Trump is making gains among Latino voters. Republicans lose them ahead of midterm elections

Washington—— President Trump made historic gains among Hispanic voters when he won re-election last year, bolstering Republicans’ confidence that their economic message is helping them win over a base that has long leaned toward Democrats.

But in this week’s elections, Democrats in key states were able to disrupt that rightward shift by regaining support among Latinos, Exit polls showed.

In New Jersey and Virginia, Democrats running for governor made gains in counties with large Latino populations and overall won two-thirds of the state’s Latino vote, according to an NBC News poll.

In California, CNN exit polls showed that about 70% of Latinos voted for Proposition 50, a Democratic redistricting initiative designed to counter Trump’s plan to reshape congressional maps to maintain Republican control of the House.

The results mark the first concrete example of Latino voters turning away from Republicans at the ballot box — a shift Recent opinion polls predict As their concerns grow over the economy and immigration raids.

Gary Segura, a professor of public policy, political science and Chicana studies at UCLA, said if the trend continues, it could spell trouble for Republicans in next year’s midterm elections. That’s especially true in California and Texas, where both parties are counting on Latino voters to help them win House seats, Segura said.

“A year is a long time in politics, but the vote on Proposition 50 is certainly a very, very good sign that Democrats are capable of winning newly drawn congressional districts,” Segura said. “I think Latino voters are going to have a real impact on the outcome.”

Democrats, meanwhile, are optimistic because their warnings about Trump’s immigration crackdown and economic downturn are resonating with Latinos.

Republicans wonder how far the party can maintain Latino support without Trump. In 2024, Trump won about 48% of the country’s Latino vote, setting a record for a Republican presidential candidate.

Some Republicans viewed this week’s trends among Latino voters as a “wake-up call.”

“The Hispanic vote is not guaranteed. Latinos are married to President Donald Trump but are only dating the Republican Party,” Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar, R-Fla., said in a social media video the day after the election. “I’ve been warning: If the Republican Party doesn’t deliver on its promises, we will lose the Hispanic vote across the country.”

Economic issues are the main driver

Trump won over Latinos last year by tapping into widespread dissatisfaction with the economy. He promised to create jobs and lower the cost of living.

But polls show that a majority of Latino voters now disapprove of the way Trump and the Republicans who control Congress are handling the economy. A Unidos poll released last week showed that half of Latinos said they expect Trump’s economic policies will make them worse off a year from now.

In New Jersey, voters like Rumaldo Gomez embody this sentiment. he tell MSNBC He voted for Trump last year, but this week he voted for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Rep. Mikie Sherill.

“Now, I see Trump differently,” Gomez said. “The economy doesn’t look good.”

Gomez added that he was “deeply saddened” that immigration raids led by the Trump administration had separated hard-working families.

While Latino voters worry about being affected by immigration enforcement actions, polls show they are more concerned about the cost of living, employment and housing. Immigration ranks fifth on the list of concerns, according to the Unidos poll.

In New Jersey and Virginia, Democratic double-digit victories were built on promises to lower the cost of living while blaming Trump for their economic pain.

Democratic National Committee spokesman Marcus Robinson said Democrats “extended their advantage and flipped key counties by winning back Latino voters who knew the Trump economy was leaving them behind.”

“These results show that the Latino community wants to make progress and not return to a state of confusion and broken promises,” he said.

Republicans see a different Trump problem

Republican strategist Matt Terrill, then-senator’s chief of staff. Marco Rubio said during the 2016 presidential campaign that the election results were not a referendum on Trump.

He said Latino voters are moving to the left because Trump is not on the ballot.

Last year, “It wasn’t Latino voters who voted for Republicans, it was Latino voters who voted for President Trump,” he said. “Like it or not, he’s able to inspire voter support that Republicans have traditionally been denied.”

Because Trump is constitutionally barred from running for a third term, Republicans have to wonder whether they can regain Latino votes when he’s not on the ballot. Trier believes Republicans need to make affordability a top priority.

Mike Maddrid, a “No Trump” Republican and former political director of the California Republican Party, has a different theory.

“They are abandoning both sides,” Madrid said of Latinos. “They abandoned the Republican Party for the same reason they abandoned the Democratic Party in November: not solving the economic problems.”

Madrid said the economy has long been a top concern for Latinos, but both parties continue to shape the Latino political agenda around immigration.

“Latinos didn’t vote for Democrats or Republicans — they voted against Democrats and Republicans,” Madrid said. “That’s a very big difference. The guerrillas looked at us as if we were some strange little exotic creature.”

future work

Democrat Abigail Spanberger was elected governor of Virginia in part because of huge gains in the Latino community. One of the areas with the largest increases is Manassas Park, where more than 40 percent of residents are Latino. She won the city by 42 points, doubling the Democratic performance in last year’s election.

Maria Cardona, a Democratic strategist who worked with Spanberger’s campaign on outreach efforts to Spanish-language media, said the shift toward Democrats came because Latinos believed in Trump’s promise to reduce the high cost of living and believed he would only go after violent criminals in immigration raids.

Instead, she believes Trump betrayed them.

Cardona said cuts to Medicaid in Trump’s massive spending plan this year and reductions in supplemental nutrition assistance during the government shutdown have panicked Hispanic families.

“Republicans mistakenly believed that the realignment results among Latino voters were a blip,” she said. “Latinos should never be considered a base vote.”

Political scientists warn that this week’s election results don’t necessarily indicate how the race will play out a year from now.

“This is just one election, but the seeds have certainly been planted for a strong Latino Democratic vote in 2026,” said Brad Jones, a political science professor at the University of California, Davis.

Now, both sides need to explain how they hope to fulfill their promises if elected.

“They can’t rest on their laurels and say, ‘Latinos are definitely going to come back because of the bad economy and poor immigration enforcement,'” Jones said. “The job of the Democratic Party now is to reach out to Latino voters in more than just token ways.”