Local Opinion: Republicans winning Hispanics starts with respect

It’s becoming obvious the path for a Republican to win the popular vote will require Latino voters.

The last time a Republican presidential candidate was even competitive on this front was in George W. Bush’s re-election campaign where he was able to flip states like New Mexico, Nevada, and Colorado. Despite recent gains in the last few years from their lows in 2012, the inability to regain the lost ground is starting to see a once ruby red state like Arizona fall into the purple territory, making it look like it may be the next Colorado or Nevada.

The biggest issue for both parties is that they often lump Latino voters into a single-issue monolith and many Latino voters feel increasingly isolated politically. It seems like Latinos should be easy to appeal to for Republicans. Latinos are religious, family-oriented, and hardworking people. However, respect is highly valued in our communities and it feels like the political parties just don’t respect our culture.

Republicans need to understand that messaging to Latino voters is going to require respect. A respect for what we want to be called is important. The left learned this after backlash to the term “Latinx,” but if you ask us, terms like Latino or Hispanic aren’t that much better. The preference we have is what we call our communities, we are Mexicans, Spanish, Cubans, etc. That identity is important to us, it means a lot to be called the right thing and it is something Republicans could really learn from.

We also don’t all speak the same type of Spanish. I repeatedly see lazily translated campaign material using European Spanish being used in areas meant to be aimed at Mexican Americans or Cubans. Despite the belly aching of some conservative pundits like Michael Knowles, who criticized the GOP’s decision to have rising star Rep. Juan Ciscomani deliver a State of the Union response in Spanish, gestures like this do go a long way. Communicating in Spanish is not only a practical tool to reach new voters, it communicates a level of respect to all Latinos, that you care about us. This is something Democrats do better and is something that is easily fixed.

The biggest elephant in the room is immigration. Something that Republicans need to grasp is that Latinos have nuanced views in the immigration debate. We know the differences between immigration and border security. As we can see from Republican gains in areas in Texas, Latino communities are fed up with the violence and crime that come from having essentially a lawless border. It is our communities that have been destroyed by the inability of the United States and Mexico to act on this situation.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem like either party is interested in solving this. Democrats just want to focus on the immigration aspect of it, appealing only to those sympathetic to the immigrant cause, while ignoring all the violence and crime. Republicans, on the other hand, can seem uncaring about the plight of these people who are fleeing their own countries as they try to make things better for their family, and while they do like to point out the crime issues, they often do so in a way that is demeaning and lacks solutions.

Latinos are longing for people in our politics who take them seriously, see that our issues aren’t so black-and-white and fit neatly into a political narrative, respect who we are, and act on our issues.

Our next nominee has the opportunity to appeal to Latinos, but there will need to be some changes not only to the basic messaging, but also to have some solutions. A real border policy is going to need to be better than a wall and talking about our drug crisis. I hope whoever it is can step up to the plate.