Trump’s approval ratings just hit a new low. A Latino voter shift could reshape the midterms

My son's friends parents are Latino and huge MAGA's and immigrants. But they think they are better than other people. It's wild. We talked Trump one day and I flat out said "if you put our two kids in front of Trump for a job he's picking my kid every time because he's white". She agreed. A lot of Latino's are racist too.

It's the entire r/LeopardsAteMyFace sub listnook. "I had no idea Trump would deport *me*, cried the man who voted for Deporting That Exact Person party"

My mom is Mexican, and she's super conservative... always has been. Back before she had dementia she was a social worker that specialized in helping new Mexican immigrants navigate the various bureaucracies to get the services they needed. She started going full maga as soon as her mind started slipping.

Just like the rest of America, within various Latino communities there are in groups and out groups and it is a mistake to call them this monolith voting bloc. That said, they voted for Trump overall just like white women and white men so absolutely f*** em all they get what they deserve.

Yo, so I’m a CA Latino who has been trying to understand why so many Latinos voted for Trump this time. These are my thoughts. It’s been mentioned in this thread but I’ll mention it again. A lot of people who aren’t part of the Latino community assume that Latinos are a monolithic group that always votes the same way but that’s not the case. A CA Latino doesn’t always have the same views and priorities as a TX or FL Latino. It’s way way more complex. Part of it is the state they live in but I think it really depends their country of origin. Yes, we all speak the same language but every Latino has a different experience in regards to politics and their relationship to the government they grew up in their country of origin. A lot of Cubans and Venezuelans have a strong distrust of the government’s intentions due to the communist/socialist dictatorships that have run those countries for decades. The government assumes control of economic and societal aspects in those respective countries. What has that amounted to? Hyperinflation in Venezuela where the currency has so little value that people make bags out of those worthless bills while people are struggling to feed themselves. In Cuba, they are currently dealing with a nationwide blackout for a 2nd time this month that goes on for days. People from these countries are traumatized from their governments and have only seen the negatives when the government overreaches personal rights and freedoms. It’s why these people lean towards the GOP who are supposedly the party of personal rights and freedoms and have a knee-jerk reaction whenever they hear any ideas such as Medicare for All. They think of the government from their home country that abused its people. I don’t blame them for havjng that distrust about our federal government and its intentions. But do know this, a common theme with a lot Latino immigrants and their American-born children have is some form of distrust about governments and politicians. Too many of these Latin American countries have some level of corruption. Some are subtle like my parents home country of Mexico. Many people know the narcos/cartels have some local, state and even federal government officials under their payroll. You don’t know who, but it’s a given there are corrupt politicians in the country who are secretly helping the cartels stay in business. Others are blatantly corrupt like Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela. Trump’s constant barrage of criticisms of Joe Biden’s handling of immigration and the economy (whether valid or not) helped fester and grow this distrust and faith in him and the Democratic Party. It didn’t help too that Joe Biden refused to step down from running a 2nd term until he did very late in the game. The Democratic Party had no time to have a primary to pick a new nominee and they went with what was a Hail Mary in having Kamala Harris take over without a primary. Trump spun it another way. He ranted how the Democratic Party didn’t even attempt to hold a primary and simply anointed Kamala Harris as their nominee. This Hail Mary play by the Democratic Party helped bring out more anti-government sentiment towards Joe Biden and the Democratic party amongst Latinos. However, this play on anti-government sentiment in Latinos would not have been successful were it not the economic state this country was in at the time the 2024 election occurred. As someone who has voted for all the Democratic nominees in every midterm and election cycle, I have accepted that the economy was not doing well under Joe Biden. The economy was improving, but not at a margin significant enough for the average voter, especially for the Latino voter. While economic progress has been made, a lot of Latinos in this country are still part of the working class. The economic impacts due to the COVID pandemic and the inflation have really stretched thin the wallets of a lot of Latinos. I notice it with my neighbors in my apartment complex who the grand majority are working-class folks. They are struggling with the increase in grocery prices and rent. Sadly, I’ve seen several neighbors move out because the rent was too high for them to keep up. A lot of Latinos were in a tough spot economically 2 years ago as they are now. They were so desperate for some form of economic change that they took a chance on Trump because he sold them on how great the economy was during his 1st term. He promised them he alone would bring the economy roaring back to life and would bring back extra money into their pockets. They were so desperate for economic change , that a lot of Latinos were willing to vote for Trump even when he was pushing for mass deportation of illegal immigrants since he promised he would only go after criminals, rapists, and pedophiles. He would never go deport one of family members, friends, coworkers or any other loved one. Voting for Trump was a risk they were willing to take so long it brought economic prosperity for them and their family. As you can tell now that we’re a little over a year into Trump’s 2nd term you are seeing these polls showing a huge drop in support for Trump amongst the Latino community. The gamble did not pay off and a lot of Latinos are still a tough economic spot. If anything, their economic situation is getting worse on top of the added stress from Trump’s mass deportation rounding up any one of their friends or family. There is a huge buyers remorse amongst the Latinos who voted for Trump. Anything that could go wrong in their life is going wrong. I know it’s a long read but I hope it gives non-Latino a good perspective as to why so many Latinos voted for Trump despite the clear obvious red flags. Not sure if you can tell but I’ve have some sympathy and understanding for the Latinos that voted for him, hell I have some friends that surprised me with that revelation. I get where they were thinking when they cast their vote for him. But it still deeply disappoints me and I see it as a betrayal to see so many Latinos put their faith on this malignant narcissist of a man who only cares about himself. For those who want a TLDR version of this: Trump played into a lot of Latino’s distrust of governments from their governments from their country of origin and used it paint Biden and the Democratic Party as corrupt. And then he went back to his play from his 2020 playbook of “It’s the economy stupid!!” to get Latinos to vote for him if they wanted to see economic prosperity in their life.

Wealthy white male Christian Nationalists who want to see the end of days voted within their stated interests, for what it's worth.

Once you understand the Conservative mind it actually makes sense in a weird twisted way. Conservatives believe in hierarchies. So if you're a Conservative Latino in the US you believe in those hierarchies but you're in a place where you're at or near the bottom. The rational thing to do would be to reject the hierarchical mindset and oppose the party that promotes it, and most do (which is why overall Latinos tend to be more Democratic than whites). But for many of them they aren't that introspective. Instead they try to find a way to be higher on the hierarchy. One way to do that (at least in their minds) is to vote for Trump and the Republicans. That proves they're "one of the good ones", right? Of course in reality Republicans will never look past their skin color and treat them as anything more than useful idiots.

It's not uncommon for women and minorities to vote against their interests. It's a type of assimilation. It's easier for most to "join" than stand out against a white male My schema shift occurred when prop 187 CA passed and bilingual education disappeared (and stricter anti-immigrant policies were implemented). Many Latina colleagues of mine were in favor of this and I better understood the "close the door behind me" mentality. Especially from those who were from South America and not from Mexico. It's a big world with a lot of racism to go around.

It's actually really simple. Every group of people has idiots. Some of those idiots are also bad people. No matter what race, ethnicity, or religion, you'll find some malicious idiots who make things worse for everyone around them.

Religion and abortion, kicking the ladder of other Latinos over since they got theirs

Ngl it’s just like in native culture. VERY misogynistic and homophobic and VERY hypocritical

I've read that misinformation in Spanish language social media is even worse than the English spaces.

Mike Madrid has a great post somewhere explaining the Latino vote and how most non-Latinos and the Democrats in general just assume and lump that entire demographic into one single entity and how that's wrong. A Texas Latino voter is entirely different than a California Latino voter. Different backgrounds, different ideals, different motives, different stances in issues. Pretty eye opening to me as a non-Latino myself. Yeah I understood the Florida voter was different, but after reading this breakdown really made me understand just how and why Trump got the support he did - and it wasn't just a bunch of dumb people voting against their self interests.

Look at how half of ICE are Latino. They’re super religious and a lot of them are immigrants themselves or first generation. They’re here and anyone who’s not isn’t as good as them and doesn’t deserve to come now. True pull the ladder up behind you types.

I lived with a Mexican woman for seven years. Her family said way more fucked up shit about Latinos than my racist uncles ever did while I was growing up in So Cal 50+ years ago.

I saw many Indians, who hate other communities, voted for Trump because they thought he would remove the other communities. Now, they are biting their tongues and cutting their fingers looking at his TACO. Sometimes, people have their own agenda and use society's brain rather than their own.

If you’re rich, the trump vote has worked out pretty well for you.

As others surely will point out, racism and right-wing politics are quite at home in Latin America.

It's classic. Old time immigrants made the move from marginalized to privileged. Once you become the privileged, all you want is to keep this way, not have more people privileged. If everyone is privileged, nobodo is. Furthermore, people will fight to keep it this way.

It’s because propaganda works

A lot of them carry trauma from failed "socialist" states. So, as long as Democrats are painted as socialists, they'll never vote for them.

