I was skeptical before the election, but I'm convinced now that the Democratic collapse with hispanic voters is an outreach problem. I think the Democratic Party can correct this, but it needs to stop with the denial. Yes, the 2020 primary forced a lot of toxic and unelectable policy positions into the mainstream discussion and I'm certain that didn't help, but it also didn't help that the Party ignored the red flags regarding hispanic support.
The great, fantastic news is that unlike in 2016, the Democratic Party can figure out how to resolve this problem in victory instead of defeat, and I'm optimistic that we can do that.
Yeah, this is going to require some serious getting under the hood. Conservatives crowing that Hispanic supposed cultural conservatism has finally had a light bulb go on over their Collective heads after 40 Years of Democrats running on a pro-choice platform, etc, is kind of laughable.
The big question Democrats have to ask themselves is why did Biden do so much worse than Hillary Clinton 4 years ago? With respect to posters who suggested this, I suspect the fact Tim Kaine is fluent in Spanish isn't even the tip of the iceberg. I doubt one- in 20 persuadable Hispanic voters even knew that. Heck, I don't think I did until reading one of those posts in the last couple days!
The key questions are to what degree was it the following:
1, the Biden campaign just sh**ting the bed in terms of campaign Logistics and Outreach. That would be the easiest answer and the most readily curable, but I fear it's not that simple. Nevertheless, was it the largest part?
2. Particular appeal Trump individually had to certain types of Hispanics? I hate to say it but this seems to be in part true as well. There is no way that simple campaign malpractice could create the type of gargantuan swings we saw in the Miami-Dade Cuban community, or the Rio Grande Valley. Heck as one of the maps in this thread done by Miles shows, Biden lost strength among Urban and Suburban Hispanics in Harris County. There is also at least some preliminary evidence that Trump did extraordinary really well for Republican among black men under 45. Obviously different communities with different voting habits, but it seems to show a general shift of young working-class men similar to what's happened with whites the past few elections. Was it that Trump in his own bizarre Big Mouth demagogue way gave voice to some of these individuals who felt they were otherwise being ignored by standard politicians like Biden? Again, one has to wonder why these people turned out so strongly for Hillary Clinton four years ago, though.
3. Was it the issues/policy? With the swings in part because of Biden, despite his support of fracking personally, being seen as part of the Green New Deal party and proclaiming in a debate how it was necessary to transition away from oil and gas? Did Trump sending out covid relief checks with his name on it help? Do Southwest rural Hispanics have a lot more sympathy and connection to the US border patrol and ICE than asylum seekers being Turner away en masse by the Trump Administration? Again, if so, how do we explain Clinton doing so well in these regions and communities four years ago?
It's not enough just to say a little of everything. The easiest, and therefore most unlikely answer is a combination of one and two. Do a much much better job in terms of Outreach and campaign Logistics as was apparently done four years ago, and hope that whatever generic far right-wing Republican wins the nomination for years from now is not going to carry the same unique appeal to working-class minorities that Trump had(at least for a republican) . 3 is obviously the hardest bullet to bite, but again if Progressive views on immigration and climate change / fossil fuels are poison among these communities, Clinton would have been shellacked here just as badly for years ago.
Now that I framed the debate without offering any complete answers, anyone else want to offer their observations?
