The Myth of the Latino Vote
After the Nevada caucus, many declared Bernie Sanders the overwhelming favorite, and rightfully so. He completely obliterated his opponents in the most diverse state so far during the primary process, not only leading in delegates but imposing his authority on the still-large pool of candidates. It changed him from serious contender to, at the time, definitive front-runner—seemingly due to Latino voters.
According to NBC News’s entrance polls during the caucus, he especially dominated the Latino and Hispanic vote with 50% support, with Joe Biden a distant second receiving 16%. Even among moderate Latinos, Sanders crushed his opposition—47% supported him, with Biden still second at 19%. With White and Black voters supporting him at just under 30% each, Latino voters clearly carried Bernie in Nevada. Pundits and politicians proceeded to declare Bernie the favorite among Latinos.
It makes sense. Christine Bolaños, communications director for Jolt Action, a Texas-based group working to involve more young Latinos in politics, says that while Latinos are “growing in population and voter power, they’re increasingly inundated in debt and struggling with access to care,” which “automatically makes them gravitate towards someone who appears to address their priorities.” Sanders has made various inclusive campaign initiatives including Spanish-language ads and personally reaching out to working-class Latino families, and his message resonates with many Latino working-class families.
But exit polls from Texas, a crucial Super Tuesday state with a large Latino population, contradict the other-worldly results he achieved among Latino voters in Nevada. While still winning the Latino vote, CNN exit polls in Texas found that Bernie won over 39% of Texan Latinos—still dominant, but with Biden and Bloomberg garnering a combined 46%, Latinos favored Bernie’s Democratic revolution far less in Texas than in Nevada. Latino politicians in Texas, moreover, heavily supported centrist candidates like Biden or Bloomberg.
The difference between Texan and Nevadan Latinos marks an enormous hole in any candidates’ political strategy. While pundits and politicians usually insist on grouping Latino voters as one, huge monolithic voting bloc, they ignore fundamental differences and diversity within the Latino community.
Latinos in Texas have very different experiences from Latinos in Nevada or other states. For example, in Nevada, 78% of Hispanics are of Mexican origin, according to the Pew Research Center. In Florida and New York, however, non-Mexicans composed 86% of the Hispanic population (“Hispanic” and “Latino” are not interchangeable, but since Pew Research Center used “Hispanic,” and it effectively marks a stark difference in cultural backgrounds between Latinos, I use it here). The Mexican/non-Mexican distinction can mean vastly different voting demographics between states like Nevada, Florida, and New York.
[pullquote]While pundits and politicians usually insist on grouping Latino voters as one, huge monolithic voting bloc, they ignore fundamental differences and diversity within the Latino community. [/pullquote]
In Florida, for example, most Cuban American voters notoriously voted for Donald Trump in 2016. NPR’s Greg Allen went to Miami last year to see the extent to which Cuban Americans support Republicans. Virtually every Cuban American that Allen interviewed vehemently supported Trump. In fact, in the 2018 midterms, 70% of Cuban Americans voted for Republican candidates and remain integral to Trump’s Floridian base.
Why do Cuban Americans so overwhelmingly support Trump, despite his anti-Latino rhetoric? After the Cuban revolution, most people fleeing Castro’s communist regime came from upper classes. Later waves of Cuban migration included more working-class families, but still featured more upper-class families than other Latin American migrations. As a result, compared to other Latin American diasporas, Cubans usually have higher levels of education, income, and home ownership. Cubans arriving to America with more resources usually opposed communism and thereby more often supported policies of Republican administrations—policies welcoming Cuban refugees, lowering taxes, and prioritizing a small, less centralized government.
New York’s Latino population—despite having the same percentage of non-Mexican Hispanics as Florida—significantly differs from both Florida and Nevada. Its Latino population consists of mostly Dominicans and Puerto Ricans—groups with vastly different experiences than either Cubans or Mexicans.
At the same time, nobody should generalize any Latin American diaspora. Mexicans and Dominicans more often leave behind poverty and violence (albeit usually through different means), while Cubans usually immigrate because the revolution threatened their privilege on the island. Nonetheless, middle-class Mexican and Dominican immigrants exist across the country, along with poor working-class Cubans. Latin Americans, like any ethnic group, have class differences, generational differences, and therefore political differences—meaning that no candidate, no matter how much they dominate the Latino vote, should ever think that one state’s Latino vote will determine the next state’s.
Latin America consists of diverse cultures, classes, and people—to group them (or any single Latin American diaspora) into one large bloc not only undermines their cultural diversity, but dangerously presumes that all of them share the same politics. Pronouncements of Sanders’ frontrunner status after his Nevada victory now seem premature—to say that he won mostly due to a large, unified Latino vote, however, is equally absurd.