Wednesday, February 24, 2016

The Latino Vote

Among the top three Republican candidates for President, two are Latinos. I haven't heard this discussed much, but what will happen if the Republicans run Marco Rubio or Ted Cruz for President or Vice President? Will they win half or nearly half of the Latino vote (and the election)?  In the Nevada caucuses we got an answer.

Among Republican Latinos, Donald Trump beat both Rubio and Cruz in Nevada. And Trump is running a racist anti-Mexican campaign. Putting Cruz or Rubio on the ticket won't help the Republicans. I can guess that Latinos see Cruz and Rubio as men who sold out their own Spanish culture in order to pander to racists on immigration.

Both men have Cuban parents. Latinos don't see themselves as a block, and we don't treat them as a block. Cubans go to the head of the line for green cards, while Mexican families get rushed into deportation.  The histories of Cuba and Mexico with the United States are different. For whatever reason, the Republican Latinos of Nevada rejected Cruz and Rubio, and I assume that independent and Democratic Latinos, most of them of Mexican origin, would do the same--and also reject the racist Trump.

No comments: