Trump's inroads among Texas Latinos
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President Trump won a higher percentage of the Latino vote nationally in 2024 than previously believed and came within striking distance of capturing a historic majority of those voters, according to a recent Pew Research Center analysis of the election results.
Why it matters: In Texas, the trend around Latino voters "is mostly bad for those harboring ambitions of the Democratic Party becoming a competitive force in the state," Jim Henson and Joshua Blank of the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas wrote in an election post-mortem earlier this year.
What they're saying: The signs of Trump's success among Texas Latinos were "hiding in plain sight," per Henson and Blank.
- On the key campaign issues of the economy and border security, Texas Latinos favored the positions most associated with Republicans, state polling found.
Stunning stat: In February 2016, 65% of Texas Latinos identified as Democrats. In December 2024, it was 45%, per polling from the Texas Politics Project.
Zoom out: The Pew analysis confirms what early exit polls hinted: former Vice President Kamala Harris dramatically underperformed previous Democratic presidential candidates among Latinos, a rapidly growing and once-solidly Democratic voting bloc that has taken a big swing toward Republicans.
- Pew's analysis shows Trump won 48% of all U.S. Latino voters — a group that soundly rejected him in 2020 and 2016 — and that it was a crucial factor in his victory.
- Separately, exit polls in Texas suggested that Trump won 55% of the Latino vote — a 13-point increase from 2020, per the Texas Politics Project.
The bottom line: "Latino party identification is in flux, making this group of key electoral concern for both parties in future elections," wrote Henson and Blank.