Democrats believed for years that immigration was their wedge issue with Hispanic voters and that leniency would win them over.
Former President Donald Trump is banking on Hispanics being just as upset over the border situation and took his message directly to them on Tuesday. He said the border chaos under President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris will be the deciding issue in the Nov. 5 election.
“The economy is bad, and it is made really bad by the horrible inflation, but I really think the biggest problem this country has is what they allowed to happen to us on the border,” Mr. Trump said Tuesday at a forum with Hispanic supporters in Miami. “I think it is the single biggest problem.”
He has been hitting that note regularly on the campaign trail.
At a town hall event last week, Mr. Trump said the “people that are most against” the influx of illegal immigrants are “the Hispanic people.”
Mr. Trump’s appeal to Hispanic voters has worked. Polls show he has eaten into or even erased Democrats’ advantage.
Mr. Trump has made the border issue a catchall for his campaign. He ties it to challenges related to violent “migrant crime,” stagnant wages and unemployment in Black and Hispanic communities.
He says he wants people to come into the U.S. legally and blames Mr. Biden and Ms. Harris for making a mess of the secure border they inherited.
For his supporters, the border symbolizes everything wrong with the Biden-Harris era. They see it as an ideological malpractice that allowed millions of people to violate the law to enter the country.
Mr. Trump’s eagerness to discuss the issue in front of any audience underscores the lengths to which he has altered the national debate and the Republican Party since crashing onto the political scene nearly a decade ago.
The shifting politics on the border has led Ms. Harris to attempt to rewrite her history on immigration and intensify her targeting of Hispanic male voters.
She recently made her second visit to the border, where she praised Border Patrol agents and promised reinforcements.
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In an interview taped Tuesday with Telemundo, Ms. Harris discussed her vision for helping Hispanic men achieve the American dream. The plan includes increasing apprenticeships and making federal jobs more accessible to people without a college degree, doubling the number of first-time Hispanic homebuyers and providing forgivable loans worth up to $20,000 each to 1 million small businesses.
“As president, Kamala Harris will genuinely invest in our future and ensure everyone has a fair shot at achieving their American Dream,” Sen. Alex Padilla, California Democrat and a member of Ms. Harris’ national advisory board, said in a press statement. “The choice in this election couldn’t be more clear: Kamala Harris will include the Latino community in the success and well-being of our country, while Donald Trump is shamelessly running to cut taxes for corporations, raise health care and grocery costs, and demonize our community.”
Alfonso Aguilar, director of Hispanic Engagement at the American Principles Project, who attended the Trump event Tuesday, said Mr. Trump has “turned the tables” on Democrats.
“Hispanics are saying, ‘We are for deportations,’” he said. “I go back 10 years ago when he came down the stairs at Trump Tower and talked about deporting people — imagine what the reaction was — it was scandalous.
“Now, we are seeing Hispanics saying, ‘We agree with you,’” he said.
“The perspective of Hispanic voters has changed, and now they see the issue as other Americans do. What is the impact on crime?” Mr. Aguilar said. “What is the effect of taking resources from other citizens? They start voting and behaving politically like average American voters.”
Mr. Trump also courted Hispanic voters last week at a Univision town hall. He promised to usher in an era of economic prosperity by driving down the costs of groceries, energy and housing.
“We had the greatest economy in the history of our country,” Mr. Trump said. “Now we have a lousy economy primarily because of inflation. So we’re going to get rid of the inflation. We are going to drill, baby, drill.”
Miami Mayor Francis Suarez said that “law-abiding Hispanics care more about having a prosperous future for themselves and their children than they do about people who are in this country illegally.”
“So I think there’s a misperception that all they care about is, you know, immigration,” Mr. Suarez said on CNN.
He said Mr. Trump has “listened better” than Ms. Harris to Hispanic voters.
“He’s tailored his policies specifically to meet the needs of the diverse Hispanic communities,” he said. “They’re not monolithic. They’re not the same. Every community needs a different approach.”
That poses a challenge for Ms. Harris and other Democrats.
They have relied on the support of Hispanic voters to help them build winning coalitions in the modern era of presidential races. One school of thought was that demographics were destiny.
A USA Today/Suffolk University survey found Ms. Harris losing ground with Hispanic voters this week. She now trails Mr. Trump 49% to 38% among that segment of the electorate.
“He may not be ahead by 11 points, but even if they are tied at the national level, that is remarkable,” Mr. Aguilar said. “Democrats are scratching their heads.”
Mr. Trump won 28% of the Hispanic vote in 2016 and climbed to 32% in 2020. President Biden pulled in 65%.
President George W. Bush set the bar for Republicans in 2004 by capturing more than 40% of the Hispanic vote.
Hispanics are expected to contribute about 15% of the vote nationally. That pool widens in the Hispanic-heavy battleground states of Arizona and Nevada. They also could help tip the scales in Georgia, North Carolina and Pennsylvania.
• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.
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