US President Donald Trump participated, on Wednesday, in a celebration of Latino Heritage Month in the East Room of the White House, an occasion that this year assumes special electoral importance, as it comes just five weeks before the midterm elections, and at a time when opinion polls show a decline in Republican support among Latino voters who played an important role in Trump’s return to the White House in 2024.
The celebration comes at the beginning of an intense election tour undertaken by President Trump, extending 32 days before the November 3 elections, to support Republican candidates and try to maintain his party’s control over the House of Representatives and the Senate. Trump will begin his trips on Thursday to Texas and Oklahoma, then go to Alabama on Friday, two states where he received about two-thirds of the votes in the 2024 elections and are considered Republican states and not swing battlegrounds. The selection of these stations indicates a focus on motivating the base and raising participation rates, in parallel with supporting Republican candidates in congressional races.
On the other hand, Democrats are intensifying their attempts to win back Latino voters who lost a large portion of them in 2024, especially in Texas. The House Democratic Campaign Committee allocated a large budget to Spanish-language advertising and voter organizing in the state's south, focusing on cost of living and local issues.
Who do Latino voters vote for?
Looking back at previous election results reveals the extent of the shift in the Latino vote. At the national level, Latino voting tendencies have for decades remained closer to voting for the Democratic Party, even though Republicans maintain strong bases among Cuban Americans in Florida, and among sectors of social conservatives, evangelicals, and business owners.
In the 2018 midterm elections, 69 percent of Latino voters voted for Democrats compared to 29 percent for Republicans, a difference of forty points. But this difference narrowed significantly in the next midterm elections in 2022. A Pew analysis showed that Democrats obtained 60 percent of the Latino vote compared to 39 percent for Republicans.
Then came the presidential elections in 2024, marking the largest recent Republican breakthrough among this bloc. According to a Pew Center analysis, Kamala Harris obtained 37 percent of the Latino bloc’s votes, compared to 60 percent for Trump, after Joe Biden had obtained 61 percent in 2020, compared to 36 percent for Trump. Thus, Trump increased his share of the Latino vote significantly within four years, and Republicans approached for the first time parity at the presidential level within a bloc that had given the Democrats a wide advantage. This makes Republicans' ability to return these voters to the polls in midterm elections an important factor in November.
2026 polls reflect trend
Despite these gains made by Trump among Latino voters, polls by BSP Research and Shaw & Company showed a decline in some of those Republican gains in seven competitive states. The poll, which was conducted with 1,353 registered Latino voters, indicated that Democrats were ahead at 56 percent compared to 29 percent for Republicans in voting for the House of Representatives elections.
The poll results indicate that Democrats could regain between six and ten points of Latino votes compared to what Harris obtained in 2024, while Republicans will lose about five points from the gains achieved by Trump.
In Pennsylvania, Democratic support among Latinos reached 60 percent, an increase of ten points from the 2024 result, while Republicans fell from 37 to 26 percent. However, experts say these numbers do not reflect a complete return to the Democrats. About 39 percent of those surveyed have a negative view of the Democrats in Congress, compared to 63 percent of the Republicans, indicating that an important segment of this Latino bloc is still capable of moving between the two parties.
Texas is a proving ground
The shifts are most evident in Texas, where Trump made significant gains among Latino voters in 2024. The Cook Political Report and TelevisaUnivision poll, which included 1,000 Latino voters, showed satisfaction with Trump's performance falling to 33 percent. Among Latinos who voted for him in 2024, 18 percent said they had become dissatisfied with his performance, especially with mounting concerns about the costs of living and the Trump administration’s immigration and deportation policy.
These numbers gain importance because Republicans have redrawn districts in Texas based in part on the assumption that Trump's gains will continue in 2024. But some of these districts are now more competitive than expected.
Despite the widespread controversy over deportation campaigns, Texas polls show that the economy is still the top issue among Latino voters. These concerns coincide with a broader decline in the American economic mood. The consumer confidence index fell to 81.9 points, the lowest level in about 12 years, with continuing concerns about the cost of living, energy prices, and the labor market. This is an important point that analysts rely on in explaining the current shift. The economy was one of the reasons why Latino voters were attracted to Trump in 2024, and therefore their dissatisfaction with the costs of living could affect their vote for Congress even without a permanent change in their party affiliation.
Migration changes the equation
The second issue is immigration, but the 2026 polls reveal a difference between support for securing borders and support for the scope of deportations.
In the BSP/Shaw poll, 63 percent of Latino voters in seven states said the treatment of immigrants had become one of their top concerns, and 59 percent supported finding a path to legal status for undocumented immigrants who have family members with U.S. citizenship. What is noteworthy is that the position goes beyond the Democrats; Sixty-four percent of Latino Republicans and 68 percent of independents said they would favor candidates who prioritize legal status and work permits over mass deportation.
The New York Times provides a field dimension to these numbers. In more than twenty interviews in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas, the newspaper monitored anger at the economy and the application of immigration laws among a number of voters who had supported Trump in 2024. It also monitored the impact of immigration campaigns on the local economy, especially the construction sector, where company owners spoke of labor shortages, project delays, and high costs.
Florida another test
The indicators are not limited to Texas. In South Florida, where Republicans have made exceptional gains among Cuban and Venezuelan Americans, some districts have become more competitive. The shift there was remarkable, as Hillary Clinton won Miami County by 29 points in 2016, then the difference in Biden’s favor narrowed to seven points in the 2020 elections, before Trump in 2024 became the first Republican to win the county since 1988.
But some current races indicate that Republican supremacy is not guaranteed to the same degree, especially in heavily Latino districts. Meanwhile, polls in Florida show that some Republican candidates still maintain a lead among Latino voters, which prevents the current shift from being read as a unified transition to the Democrats.
This is why the Democrats' strategy focuses on regaining voters the party lost, not assuming they will return automatically, and they allocate significant spending on Spanish-language advertising, with messages focusing on the cost of living. The New York Times says that this battle may be more important than trying to change a permanent party allegiance. Because the 2026 midterm elections could also be affected by who will participate and who will abstain from voting. Former Trump voters interviewed by the newspaper said they might vote for Democrats, but others are simply considering not voting.
