SAN ANTONIO – Rebecca Contreras planned to vote again for President Joe Biden, but the 30-year-old Texan wasn’t sure she would win. Now that Vice President Kamala Harris is the de facto nominee, she said her confidence is back.
“Maybe there’s still hope and our voices can matter,” the self-proclaimed progressive San Antonio social media marketing expert said Monday.
Support from young Latinos like Contreras, long seen as reliable Democratic voters, has become less of a sure bet for Democrats this year than in previous election cycles.
Democrats saw then-President Donald Trump and the Republican Party win a larger share of the Hispanic vote in 2020. Polls this year have shown a steady decline for Biden with two presidential candidates. essentially connected among the Latins; the party also fears losing more Latino supporters third party candidates or to voters generally staying at home.
Latinos are younger than Americans in general, and hundreds of thousands of Latinos turn 18 and are eligible to vote each year. A May poll of more than 2,000 voters under the age of 40, including Latinos, found that only a third would vote for Biden. 32 percent of Latin Americans said they would support Trump, 28 percent Biden, and 28 percent “someone else.” University of Chicago GenForward survey found.
Young Latino college students Arizona, Georgia and Pennsylvania told NBC News in April that while majorities supported progressive policies that fit the Democratic agenda, few said they supported Biden or Trump.
One in 5 Spaniards According to UnidosUS, a national Latino advocacy group, they will vote in their first presidential election this year. More than a third (36%) of those new Latino voters say they are independent or nonpartisan.
They do not win so easily.
Dennison Pinto, 19, of Allentown, Pennsylvania, was researching voting for a third-party candidate. On Monday, Pinto said he favors a Democratic presidential candidate, but he’s not yet sold on Harris or any other specific candidate.
Allentown resident Jeremy Bautista, 20, cast his first ballot in a local Pennsylvania election last year. He is still considering whether to vote this year. While Bautista said Harris is starting to look like “one of the better options,” he’s not sure if his views on economic policy and the Israel-Hamas conflict align.
Stella Rouse, a political scientist at Arizona State University, told NBC News in April that young voters “have a general understanding of both parties, nothing is going to change.” This week, he said Harris could reinvigorate young Latinos if he delivers a “message of opportunity” and paints a picture of a future America where multicultural and young Latinos can lead.
Room for support?
Poder NC Action, a progressive group focused on mobilizing North Carolina Latinos, said statement they were unsure whether young voters would be represented by any presidential candidate or political party. After Biden resigned, “we are more optimistic than ever,” said founder Irene Godinez, 41. “While we don’t agree 100% with VP Harris, we support the election of a new candidate who will bring new spirit to the US. fight of our lives.”
Carlos Odio, co-founder of Equis Research, a Democratic firm that polls Latin Americans. An inscription in X says An early reading of Monday’s data from a July 11-15 poll of Nevada Latinos shows Harris is winning back some Latinos who have drifted away from Biden, “especially drawing a segment that says they’ll sit out a Biden/Trump rematch.”
His firm’s past poll showed Harris had favorable and unfavorable ratings similar to Biden’s, but fared significantly better with Latinos, including those under 40, a key swing group.
Biden’s internal campaign poll conducted by Democratic pollster Matt Barreto shows that Harris is more popular than Biden among Latino voters.
Harris had a net 46-point lead over Biden among Latinos who said they disapproved of Biden and his GOP rival, Trump, according to the detailed poll. July 14 memorial Barreto and Biden’s colleague Angie Gutierrez posted online.
Harris’s approval rating among Latinos 18-29 is 16 points better than Biden’s, it said. Hill first reported the note. Barreto said the vote was taken before Biden resigned to determine if Harris could support Biden’s campaign with Latinos.
Barreto said Harris won California’s Latino vote when he ran for attorney general in 2010 and 2014, and defeated Loretta Sanchez in 2016.
“He has an opportunity to reverse the media narrative that Democrats are losing Latino support because he’s so popular with Latinos, and I expect his approval ratings to go up as Latinos learn more about him,” Barreto told NBC News on Tuesday. .
Harris is facing frustration from voters as well as attacks from Republicans over the high cost of living for Latinos. repeatedly referred to as primary care in the election as well as in immigration. There are Republicans he mistakenly called him the border kingalthough his work focused on working on the root causes of immigration rather than on border protection with Central American countries.
Harris also needs to make his case to voters who think they don’t know him.
Evelyn Jimenez, 20, of San Antonio, was excited to cast her first vote for Biden in the presidential election and was “heartbroken” when he resigned, saying she was skeptical of Harris.
“I haven’t seen him do much in those four years. I didn’t see him get involved,” Jimenez said.
Harris has been campaigns this year Strengthening Latino supportThe challenge was to “let people know who brought it on,” he told NBC News in March, promoting the administration’s policy.
Harris campaign media director Maca Casado said in a statement that Harris has worked to win the support of Latino voters throughout her career, focusing on issues like health care, child care and fighting gun violence.
“Trump and MAGA proudly run on an anti-Latino platform that demonizes immigrants that only serve the rich and powerful, and do nothing to reach Latino voters,” Casado said. “We are working aggressively to make this work because we will not take their voices for granted,” the campaign said.
“Latinos recognize Kamala Harris as the original Border Czar, a decisive voice on deflating inflation, and dangerously liberal,” Trump campaign adviser Danielle Alvarez told NBC News. President Trump’s message to our community is simple and builds on his winning record: If you want to restore the strongest economy in more than 60 years, with rising wages, quality jobs, strong borders and safe neighborhoods, vote for him.”
Effect of abortion
More Latinos live in states with abortion bans and restrictions than last year; Florida recently banned six-week abortions. In Texas, where abortion is almost outlawed Teen birth rate rises for first time in 15 years, and average birth rate among Latinos rises 5.1%it affects them disproportionately.
Harris’ outspokenness on abortion may be helped by campaigns to get abortion-rights measures on the November ballots in Arizona and Nevada. Support for abortion rights among Hispanics has been growing for decades and majority (62%) believe it should be legal in all or most cases. Harris blasted Trump and Republicans abortion is difficult On trips to Arizona and other states.
Abortion has been a difficult issue for Republicans with some GOP candidates downplay their anti-abortion views or avoids discussing them. Trump softened the party’s platform to exclude the federal abortion ban.
Gabriela Torres, a 29-year-old high school culinary arts teacher, is the US Supreme Court’s 1973 landmark Roe v. He said his mother and sister were with him when he canceled Wade. Her mother was in tears and “you could feel the world change,” she said.
“My mom helped make this happen and now she’s been taken from us. Now I look at my daughter and it’s not just abortion, it’s reproductive rights. It’s the right to get birth control, to have access to safe abortions,” said Torres He nominated Hillary Clinton in 2016. “I hope that maybe if a woman is in power” these rights can be returned, he said.
Arizona school board member Marcus Ceniceros, 20, who lives in Phoenix and identifies as half-white, half-Latino, said he has attended rallies where Harris has spoken.
“He knows how to rally a crowd,” she said, “and he’s kind of been a young voter spokesperson for the campaign since last year, and I think it’s working.”
Younger voters, including Latinos, voted more in 2020 and in the 2022 midterm electionsbut there is low voter turnout compared to other groups.
Four months later and with tight races in battleground states, the Democratic-leaning political arms of three national Latino groups — Voto Latino, UnidosUS and Mi Familia Vota — said they have joined forces to double down on Latino voter mobilization and registration. Support Harris.
Suzanne Gamboa reported from San Antonio and Nicole Acevedo reported from New York.