US election: Did Trump gain Latino vote despite ‘floating garbage’ jibe?

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The US Latino vote leaned more to the Republican side this election than it did in 2020, when President Joe Biden won, one of several drivers that have propelled Donald Trump to triumph over Vice President Kamala Harris this time around.

Analysts and observers say this is an important but unsurprising shift, as the traditional support among Latinos for the Democratic Party has waned in recent years.

A key voting bloc, Latinos make up nearly 20 percent of the United States population, with most born in the country. Some 36.2 million Latinos were projected to vote this year.

A crude, badly-timed joke likening Puerto Rico to a “floating island of garbage” by comedian Tony Hinchcliffe at a Trump rally in New York had been expected to batter Trump’s growing support base among Latinos, especially in battleground states such as Pennsylvania – an Electoral College heavyweight which counts some 486,000 residents of Puerto Rican origin (3.7 percent). But did it?

Here’s what we know about how Latinos voted in the 2024 US elections:

Supporters of Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump celebrate after the Fox Network called the election in his favor at the site of his rally, at the Palm Beach County Convention Center in West Palm Beach, Florida, U.S., November 6

What was the ‘Puerto Rico joke’ controversy?

On October 27, during a warm-up performance at Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden in New York City, Hinchcliffe, whose brand of comedy is insults, took jabs at Latin Americans in general. He implied Latinos reproduce indiscriminately and called Puerto Rico a “floating pile of garbage”.

The comments drew anger from Puerto Rican-Americans and Latinos. In an open letter, the Archbishop of San Juan de Puerto Rico, Roberto Gonzalez Nieves, who previously served in New York’s Bronx borough, demanded that Trump apologise personally. “Hinchcliffe’s comments not only provoke sinister laughter but hatred,” he said.

Trump’s campaign distanced itself from the comedian, saying the joke did not reflect Trump’s views. Trump himself told ABC News a few days afterwards: “I don’t know (Hinchcliffe) – someone put him up there.” He stopped short of condemning the comments, however.

JD Vance, Trump’s running mate, who previously made untrue and disparaging claims about Haitian immigrants eating cats and dogs in Ohio, downplayed the comedian’s comments. He told reporters: “I think that we have to stop getting so offended at every little thing in the United States of America.”

For Democrats, it seemed well-timed. Vice President Kamala Harris called the comments “nonsense”. Her campaign had just released a new video that unveiled her plans to strengthen economic support for Puerto Rico, a US territory whose citizens cannot vote in the US. The campaign also rallied Puerto Rican pop stars Bad Bunny, Jennifer Lopez and Fat Joe to its side.

In the final hours of the election campaigns on Monday, both Trump and Harris spent several hours in Reading, Pennsylvania, a town with a 70 percent Puerto Rican population – Trump to cool down the controversy, and Harris to woo angry voters to her side.

How did Latinos vote on Tuesday?

Despite that drama, Latino voters appeared to lean slightly more in favour of Trump in Tuesday’s election, compared to their more Democrat-leaning vote in the last election. Trump defeated Harris 51 percent to 47 percent to make his political comeback.

Overall, more than half of Hispanic voters supported Harris, according to a survey of 115,000 voters compiled by the Associated Press news agency. However, that’s below the estimated 60 percent who voted for President Joe Biden in 2020.

That shift follows a trend spotted in the 2020 elections. About three in five Latinos voted for Biden, according to pollster FiveThirtyEight – lower than the two in three who voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016.

In Harris’s home state of California, which also has the largest Latino population (15.7 million), the vice president won by 58 percent to Trump’s 40 percent overall, according to FiveThirtyEight. However, she was barely ahead, or even trailing, in some Hispanic-majority counties like Merced and Fresno, according to early counts by US publication Axios.

In battleground states, support among Latinos for Harris was highest in Pennsylvania, where she won the Latino vote by 77 percent to 26 percent, according to data from Latino rights group UnidosUS. She also won the Latino votes in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina and Wisconsin.

Economic issues drove Latinos in Pennsylvania to the #Election2024 polls. Hispanic voters chose Harris over Trump (72%-26%) and voted Democrats over Republicans for the U.S. House (68%-27%).

