John Locher / AP, file
Maria Nieto, right, and Alma Romo, second from left, register people to vote in Las Vegas in 2018. Young Latino voters in Southern Nevada say they feel their demographic is being ignored by the Biden and Trump campaigns.
Saturday, Feb. 24, 2024 | 2 a.m.
The Latino vote, especially in a swing state like Nevada, could be crucial in determining who is the nation’s next president, election watchers say.
That makes Latino voters a natural demographic to target by the campaigns of both President Joe Biden and his likely Republican opponent, former President Donald Trump, especially in battleground states like Nevada.
But those campaigns might run into some trouble appealing to at least one large segment of Latinos: Young voters feeling limited by the choices they’re being presented.
“I think we might be seeing that on certain key issues, when you’re looking at younger voters, Latino voters, African American voters, the issues that are most important to them, they’re not seeing a whole lot of difference between the two political parties,” said Sondra Cosgrove, a history professor at the College of Southern Nevada and executive director of Vote Nevada, a nonprofit, nonpartisan group that promotes civic engagement. “And because that’s all we have to offer them, because of the way our election system runs, they don’t see any other choices or any other options, so they’re feeling like why should I vote?”
The last two elections have seen historic turnouts of Latino voters, and it’s expected to grow even more, according to the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO), a nonpartisan organization of Latino elected and appointed officials.
But Cosgrove said many younger Latinos in Nevada and across the nation are frustrated with both political parties and their responses to issues like the conflict in Gaza, immigration, abortion and housing affordability.
It’s a struggle that may walk back some of the progress made in getting both Latinos and young voters to the polls, she said.
Latino voters are most concerned with the economy, immigration, housing affordability, health care and foreign relations, according to NALEO research.
“I’ll underscore that the most important thing is to ensure that (eligible Latinos) get registered to vote because that registered Latino is very likely to actually vote in an election,” said Arturo Vargas, the CEO of the NALEO educational fund. “And our polling suggests that robust outreach that occurred in 2020, we hope to see repeat it in 2024 so that we can actually have a significant participation of Latinos in this year’s election.”
In the past two decades, the Latino voting base nationally has steadily increased from 5.9 million in 2000 to 16.5 million in 2020, with an especially dramatic jump between 2016 and 2020, Vargas said. About 88% of Latinos who registered to vote took to the polls,he added.
NALEO projects — based on previous data — that 17.5 million Latinos nationally will vote this November, with a 15.5% increase of Latino voters in Nevada. Many factors contribute to the high projection, said Vargas, but the biggest factor is growth of the Latino electorate itself.
Latino U.S. citizens 18 years of age or older make up one of the largest voting populations in the U.S., second only to non-Hispanic whites, Vargas explained.
In Nevada, roughly 30% of the state’s estimated 3,194,176 residents identify as Hispanic or Latino, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. In the 2020 election, according to the Americas Society / Council of the Americas, Latinos comprised 20 percent of Nevada’s total voter turnout.
Under such a backdrop, it’s easy to see why campaigns are reaching out to Latinos.
Last August, the Biden campaign announced a $25 million advertising buy on Hispanic and Black media outlets in battleground states like Nevada. It was the largest and earliest media investment in the Latino and Black communities in history for a presidential reelection campaign, CNN reported. The Biden ads ran for 16 weeks on broadcast and cable television, according to CNN.
Locally, engaging with the state’s Latino population is a critical part of Democrats’ strategy, said Natalia Jordan, political and party affairs director for the Nevada State Democratic Party.
Jordan — a Latina born and raised in Nevada — said the Nevada Democratic Party has also been hosting campaign events statewide in English and Spanish to “engage our communities as early as possible.”
Some of the main priorities the Democrats are highlighting in Biden’s reelection campaign are creating high-paying jobs, defending abortion rights and lowering costs for American families.
They’re also paying special attention to members of the Culinary and Bartenders unions. Culinary Local 226, which represents 60,000 workersin Nevada, traditionally has been a powerful voting bloc. Over half of the Culinary Union’s members identify as “Latinx,” according to the union’s website.
Biden spoke with members of the Culinary Union during a visit in December to Las Vegas to tout a $3 billion federal grant awarded to Brightline West for their high-speed rail project linking Southern Nevada and Southern California. During a visit to the College of Southern Nevada’s North Las Vegas campus last October, Vice President Kamala Harris stopped by the Culinary Union headquarters to talk with workers and union organizers.
“Nevada is a union state, and we really stand behind that, and the only person delivering for us is President Biden,” Jordan said. “That’s truly one of the backbones of our community with getting out these voters, and at the end of the day, they only have one person that’s standing behind them, and that’s what they’re getting excited (to vote) for.”
Part of Nevada Democrats’ strategy to get their message out is by having Latinos — especially Spanish-speaking ones — organize fellow Latino voters.
They’re even trying to expand their resources to accommodate Spanish speakers by providing translated materials, such as their website and delegate selection process documents.
All of this could bolster a party’s chance of capturing more Latino voters, but from Cosgrove’s observations, many voters of color “feel taken for granted” by politicians who she said forget about these populations once the elections are over.
There’s also a lack of knowledge about the races at stake in the June primary as well as the issue of nonpartisan voters, who aren’t able to participate in Nevada’s closed primaries despite having the largest number of registered people.
Cosgrove foresees a scenario where nonpartisans, if ignored by Democrats and Republicans, could “be a wild card that could completely upset the results in November” should a charismatic independent candidate come along.
“I think if we want to engage voters who are feeling taken for granted, they need to be listened to and they need more choices,” Cosgrove said.
The Sun attempted to contact Republican officials in Nevada to detail their outreach efforts to Latino voters, but they didn’t respond.
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