote. A recent poll by Telemundo found that <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/f\/?id=0000016e-3dc9-ddf0-ad6e-bfc97c490000\" target=\"_blank\">1 in 4 American Latinos<\/a> would vote to re-elect him.\u00a0<\/p>   <p>In 2016, according to exit polls, Trump got <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/edition.cnn.com\/election\/2016\/results\/exit-polls\/national\/president\" target=\"_blank\">28% of the Latino vote<\/a>.\u00a0He did better than Sen. Bob Dole, who got <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/hispanic\/2012\/11\/07\/latino-voters-in-the-2012-election\/\" target=\"_blank\">21% of the Latino vote<\/a>  in 1996, and Sen. Mitt Romney, who got 27% in 2012. But he couldn\u2019t  match Sen. John McCain, who got 31% of the Latino vote in 2008, or  President George W. Bush, who got 40% in 2004. Anything north of 30% is a  decent showing for a Republican, and anything beyond 40% will make a  GOP candidate virtually unbeatable.\u00a0<\/p>   <figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-32021\" src=\"http:\/\/latinosreadytovote.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/ca6ef807-b6ca-4b6b-bc7b-5434bf5d6aa4-AFP_AFP_1LI6CC.jpg\" alt=\"\"><\/figure>   <h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Why Latino votes matter<\/h4>   <p>Latino voters count for a lot. Three reasons: they\u2019re a <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/fact-tank\/2018\/09\/13\/key-facts-about-young-latinos\/\" target=\"_blank\">young population<\/a>\u00a0that is <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/news\/latino\/first-time-latinos-be-largest-non-white-share-eligible-voters-n964571\" target=\"_blank\">adding new voters at a staggering rate<\/a>; They\u2019re well-represented in so-called battleground states such as <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/hispanic\/fact-sheet\/latinos-in-the-2016-election-colorado\/\" target=\"_blank\">Colorado<\/a>, <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/hispanic\/fact-sheet\/latinos-in-the-2016-election-nevada\/\" target=\"_blank\">Nevada<\/a>\u00a0and <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.census.gov\/quickfacts\/fact\/table\/FL\/BZA210216\" target=\"_blank\">Florida<\/a>; And<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/hispanic\/fact-sheet\/u-s-hispanics-facts-on-mexican-origin-latinos\/\" target=\"_blank\"> close to two-thirds<\/a> of Latinos\u00a0are Mexicans\u00a0or Mexican-Americans, who\u00a0<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/politics\/2020-election\/latino-votes-could-swing-democratic-primary-candidates-know-it-n1031966\" target=\"_blank\">tend to be swing voters<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>   <p>Latinos are now poised to be the <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pewsocialtrends.org\/essay\/an-early-look-at-the-2020-electorate\/\" target=\"_blank\">largest racial or\u00a0ethnic minority group<\/a>  to be eligible to vote in a presidential election, according to the Pew  Research Center.\u00a0By 2020, an estimated 32 million Latinos will be  eligible to vote, which is just slightly more than the 30 million voters  who are African-Americans. According to Pew, Latinos are expected to be  about 13.3% of the electorate in 2020.\u00a0<\/p>   <p>Here\u2019s  what you need to know about the Latino vote: there is no such thing.  That is, Latinos aren\u2019t monolithic and we don\u2019t vote as a bloc.\u00a0<\/p>   <p>Yet, Trump is likely to do better than expected with Latino voters.<\/p>   <p>It\u2019s not just because of a strong economy, <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2019\/05\/25\/725354469\/hispanic-unemployment-has-hit-record-lows-but-does-that-mean-progress\" target=\"_blank\">low unemployment rates<\/a>  among Latinos, etc. It\u2019s also because many Latinos are willing to look  past Trump\u2019s anti-Latino bigotry. After all, they tell themselves, the  president is not talking about people like them.\u00a0<\/p>   <p>The problem is that, when it comes to Latinos, Trump can\u2019t stop talking trash. Here\u2019s a look at his rant sheet.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>   <p> As a candidate, Trump\u00a0declared that Mexico is\u00a0\u201c<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/time.com\/4473972\/donald-trumpmexico-meeting-insult\/\" target=\"_blank\">not sending their best<\/a>\u201d\u00a0but  ridding itself of those who are\u00a0\u201cbringing drugs\u2026bringing  crime,\u201d\u00a0labeled Mexican immigrants criminals and rapists, promised to  deport \u201c<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=AneeacsvNwU\" target=\"_blank\">bad hombres<\/a>,\u201d praised the <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.history.com\/news\/operation-wetback-eisenhower-1954-deportation\" target=\"_blank\">1954<\/a>\u00a0mass deportation program called &#8220;<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/news\/latino\/trump-praised-it-without-naming-it-what-was-operation-wetback-n461666\" target=\"_blank\">Operation Wetback<\/a>,&#8221; promised a \u201c<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/national\/immigrant-community-on-high-alert-fearing-trumps-deportation-force\/2017\/02\/11\/e5c30d06-f06f-11e6-9973-c5efb7ccfb0d_story.html\" target=\"_blank\">deportation force<\/a>,\u201d\u00a0and  attacked the integrity of U.S. District Court Judge Gonzalo Curiel \u2014\u00a0a  U.S.