I am a Latino and I don't understand it too. I believe it's because he doesn't act like most politicians. And of course a lot of us are self hating. And get upset with illegal border crossing. What I tell them is that they look like the enemy to the right wing. And if they talk to me I'm Spanish. I tell them in America we speak English now! A lot of us have been here since the 50s and they still don't know how to speak proper English.

No group is a monolith even when it seems like a clear cut issue. Identity often Trumps common sense. Like a guy who is allergic to beef but feels like Men have to eat steak. So he dies choking to death...

Religion

It’s pretty simple. Most Lartinos are very religious and anti-immigration. Because all new immigrants make the entire community look bad when they f*** up. 

[removed]

I’ve noticed a lot of that too, especially when it’s only around ~40%. That said, 36% from Reuters is pretty damn low.

Agreed. Heck, I’m waiting for him to consistently poll below 33%. How is it that more of a third of our country consistently approves of him?

They disapprove of him but they would never vote for anyone else 

I get what you're saying, but this is so extraordinary because he is underwater. Underwater approval rating was basically never heard of until Trump. Even Bush, with his low approval rating, wasn't underwater

It won't go below 36% short of a civil war or an asteroid killing mostly Republicans. The country is fucked and the 35-40% of the country loves it that way

I would cheerfully crawl over broken glass to vote against them in the midterms. Compared to your average suburban wine mom that makes me a disengaged moderate.

The breakdown of the "Hispanic" vote shows 60% of Cubans voted for Trump. Only 35% of other Hispanics did. Cuban Americans are 85+% white. White Hispanics vote exactly like all other white Christians. https://www.as-coa.org/articles/poll-tracker-latino-vote-2024-us-presidential-election

The men are often misogynists and older Latinos are conservative, aka anti-choice.

At this point I don't give a shit. He'd spend a few months in jail anyway with his health. What's more important is ending MAGA as a concept and his exit does that to a major degree.

Very disappointed in the democrats for that.

This. The Supremely Compromised will park his immunity and self-patdon cases on the slow boat to Russia docket and by the time they do anything, he’ll be dead.

Polls aren't false. A poll, in this use, is literally just a sampling of opinion. The extrapolation of that data can be unreliable, if that's what you mean.

The breakdown of the "Hispanic" vote shows 60% of Cubans voted for Trump. Only 35% of other Hispanics did. Cuban Americans are 85+% white. White Hispanics vote exactly like all other white Christians. https://www.as-coa.org/articles/poll-tracker-latino-vote-2024-us-presidential-election Also, keep in mind that voter suppression looks like voter swing just because of the math. A "shift" is comparing % of votes. If you lower the bottom number (total number of ppl voting) but focus on reducing it only from liberal areas, it will look like a shift. That's just math Example - From 3R/(3R+7D) to 3R/(3R+5D) will look like a shift from 30% Republican to 37.5% Republican... Just from suppressing liberal areas. And Republicans constantly focus on voter suppression.

Because being a Democrat isn’t membership in a cult.

There are many people including me who are a Democrat and will vote for democrats. I still don’t approve of the way they have handled themselves since the 2024 election. They shot themselves in the foot by infighting and Nancy Pelosi encouraging Biden to step down. I would have rather had Biden finish the race and still lose vs swapping someone out at the finish line and still lose. Chuck Schumer and the Jefferies need to go. They are nothing but political theater who cannot bring their party together. Why would anyone respect them when their only instinct is to write “strongly worded” letters?

Those that remain will insist it never could've happened to them because they're "the good ones".

Different polls have different approval ratings. Also Trump has a much higher floor than other Republican presidents since he literally has a cult.

Shame they helped him get elected twice in massive numbers

>How optimistic to think there's going to be fair midterms. At this point it literally doesn't matter what he tries. Dems are getting the House at the very least and there's basically nothing short of nuking polling stations he can do about it. That's how bad his current situation is and that situation will continue developing as Iran and the economy unfold. >Trump's people know that if the GOP loses control of Congress, Trump is going to jail. I don't think his cabinet gives a shit about whether he goes to jail or not. They care about if THEY'RE going to jail or not. The second that becomes a real possibility they'll start to turn on one another. >They're seeing the way the polls are breaking, and they're getting desperate I actually don't believe this is true for the Senate. Thune seems perfectly content with losing the Senate majority role should November's bloodbath actually happens. Republicans operate better as an opposition force than governing party and Thune knows that. Johnson on the other hand is f****** cooked. He's disliked by basically everyone in the House including his own party. The House is going to be Dems almost gaurenteed at. This point and there's next to zero Trump or Johnson can do about it.