Check️https://t.co/AMsYgx0il8 for 2024 American Electorate Voter Poll data! 🗳 pic.twitter.com/ozTvGPOwfy

— UnidosUS (@WeAreUnidosUS) November 6, 2024

In Florida, which is home to the third-largest Latino community in the US (5.7 million), Trump won 56 percent of the vote over Harris’s 43 percent. He also won the state in 2020, but led Biden 51 percent to 48 percent – again showing a downward trend for Democratic support over the longer term.

What’s causing the shift?

Democrats not addressing ‘real-life’ issues

Many Latinos, particularly older voters, appeared more motivated by biting inflation in the US, healthcare costs and housing affordability than they did about more broad values like democracy, reproductive rights or even immigration – values that appeared more critical to the Democrat campaign, according to AP’s survey.

In general, though, voters had diverse points of interest, analysts say. Some, like 26-year-old Claudia from New York, are disappointed about the Democrats’ handling of Israel’s war on Gaza and immigration but still prefer to align with Harris, while others prefer Trump, revealing a wide range of political leaning.

“We have nuanced political views and some national political debates aren’t as important here,” Californian farmer Joe Garcia told Axios. “The farmer workers who work for me don’t drive Teslas … They are worried about jobs and clean water,” he added, referring to political debates on electric vehicles and fossil fuels.

The economy

Analysts say Trump gained traction with Latino voters with claims about the stronger state of the economy under his presidency, and by playing on fears of a supposed “communist” system under Harris.

“I will deliver the best future for Puerto Ricans and Hispanic Americans. Kamala will deliver you poverty and crime,” Trump told supporters in Allentown, Pennsylvania on Monday.

Trump’s campaign delivered such messages in Spanish advertisements and spread them widely on social media. Trump also rallied with Puerto Rican reggaeton stars Anuel AA and Nicky Jam to reach young Latino men, although Nicky Jam withdrew his endorsement after the Hinchcliffe joke.

Ideological concerns

Ideological concerns are real for many Latino immigrants, especially those with ties to Cuba and Venezuela, where leftist administrations are perceived as having poor track records on the economy.

“Republicans have weaponised the fear of socialism and communism, especially in Florida,” Paola Ramos, author of Defectors: The Rise of the Latino Far Right and What It Means for America, told Al Jazeera.

Appealing to men

Trump’s macho rhetoric also appeals in particular to Latino men, and gives them a sense of elevated status, analysts say. Then there’s the new crop of young Latinos who identify as politically independent. Some in this group don’t define themselves solely by their heritage, and their voting can’t be predicted.

How did concerns about immigration affect the Latino vote?

Experts say there is no one dominant view on whether migration is “good” or “bad” for the country among Latinos. And where there are concerns, they are far more nuanced than this.

In Latino communities, surveys show that 46 percent of people perceive migrants as contributing to crime – a narrative Trump has pushed – but the same number see them as not contributing to crime, according to the Pew Research Center.

This is largely split down party lines. Latino Republicans (72 percent) say the migrant situation is leading to more crime, much higher figures than Latino Democrats (33 percent).

Trump, who made immigration a hot-button issue in his campaigns, has long thrown jabs at undocumented immigrants. During his first run as president, he famously said immigrants from El Salvador, Haiti and the African continent were from “s***hole countries”.

This time, he has promised to deport some 11 million undocumented people, seal the US border to stop the migrant “invasion”. He also wants to reinstate the controversial “Remain in Mexico” policy, which would require asylum seekers to stay in Mexico until their immigration court cases have been resolved, and to reinstate a ban on people from certain Muslim countries entering the US. Trump, in the past, has mostly made good on his campaign promises.

Harris, on the other hand, promised tighter border controls and an “earned pathway to citizenship” that would see more people receive employment and family visas.

Historically, a vast majority of undocumented people are from countries in Latin America, although more recently, migrants from Russia, India and China make up a growing share of those entering the country.

But there is little difference in outcomes for undocumented people between a Republican and Democratic administration. Biden carried out 1.1 million deportations between 2021 and February 2024, according to the US-based Migration Policy Institute. That nearly matches Trump’s 1.5 million removals, although Trump also ended a policy from the era of President Barack Obama that created pathways to citizenship for some half a million undocumented children who grew up in the US and who are known as “Dreamers”.

Immigration reforms for Latin American immigrants already in the US, such as the Dreamers – rather than the issue of fresh arrivals – are more important to Latino voters, experts say.

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