-born citizen of Mexican descent \u2014\u00a0by questioning whether Curiel  could fairly adjudicate a lawsuit against Trump University because,  \u201cHe\u2019s a Mexican. <\/p>   <p>As president, <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2017\/08\/25\/politics\/sheriff-joe-arpaio-donald-trump-pardon\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\">Trump pardoned Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio<\/a> after the former lawman was found guilty of racially profiling Latinos and defying court orders, <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2017\/09\/05\/546423550\/trump-signals-end-to-daca-calls-on-congress-to-act\" target=\"_blank\">ended Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals<\/a> (DACA), &#8220;leaving&#8221;\u00a0more than <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/news\/latino\/what-happens-daca-holders-if-supreme-court-allows-trump-end-n1081891\" target=\"_blank\">700,000 young people<\/a>\u00a0potentially subject to deportation, <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2018\/10\/30\/662046752\/trump-targets-birthright-citizenship-with-executive-order-axios-reports\" target=\"_blank\">targeted birthright citizenship<\/a> for the U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants, embraced policies that would cut\u00a0<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-usa-immigration-benefits\/new-trump-rule-targets-poor-and-could-cut-legal-immigration-in-half-advocates-say-idUSKCN1V219N\" target=\"_blank\">legal\u00a0immigration in half<\/a>\u00a0and separated <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/family-separation-1556-more-migrant-families-were-separated-under-trump-than-previously-known\/\" target=\"_blank\">thousands of refugee families<\/a> to the point where <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/015702afdb4d4fbf85cf5070cd2c6824\" target=\"_blank\">nearly 70,000 immigrant children<\/a> were held in U.S. custody at some point in the last year.<\/p>   <p>Even  as he campaigns for re-election, Trump still can\u2019t seem to refrain from  sticking his foot in this mouth when it comes to Latino voters.\u00a0<\/p>   <h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Trump&#8217;s own words used against his own citizens<\/h4>   <p>He talks often about how the United States is facing an \u201cinvasion\u201d from the south.\u00a0That\u2019s the same word that <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2019\/08\/05\/us\/el-paso-suspect-patrick-crusius\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\">21-year-old<\/a> Patrick Crusius used in a <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2019\/08\/04\/us\/politics\/trump-mass-shootings.html\" target=\"_blank\">racist manifesto<\/a>\u00a0he penned before walking into a Walmart in El Paso, Texas\u00a0on Aug 3 to, as he allegedly told police,\u00a0\u201c<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/news\/nation\/2019\/10\/10\/el-paso-walmart-mass-shooting-suspect-pleads-not-guilty\/3935362002\/\" target=\"_blank\">kill as many Mexicans as possible<\/a>.\u201d\u00a0Crucius killed 22 people, many of them Mexican\u00a0and wounded 25\u00a0others.\u00a0<\/p>   <p>Several  weeks ago, when Trump traveled to New Mexico to court conservative  Latinos, he doted on CNN commentator Steve Cortes, a pro-Trump immigrant  from Colombia who the president declared \u201c<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/news\/politics\/elections\/2019\/09\/16\/donald-trump-steve-cortes-he-looks-more-like-wasp-than-do\/2348378001\/\" target=\"_blank\">looks more like a WASP than I do<\/a>.\u201d\u00a0Trump  put Cortes on the spot, asking him,\u00a0\u201cWho do you like more,\u00a0the country  or the Hispanics?\u201d\u00a0Cortes answered \u201cThe country.\u201d<\/p>   <p>Most of the Latinos who back Trump are not so buffoonish about their support. But they\u2019re no less devoted to their guy.<\/p>   <p>As  a Mexican-American Never Trumper, I wanted to understand these people.  Besides, as a journalist who is trained to talk to strangers, the idea  of Latinos who support Trump sounded plenty strange to me.\u00a0<\/p>   <p>So, I went out and interviewed a couple dozen Latinos for Trump.<\/p>   <p>What  I found is that, in many cases, these folks are not really Latino at  all. They\u2019re \u201cpost-Latino.\u201d They see themselves as Americans. They\u2019re  ambivalent about their heritage, relatives, ancestors. They don\u2019t take  offense when Trump insults Mexican immigrants because \u2014\u00a0even for  Mexican-Americans \u2014\u00a0they see the people he\u2019s talking about as another  species.\u00a0<\/p>   <p>Consider the views of Chris Salcedo, a  conservative Mexican-American radio host in Texas who bills himself as a  \u201cliberty loving Latino.\u201d<\/p>   <p>\u201cI\u2019ve always resented  the hell out of liberals, in the press and out of the press, who have  said that I, because of my Latino surname, have anything in common with  someone who is breaking into my country without our permission,\u201d Salcedo  told me. \u201cWhen the president cracks down on illegal border crossings  and human trafficking, I do not believe he\u2019s attacking me \u2014\u00a0because I  also want to stop those same things.\u201d<\/p>   <p>I get it.  But I also recognize a familiar song when I hear one. Other ethnic  groups know this one by heart. The Irish, Italians and\u00a0Jews\u00a0all have  people in their community who don\u2019t identify with their heritage or who  think they\u2019re better than others in their tribe, when they\u2019re really  just better off. These are the folks who were born on third base\u00a0but  tell themselves they hit a triple.\u00a0<\/p>   <p>Now some Latinos have found their way to Trump. Good for them. But make no mistake. In a larger sense, they\u2019re lost.\u00a0<\/p>   <p>.<\/p>   <hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-css-opacity\"><\/hr>   <p><em>Ruben  Navarrette Jr., a member of the USA Today Board of Contributors, is a  syndicated columnist with the Washington Post Writer<\/em><\/p> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>espite his harmful rhetoric, President Trump&rsquo;s policies and fierce attitude have attracted a certain subset of those in the Latino community. Latino voters California are 2020 kingmakers for Super Tuesday by Ruben Navarrette Jr. It&rsquo;s <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/?p=13392\" title=\"Millions of Latinos are Trump supporters. Here&#8217;s what they&#8217;re thinking\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13393,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[70],"tags":[81],"class_list":["post-13392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-latino-vote","tag-latino-vote"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13392"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13392\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13394,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13392\/revisions\/13394"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}