Democrats' pitch has resonated with more Hispanic voters since Vice President Harris became the party's nominee, they say.New poll by UnidosUS.
The survey, conducted Aug. 5-23, found that 59% of respondents were leaning toward or supporting Harris, while 32% supported former President Trump. In November, 51% of respondents expressed support for President Biden, while 33% supported Trump.
“Vice President Harris has visibly increased her support among Latinos since becoming the party's candidate just a month ago, and her candidacy appears to be resonating with more people in the community. However, Democrats still have work to do to reach the level of support they need and have achieved in previous elections,” said UnidosUS President Janet Murguia.
Not only are Hispanic voters more supportive of the Democratic presidential candidate than they were last November, but that support extends to some of the lesser candidates and views on specific issues.
Economic concerns, particularly inflation and the cost of living, have consistently ranked as top priorities in polls of Hispanic voters in the post-pandemic era.
According to the UnidosUS survey, 45% of respondents said Democrats have better solutions to curb inflation and the overall cost of living, while 27% said Republicans are better equipped to deal with the issue. An additional 11% said both parties are good at solving the problem, and 10% said neither party can effectively curb inflation.
In 2023, 39% of respondents said Democrats would be better at fighting inflation, 21% said Republicans would do the same, 17% saw the two parties as equally effective, and 12% said neither party would be effective.
The change reflects growing polarization as more voters make up their minds: The number of people who are still undecided about a presidential candidate fell from 16% in November to 9% in August.
“The biggest change from the last poll is the rebound in the two-party Democratic vote in the presidential election, and frankly at every electoral level,” said Gary Segura, founder of BSP Research, which conducted the poll.
On many issues, many previously undecided respondents switched their support to the Democratic Party.
For example, in the 2024 poll, 48% of voters said the Democrats were closest to their views on the American Dream, while 25% said the same about the Republicans and 13% said neither party reflected their positions.
In the 2023 poll, 37% of respondents said the Democratic Party reflects their views on the American Dream, 25% said the same for Republicans, and 20% said they did not identify with either party.
Although Democrats have been gaining support in every poll, they have been unable to significantly reduce Republican support, nor have they succeeded in turning the majority of Hispanics against the Republican Party.
The survey found that 27% of respondents said the Republican Party cares a lot about Hispanics, 47% said they don't care that much, and 26% said the Republican Party is openly hostile toward Hispanics.
These numbers represent a slight increase among Republicans from November, when 25% said they were very interested in the Republican Party, 48% said they were not very interested, and 26% said they viewed the party as hostile toward Hispanics.
Democrats have been successful in reducing the number of voters who see them as hostile: In August, 7% of respondents said Democrats were hostile toward Latinos, down from 11% in September.
Additionally, 52% of respondents said Democrats care very much about Hispanics, up from 48% in the previous survey.
Much of the party's polling rise can be attributed to Harris' rise as the Democratic nominee.
“We've had a situation over the last five years or so, and even going back to the last Trump administration, where Democratic policy positions have been more popular than Democrats themselves,” Segura said.
“Part of the reason is that people have flaws, and your opponent will highlight those flaws and therefore be less popular than the positions you support. But this has been a big problem for Democrats for a long time. It's an issue that has put a very real burden on the president's reelection.”
Beyond choosing candidates, both parties still have a lot of work to do when it comes to voter engagement.
Only 23% of respondents said they were directly contacted by Democrats during this election cycle, compared with 16% who said the same about Republicans. Nonpartisan and community groups contacted 12% of respondents. Ballot initiative campaigns contacted 8%.
“It's surprising that 55% have not been contacted. [is] “And by the way, this also includes any contact that people may have had from the organizations, but believe it or not, in previous polls, election polls, the average non-contact rate of people who voted or were 100% sure that they would vote was about 60%, so it's actually an improvement,” said Clarissa Martinez de Castro, vice president of Latino Voting Initiatives at UnidosUS.
The 2024 poll was conducted online and by phone among 3,000 Latino voters in English and Spanish and had a reported margin of error of 1.8 percentage points nationwide.
