Latino unenthusiasm ahead of the 2024 general elections may benefit Trump, as more Latino Republicans assert they will head to the polls in November compared to their Democratic counterparts, a new Axios Vibes survey by The Harris Poll shows.
The data comes from a nationally representative sample of over 2,000 U.S. adults conducted online from July-10-12, in which 587 individuals identified as Latinos and 502 as Latino voters.
From those respondents, 86% of Latino Republicans said they will vote ahead of November, compared to 71% of Democrats who said the same thing. Similarly, 54% of Independent voters confirmed they will also cast their ballots.
One of the reasons for these trends is that Latino Republicans tend to believe and connect with their candidate, in this case former president Donald Trump, and are also inspired by a drive to improve their personal economic status, Axios reports.
The latter issue aligns with a growing body of literature that shows Latinos place the economy and inflation as their top priority ahead of this year's elections. Latino Republicans add border security and crime to that list, while Latino Democrats follow it with climate change and abortion, according to the survey.
"From a branding standpoint, Latinos have a different perception of the GOP than they do of the candidate," said John Gerzema, CEO of The Harris Poll. "They think Republicans are business-friendly, out of touch, they trail on caring, they trail on equality. They see Democrats as more in-touch, tolerant, promoting the people, but they haven't delivered."
"As Trump remakes the party's image in his likeness, Latinos are primed to receive that message because... it's a more populist message. Their No. 1 issue is their personal economics and he's talking about lowering taxes, improving wages and making housing more affordable, which are really the biggest issues of this cycle," Gerzema continued.
By the numbers, Latino voters prioritized the economy three times as much as immigration or abortion, Axios found. That's a bigger gap than among non-Latino voters. They also placed a higher priority on housing affordability, climate change and taxes than non-Latinos.
The report comes during an election cycle where Latinos' diversity and growing numbers across the U.S. have placed them to be a decisive group on choosing the next president of the U.S.
"Latinos are geographically concentrated in states that are rich in primary delegates and Electoral College votes (California, Florida, New York, Texas), are electoral battlegrounds (Arizona, Nevada), or both," Clarissa Martinez-de-Castro, vice president of the Latino Vote Initiative being run by UnidosUS, said back in April.
"In addition, given razor-thin margins of victory, even in battleground states with smaller Latino populations— like Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin— these voters have the ability of tipping the outcome," she continued.
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