Does trump read from a prompter3/10/2023 ![]() ![]() Reasonable people can disagree about the details of immigration policy, but Trump’s demagoguery on the subject, to me, reeks of irrational hostility to people of Latin American ancestry. Over the past five years, many liberals have had occasion to refer to Trump’s rhetoric and approach to immigration policy as “racist.” I’ve done it myself. What if many US Hispanics simply don’t see the racial politics of the Trump era the way intellectuals - whose thinking and writing on structural racism and white supremacy have gained broad influence in recent years - think they should? Trump, racism, and immigration ![]() Looking at Democrats’ problems with Cubans and South Americans in Florida in the context of their struggles with Mexican Americans in Texas suggests a different diagnosis. In the Rio Grande Valley, Cameron County early vote has Biden up 12Ĭlinton won it by 33 in 2016 - Patrick Svitek November 4, 2020 Cuba, for example, is a multiracial nation with a history of slavery, racism, and colorism, much of which migrated to the US with the conservative-leaning bloc of Cubans who fled Fidel Castro’s revolution. Nikole Hannah-Jones, the New York Times Magazine writer whose work on the 1619 Project has been very influential in progressive thinking about race, noted on Twitter that the “Latino” construct is a US invention, one that doesn’t reflect the actual racial dynamics in Latin America. Since the issue arose first and most clearly in Miami, it’s understandable that a lot of intellectual reactions focused on specific issues related to the Cuban community. Biden’s weakness with Hispanics is bigger than Cubans It’s not just about electoral tactics or outreach: The professional class of progressives who often shape cultural narratives should consider the racial dynamics of the Trump years and their own approach to intersectional politics. The more urban (and, in the case of Las Vegas casino workers, unionized) Latino populations of Arizona and Nevada do seem to have delivered for Biden, so one should not overstate the scope of the trend any more than one understates it.īut there should be some broader rethinking prompted by the breadth of Trump’s improvements with segments of the Latino population that one might anticipate would be more open to a conservative message on either foreign policy or cultural issues. ![]() President Donald Trump during a rally at Miami-Opa Locka Airport in Opa Locka, Florida, on November 2. Trump actually won Zapata County, for example, a small border jurisdiction that’s 84 percent Hispanic and which Hillary Clinton won by 30 points in 2016. More to the point, Democrats turned in extremely disappointing performances in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas, even in the context of a large overall improvement in the state. In South Florida, Biden lost ground with a diverse Hispanic population that includes many families from Puerto Rico, Venezuela, or Colombia, as well as Cuba broadly. Miami has always been a bit of a city apart in terms of Latino politics in the United States, with a heavily Cuban American population that has a tradition of Republican voting and deep emotional and intellectual investments in the Latin American Cold War.īut while Cuba-specific issues are tactically central to electoral battles in Florida, the fact is that even before all the results are in, it’s clear Biden’s weakness with Latino voters was broader than that. Donna Shalala her House seat and sank Joe Biden’s hope of an early win. Election night started with a major underperformance for Democrats in Miami-Dade County that cost Rep. ![]()
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