What If Hispanics Turned Out for Trump?

As ambivalent as I am about a Donald Trump victory—or, for that matter, a Joe Biden one—there is one scenario I would enjoy: What if Trump was re-elected thanks to support from Hispanics?

Now, I should say this is only a remote possibility. There’s zero indication Trump can win a majority of Hispanics nationally. Biden currently has about a 20-point lead among Latino voters nationwide. But the whole reason the thought comes to mind is that Biden is underperforming among the fastest growing demographic group, even at a time when he is generally doing better than Hillary Clinton did in 2016 and has been holding a steady lead over Trump for months now.

The biggest worry for the Biden campaign is that Trump is actually leading among Hispanics in Florida, a crucial state for Democrats and an absolute must-win for Republicans. This is largely because Cuban-Americans tend to be more supportive of Republicans more than other Hispanic groups, and Trump’s anti-socialist rhetoric probably has special appeal to a community with long memories of Castro’s takeover of Cuba.

But the fact that Trump is doing well with Hispanic voters in Florida highlights an important point: Hispanics aren’t a monolithic group. Cuban-Americans are very different from Mexican-Americans and Mexican-Americans are very different from Puerto Ricans.