Latino voters are set to play a key role in the 2020 election and beyond, according to new analysis that shows a major spike in Latino voter registrations.
A new analysis of demographic trends by progressive voter participation group Voto Latino found 295.1 percent growth in new registrations from Latino voters between 2014 and 2018. And 90 percent of those registrations were concentrated in Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, New Mexico, Nevada, Pennsylvania, Texas and Wisconsin, many of which will be critical swing states in the 2020 presidential election.
The Latino electorate has long suffered from low participation rates, particularly in midterms, mostly driven by low registration numbers. Participation rates in the 2018 midterms seemed to mark a sea change for the electorate, as 27 percent of Latino voters said it was their first time voting in midterms, according to the Pew Research Center.
Maria Teresa Kumar, president and CEO of Voto Latino, told The Hill her organization has been actively organizing in all those states. Young voters under 33 years of age accounted for 55.5 percent of the registrations and Latinos accounted for 51.5 percent; 73 percent of all registrations were of people of color.
According to the organization’s numbers, 76 percent of those registered voters successfully voted in 2018, compared to a 40.4 percent voting rate among all Latino citizens nationwide. In the 11 priority states, voting numbers were slightly higher at 77 percent and a survey of 2018 Latino voters by Voto Latino and Change Research showed that 94 percent of those voters plan to keep voting in future elections.
While Latino participation is growing, there are still large swaths of eligible voters that have never been contacted directly by campaigns, according to Kumar. “Candidates should be paying attention, they can’t just rely on the same voters, they have to expand it because there’s an appetite for outreach by the Latino community,” said Kumar.
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