Latinos unleashed a political earthquake after voting for Donald Trump, who has lengthy painted the nation’s largest minority as an existential risk, in unexpectedly massive numbers within the fall.
This swing to MAGA helped Trump win, kicked Democrats into the political wilderness, launched a thousand thought items and confirmed politicians that they ignore Latinos at their very own threat.
Now, Latinos as soon as once more maintain the facility to make or break American politics, because of redistricting fights shaping up in Texas and California. And as soon as once more, each Democratic and Republican leaders assume they know what Latinos need.
Within the Lone Star State, the GOP-dominated Legislature final week authorized the redrawing of congressional districts on the behest of Trump, upending the normal course of, to assist Republicans achieve as much as 5 seats within the 2026 midterms. Their California counterparts landed on the alternative facet of the gerrymandering coin — their maps, which can go earlier than voters in November, goal Republican congressional members.
Texas Republicans and California Democrats are each banking on Latinos to be the swing votes that make their gambits profitable. That’s comprehensible however harmful. If ever a voting bloc fulfills the cliche that to imagine one thing makes an ass out of you and me, it’s Latinos.
Regardless of President Reagan’s well-known assertion that Latinos have been Republicans who didn’t comprehend it but, they rejected the GOP in California and past for a era after the passage of Proposition 187 in 1994. When Hillary Clinton supporters whispered through the 2008 presidential race that Latinos would by no means vote for a Black candidate, they gladly joined the coalition that put Barack Obama within the White Home. Trump elevated his Latino help every time he ran — to the purpose that in 2024, an even bigger proportion of Latinos voted for him than for any earlier Republican presidential candidate — regardless that Democrats insisted that Latinos couldn’t presumably abdomen a person that racist.
Many Latinos hate being taken without any consideration and don’t just like the institution telling them assume. It’s basic rancho libertarianism, the time period I created within the period of Trump to explain the political leanings of the individuals with whom I grew up: Mexican People from rural inventory who concurrently believed in group and individualism and hated the racist rhetoric of Republicans however didn’t care a lot for the woke phrases of Democrats, both.
Such political independence exasperates political leaders, but it’s lengthy been a factor with Latino voters throughout the U.S. however particularly in Texas and California, the place Mexican American voters make up an amazing majority of every state’s Latino voters. As Republicans within the former and Democrats within the latter launch their preliminary redistricting volleys, they appear to be forgetting that, but once more.
Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas), poses for a portrait within the Rayburn Home Workplace Constructing in 2021.
(Kent Nishimura/Los Angeles Instances)
The GOP is hoping voters in South Texas, probably the most Latino areas of the U.S., will carry their Trump like to the 2026 congressional races. There, two of the three congressional seats are held by Democrats Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez, regardless of a swing from a lot of the area’s 41 counties supporting Hillary Clinton in 2016 to simply 5 going for Kamala Harris eight years later.
Of their new maps, Texas legislators poured extra Republican voters into these South Texas districts. In addition they configured new districts within the Houston space and central Texas in order that Latinos are actually the bulk, however voters favored Trump final yr.
However a lawsuit filed hours after the Texas Senate moved the maps to Gov. Greg Abbott for his approval alleged that each one the finagling had created “Potemkin majority-Latino districts.” The intent, based on the lawsuit, was to dilute Latino energy by packing some voters into already Democratic-leaning districts whereas splitting up others amongst red-leaning districts.
The legislators particularly threw San Antonio, a longtime Democratic stronghold that’s a cradle of Latino electoral energy, right into a political Cuisinart. Three Latino Democrats at the moment symbolize the Alamo Metropolis and its metro space: Cuellar, Joaquin Castro and Greg Casar. Beneath the brand new maps, solely Castro is actually protected, whereas Casar is now in a district represented by Democratic Rep. Lloyd Doggett, who has introduced he’ll retire.
“We have three Hispanic-predominated districts in South Texas that we believe we can carve out for Republican leadership,” state GOP Rep. Mitch Little bragged on CNN this month. “It’s good for our party. It’s good for our state. And we need to ensure that Donald Trump’s agenda continues to be enacted.”
The factor is, fewer and fewer Latinos are supporting Trump’s agenda. In Reuters/Ipsos polls, his Latino help dropped from 36% in February to 31% this month. Solely 27% of Latinos authorized of his efficiency in a Pew Analysis Heart ballot launched this month.
If this slide continues by means of subsequent yr and Latinos proceed to reject MAGA, Texas Republicans would have accomplished Trump’s gross gerrymandering and sparked a nationwide legislative civil conflict for nothing.
Republican Rep. Kevin Kiley’s district would swing into Sacramento, selecting up many extra Latino voters than he now has within the majority white Japanese Sierra.
Proposed districts for Democrats Josh More durable and Adam Grey in Central California and Derek Tran in Orange County, all of whom the celebration is making an attempt to buttress after they squeaked by means of in shut elections within the fall, additionally embody areas with extra Latinos. A brand new congressional district in southeast L.A. County would in all probability be crammed by a Latino Democrat.
However all this shuffling is occurring a yr after these very voters jolted state Democrats. Though the celebration nonetheless holds a super-majority in Sacramento, Democratic legislators serve alongside the biggest variety of Latino GOP colleagues ever. The largest swings to Trump occurred in areas with bigger Latino populations, based on a Public Coverage Institute of California report printed final month.
The president’s recognition is very souring in California because of his deportation deluge — however whether or not Latinos will help redistricting is one other matter.
Latinos, as one other cliche goes, aren’t a monolith. They may very effectively assist Republicans win these further congressional seats in Texas and do the identical for Democrats in California.
However any politician betting that Latinos will robotically do what they’re anticipated to … remind me what occurs if you assume one thing?
