Thursday, February 25, 2016

Whither Hispanic Voters

It has been argued that Trump is anathema to Hispanics, because of his desire to shut off illegal immigration and expel illegal immigrants. On the other hand, he apparently won most of the Hispanics voting in the Nevada GOP caucuses. Here are links to two arguments that go in opposite directions.

First, the conventional wisdom about Hispanic voters is written by The Washington Post's Dan Balz and Scott Clement. They point out survey findings that most Hispanics prefer Democrats, and trust the Democrats on most issues. They conclude most will end up voting for the Democrat nominee, and I have no reason to doubt they are correct.

Contrarily, Ruben Navarrette, Jr. writes for The Daily Beast that Hispanics are more like prior Catholic immigrant groups (Italians, Irish) than they are like African-Americans. He argues that they are aspirational, seek to get ahead and work hard to do so. Chances are, he correctly describes the 20% or so who vote Republican. This 20% is probably more likely to vote than the others.