With new Texas cards, GOP tests its gains with Latinos: NPR

Seguin, Texas – Under a grill sun, there is a popular and frozen drink stops here in the seat of the county of Guadalupe, known as Milly, where the inhabitants cool in summer.

But the business owner, Tomas Hernandez Jr., says that the political environment is warmer than ever. Much of this has to do with an economy in difficulty, he says.

“Many people who supported Trump did not expect it to happen,” said Hernandez, 64.

The prices of the grocery store are high, the suppliers invoice more and the workers leave while the Trump administration intensifies its deportation thrust.

Now, state republicans move the center of the center of the center of Hernandez Texas in a new Congress district as part of a controversial redistribution effort in mid-December designed to increase the size of their delegation in the American house. This is a decision that became official on Friday when Governor Greg Abbott Signed the new law in law.

At the center of the GOP redistribution plan is a bet for high issues that the new card will increase the chances of the party to keep control of the congress in the mid-term elections next year. The effort sparked a sort of redistribution arms race, because Democrats in California have evolved to redraw their cards, other states that should follow.

In Texas, where the Republicans made great breakthroughs with Hispanic voters in last year’s elections, the party hopes that these earnings can be locked up for good. The new Texas map adds five districts that should be safe republican seats.

Four of these seats are a Hispanic major, testing the gop earnings with the largest demographic group in the state.

A democrat, Hernandez wonders if the Latinos who voted republican last year, including his own parents, will remain faithful to Trump.

“The Hispanics, whether my own family, or non-family members who supported Trump, they saw him as good for the economy, but I see no advantage,” he said.

Party leaders are more confident. The longtime republican senator from Texas, John Cornyn, likes to boast of his party gains with Latin voters.

“President Trump won a substantial increase in the vote of the Hispanic population,” Cornyn said during a campaign stop in a technical school in Abilene, Texas, about 300 miles from Seguin.

During last year’s elections, Trump came to a striking distance from the victory of the majority of the country’s Hispanic voters, Take 48% of votes At 51% of Kamala Harris. For Trump, it was a sharp increase in the 36% share that he won in 2020.

In the elections of last year, Trump came to a striking distance to win the majority of Hispanic voters nationwide, winning 48% of the vote. Above, Trump speaks during a campaign gathering at Trendsetter Engineering Inc. in Houston on November 2, 2023.

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“While democrats at the national level become more and more radical, and more and more extreme, I think that more Hispanics are turning to republican candidates to vote,” said Cornyn.

But the member of the Democratic Congress of Texas, Greg Casar, does not agree. When launching the campaign this week in a building in downtown Austin, he said the Republicans will lose Latin voters.

Casar presents himself to represent a narrowing blue point in Austin under the new Texas map in a 37th district of the redrawn congress. Its former 35th Congress district will move south to an area of ​​four counties which includes seguin. It will be 60% Latin.

“I have heard elected democrats in southern Texas, who seek to run in this Southern Texas district, and I can’t wait to support them,” he said.

Representative Greg Casar, D-Texas, protests against the redistribution plan outside the manor of the Governor of Texas on August 4 in Austin. Casar takes place to represent a narrowing blue point under the new Texas map in a 37th Congress district. Its old district, the 35th, will go to an area at 60% Latino.

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Houston University Professor Brandon Rottinghaus said that history may not be on the side of Democrats, noting that the party has indeed lost control of the state in the 1990s.

“The effort here seems to be to ensure that Democrats are exclusively an urban party,” said Rottinghaus. “The districts that the Republicans derive to try to maximize their gains include suburban areas, exurgain areas and rural areas,” he said.

But there is no guarantee that the Republican Gerrymander will take place in this way, at least in the short term.

The polls show that the Latinos who voted for the GOP turn against Trump on the economy and the deportations. About a third of the Latinos who supported Trump last year “are not ready to vote for a Republican” mid-term next year, According to Equis ResearchA Latin survey organization.

This could make the new cards more risky for the Republicans than they think.

“This is what some people call a dummymander,” said Rottinghaus. You “inadvertently draw a card that ends up hurting”.

The changing landscape takes a critical test for the Republicans. The new GOP card could consolidate the party’s grip over Texas for the coming years, especially if Democrats have trouble winning back Latin voters who were once securely in their camp.

Back in Seguin, Hernandez said that the Democrats held Latin Voters from Texas for acquired. Now, he says, the Republicans have given them new opening and his party must accelerate their game.

“If the Republicans were not worried, they would not do all this redistribution,” he said. “I think Democrats have to wake up and be active and vote.”