The Latino vote in Florida: Trump’s anti-communist rhetoric is hitting a wall

The Latino vote in Florida is a lot like what people in the Caribbean call “rice with mango.” That is to say, something that at first glance lacks linear logic and contains apparent contradictions. Trump’s visit to Hialeah on the outskirts of Miami last November offers an idea of this complex spectrum of voters. “He spoke about the mass deportations he intends to carry out if he is reelected. He also spoke about his plans to end Obamacare. The event was full of Cubans, Venezuelans, and Colombians who praised him. The most curious thing of all is that this neighborhood has the highest number of zip codes with Hispanics enrolled in Obamacare. It is a phenomenon that we have not been able to explain yet,” says Eduardo Gamarra, director of the Latino Public Opinion Forum program at Florida International University.

The state is now a Republican bastion, and Latin American immigration has had a lot to do with it. Cuban exiles began to become naturalized in large numbers in the 1980s, tired of waiting for the fall of Fidel Castro. Many joined the party of Ronald Reagan, the former president who campaigned saying that “Latinos are Republicans, they just don’t know it yet.” This situation created the opinion that Hispanics are mainly conservative, although polls refute this.

“When asked which party best represents their values, most people identify with the Democratic Party. When asked their opinion on socialism, a minority loves it, another minority hates it, but again the majority is in the middle; and it is the same when they are asked about capitalism,” says Gamarra, who has been studying the Hispanic vote in the United States for more than 20 years. In fact, Obama’s policy of opening up to Cuba caused levels of support for the embargo to drop considerably and many Cubans to move closer to the blue party.

The fact that they are immigrants has also made Latinos a population that is inclined to support a more active role by government. They are a group that is highly receptive to government aid. “It is stunning to hear the story told by many pro-Trump Cuban millionaires that the government never helped them out, when the truth is that the White House made them a privileged group. I am not criticizing them, but it is a reality. A lot of money was spent on them. They were given all kinds of subsidies so that they could achieve the success they have today,” adds this expert. The main concern that Hispanics have today is inflation and, in second place, access to medical insurance that will guarantee them comprehensive health coverage in a country where health care is exorbitantly expensive. However, these motivations disappear when one enters the arena of American foreign policy.

Florida Hispanics have found in the Republicans’ anti-socialist rhetoric a way to repair the wounds caused by the region’s authoritarian regimes. Trump’s years in Washington coincided with the state violence unleashed in Nicaragua and Venezuela, and now that he is fighting for re-election, with Gustavo Petro’s presidency in Colombia, the return of Lula in Brazil and the continuation of the Central American exodus. But, notes Gamarra, “the usefulness of that discourse is already beginning to run out in Florida. Trump is spending more time on insults than on discussing public policy.” The Republican candidate will not stop accusing Kamala Harris of being a communist, yet polls indicate that Latinos do not associate social spending with socialism. “When you tell a Hispanic person that you are going to give him $25,000 for a down payment on a house, it is a form of economic populism, but it is an effective one. Harris’ campaign is directly targeting lower living costs, and this is precisely what field research has been telling us about voter expectations,” adds Gamarra.

Earlier this week, the Democratic mayor of Miami-Dade County (the most densely populated county in the state, with 70% of its population being Latino), Daniella Levine Cava, was re-elected with around 60% of the vote. Her four Republican opponents attacked her with the usual insult, “she’s a communist,” but failed to convince voters. It could serve as an indication of what might happen in November. Republicans dismiss any state aid as socialism, but two essential programs such as Social Security and Medicare date back to the presidency of the Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the 1930s, that is to say, they are almost a century old and are part of the American welfare state.

Classism as a factor in the Republican vote

To address the Hispanic electorate is to address an extremely diverse group made up of citizens of different origins, social classes, races and times of arrival in the United States. In this sense, one of the greatest contradictions of this diverse group is reflected in the surveys when they are asked about the immigration of other Latin Americans. The latest study by the Latino Public Opinion Forum, which dates back to July of this year, indicates that 23% of Latinos in Florida consider the border and illegal immigration as the main threat to national security. Likewise, 32% agree with mass deportations. “If you have more education and money, a stable life, children who speak English without an accent, you are privileged. In this sense, I have interviewed leaders of the Venezuelan community who see their recently arrived compatriots as criminals from the Tren de Aragua. Their thinking is ‘I am not like those people who are arriving now’,” says Gamarra.

The “pulling up the ladder” theory might explain the paradox. The first immigrants to arrive assume themselves to be the good ones and do not want more people to arrive. Once the boat is full, the last one asks for the ladder to be pulled up. “It is a phenomenon that has occurred among various groups of immigrants, not only Hispanics. We bring forms of racism and classism from our countries and we reproduce them here. In June 1980, a Marielito (a Cuban immigrant who departed from the Port of Mariel) brought me a crumpled piece of paper with his brother’s address and phone number. My job at that time was to try to reunite families, so I called this person and to my surprise he said: ‘Please tell him that you haven’t found me, he is Black and I can’t bring him to live with me in Coral Gables.’ It turns out that they were half-brothers. I told him that I couldn’t do that… Years later, I met this person again and asked him if he had managed to reconcile with his brother, and he said that he never did. That gives you an idea of what Miami was like. Many years later, when Obama was a candidate, we held focus groups with Latina women from the state, and a Colombian woman stood up to say: ‘This country is too serious to elect a Black man as president.’” These are two anecdotes that the expert highlights to indicate how these forms of discrimination among the Latino community influence voting.

The Kamala Harris phenomenon

The Democratic Party has historically been the party of the white working class. It is also the party of African Americans, and polls are showing that Latinos who followed the movement of whites towards the Republican Party are now rethinking their relationship with the Democrats. “Not so much in Florida, but the Mexican and Puerto Rican vote in favor of the Democrats could be decisive in this election. There is a group of wealthy Mexicans in Texas who share a similar view to the Latinos in Florida, but in California, New Mexico and Arizona, the Mexican community is very Democratic. We also saw a movement of African American men towards Trump’s party, but what the polls are telling us is that with the arrival of Kamala Harris all these movements will stop,” says Gamarra about the study they are currently carrying out and whose results will be revealed on October 22.

The image of a biracial candidate has burst into the campaign at a dizzying pace. Trump has chosen a running mate (J. D. Vance) who, instead of highlighting his multicultural marriage, has instead identified himself more with Christian nationalism in order to secure the vote of those who continue to find diversity a threat. “The Harris phenomenon is attracting voters who are in limbo, seduced by Trump’s nationalist rhetoric but fearing the racism he represents. What will define the election are the independents in five states: Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Georgia, and Arizona. But Kamala will win the national vote, there is no doubt about that,” concludes the professor.

In the end, what defines the vote is who turns out and who doesn’t: 75% of Latinos who are registered to vote have confirmed they will participate in the November election, in which a high turnout of both anti-Trump and pro-Trump voters is expected. However, in the 2020 and 2022 elections, records indicate that Latinos did not go out to vote in large numbers. The effective participation rate was around 50%. So what will happen in an election that both candidates have called the one that will mark the lives of Americans? In Florida and the rest of the country, the cards have already been dealt.

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