ORLANDO, Fla. — As new leaders are taking office at the federal, state and local levels, the elections that put those leaders in office are revealing new information about the electorate, including specific parts of the electorate and shifts in voting trends.
Among Hispanic voters specifically, there was a shift from Democrat to Republican in Florida and across the country.
Samuel Vilchez Santiago, Chair of the Orange County Democratic Party, says Democrats must learn from the loss of Latino votes in the 2024 election.
“We have got to do better,” said Vilchez Santiago. “As a party, we cannot afford to continue losing the Hispanic vote in the way we are.”
Data from UnidosUS, a national Latino civil rights and advocacy organization, showed while a majority of Hispanics in every state across the country voted for Kamala Harris, in Florida, and Florida alone, Hispanics favored Donald Trump. Vilchez Santiago says the Democratic party’s argument that democracy was at stake didn’t resonate with voters as much as they had hoped.
“A lot of Americans take our democracy as a given, because we’ve had it for so long and we’ve been lucky to have it,” said Vilchez Santiago. “I myself am from Venezuela. My parents had to escape political persecution when I was a kid, so I don’t take it for granted at all.”
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He believes Hispanic voters, like many other voters, voted mostly on the economy - and they blamed any perceived shortcomings on Democrats.
“If the egg prices are too high, the grocery prices are too high, democracy becomes a secondary need,” said Vilchez Santiago.
While he believes Democrats had a strong ground game, he concedes Republicans were able to connect more effectively with Hispanic voters.
“I got a call from my uncle in Venezuela about how I needed to vote for Trump because it would be better for Venezuela’s democracy,” said Vilchez Santiago. “Imagine if you’re a first-time voter and you get a call from your family telling you how to vote. And they do that really effectively with churches.”
At Nacion De Fe, which means “Nation of Faith,” the Kissimmee church’s hallway is lined with pictures of a who’s who of the Republican party.
Church leader Christian De La Torre, who’s also with the Osceola County Republican Party, often uses the church’s television studio to record messages to members about elections – the issues and general voter outreach. He believes his fellow church members’ votes in the election reflected their faith.
“They believe in God, they have principles and values, they believe in having a healthy family nucleus,” said De La Torre. “So that was one of the things that turned them to vote red, especially for Trump.”
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Along with faith, he says the economy was important, especially to young Hispanic men.
“I’m not going to have money to buy some groceries, I’m not going to have money to buy some gas to go to work, so once they hit their pocket they know they’ve got to vote the right way,” said De La Torre.
While elections for federal offices went their way, he believes the GOP has more work to do when it comes to local and state offices.
“Here in Osceola County, Florida, we fell a little bit short,” said De La Torre. “But we’re now thriving with President Trump on board and we know we’ll get wins in other seats.”
Back in Orange County, Vilchez Santiago believes Democrats must be ready to highlight policies, like the incoming Trump administration’s plans to carry out mass deportations, as ones that are bad for the Hispanic community.
“Now he has unified power, and I’m sure that’s where he’s going to lead,” said Vilchez Santiago. “So we need to be ready to step in to message effectively on how those policies are impacting our families, our communities.”
He also says Florida Democrats must cultivate more Latino leaders, and become much better at communicating a clearer message of what they stand for.
“We have to be able to build a Democratic party that can go in and explain these issues to people and make it okay for people to then go back and talk to members of their community, to members of their family about what’s actually at stake,” said Vilchez Santiago.
The UnidosUS survey showed nationwide, 20% of Latinos were first-time voters, and 45% of those first-time voters say they were not contacted by either party leading up to the elections.