Latinos in the United States (III): the Latino vote moved again, and the economy explains much of it
ECONOMY · DEMOGRAPHICS · U.S. ELECTIONS
A few days ago, in "Latinos in the United States: The World’s Fourth-Largest Economy Heads to the Polls," I noted that Latinos contribute about $5.1 trillion to U.S. GDP, according to the 2026 estimate by the Latino Donor Collaborative with Arizona State University's W. P. Carey School of Business. I also said this group votes, is young, and is growing precisely in the states where elections are decided.
On election night I came back to the subject on X, starting from a reading by Steven Rattner about Florida. Rattner saw the most Hispanic districts moving toward Democrats and many Latino voters reacting to ICE's excesses. It was a short note, written while the numbers were coming in.
Now that there is more data, I want to do what I would do with any economic series: look at the number, put it in historical context, and ask what moved it.
Forty years of the Latino House vote
The chart that helped me most to understand the night comes from The Voter Poll, SSRS's survey of voters in the House elections, and it was published by AS/COA (Americas Society/Council of the Americas). According to that series, 62% of Latinos voted for Democratic House candidates this Tuesday and 35% for Republicans. In 2024 the split had been 54% to 45%, the narrowest in the whole series since 1984.
The Associated Press, with its own survey data, speaks of "about 6 in 10" Latinos voting for the Democratic House candidate and roughly a third voting for the Republican, when about 4 in 10 had voted for Donald Trump in 2024. They are two different sources telling the same story, and SSRS's 62% fits within that "about 6 in 10."
What strikes me about the chart is that 2026 does not break the long story. The 62% resembles the 62% of 2000 or the 60% of 2022. The exception was 2024, and this year the Latino voter returned to familiar ground. AS/COA describes the move as a double-digit swing toward Democrats and notes that this is an electorate of around 39 million people, with some 4 million Latinos eligible to vote for the first time.
What happened on Tuesday in Texas and Florida
According to AP coverage published by PBS NewsHour, Democrats won Senate and governor's races in states such as Georgia, Ohio and Texas, and were positioned to control both chambers of Congress. In Texas, where the Democratic Senate candidate arrived with just a 1.5-point lead in the RealClearPolitics average for October 8 to 21 (I mentioned it in the previous installment), James Talarico was elected senator and Gina Hinojosa became the state's first Latina governor.
I include these two screenshots as I saw them, at the same hour, because they show something worth remembering on an election night: House counts changed from one outlet to another while votes were being processed. Final figures will come from certified results, and I do not use them in this text.
Texas's 15th district, in the Rio Grande Valley, seems to me the most telling case. Bobby Pulido, a Tejano singer and the Democratic candidate, won with 62.3% against 37.7% for Republican Monica De La Cruz, with 99% of the vote counted (AP, via TexPolls/DDHQ). Political scientist Lisa García Bedolla, in an opinion column in Time, writes that Pulido performed at 75 quinceañeras during the campaign and estimates that the district shifted 42 points toward Democrats compared with 2024. That figure is hers, and I have not been able to check it against another source, but its direction matches everything else.
Florida, the state I write from, also sent signals. The AP reports that in districts 25, 22 and 14, redrawn this spring with the intention of securing Republican wins, Jared Moskowitz, Pia Dandiya and Kathy Castor won, and that the Republican plan counted on Latino votes that, according to early results, did not arrive. Even María Elvira Salazar, a friend of Venezuelans, of Cubans and of Latinos in general, and close to leaders such as Javier Milei, Abelardo de la Espriella and María Corina Machado, had to work hard to win. According to the Miami Herald, she held her District 27 seat by just over a thousand votes, about half a point, against Democrat Eliott Rodriguez. It was the closest reelection of her career, and in Miami that says a lot.
The cost of living arrived before the election
None of this came without warning. The Pew Research Center surveyed 774 registered Hispanic voters between September 28 and October 4 and found a 27-point Democratic lead in the House race (51% to 24%, with 18% undecided). Trump's approval among those voters had fallen to 24%, from 38% in February 2025. Among Hispanics who voted for him in 2024, it went from 93% to 57%.
As an economist, the figure that weighs most on me is prices. For Latino voters the economy is the top issue, according to Pew, and about 7 in 10 told the AP that the president's policies had made economic conditions worse. García Bedolla cites in Time a 2025 Equis survey: 29% of Latinos had trouble meeting their expenses and another 32% could just meet them. This is a population with a median age of about 31, many households with children, and a very high share of renting (25.1% of the country's spending on rented housing in 2024, according to the LDC report). When prices rise, these families notice it in the fridge and in the rent before anyone else.
The other factor was immigration policy. Seventy percent of registered Hispanic voters told Pew that the administration's policies had been harmful to Hispanics, and 61% said their situation was worse than a year earlier. Even among Latinos who voted for Trump in 2024, 30% thought too much was being done on deportations. AS/COA sums up what the exit polls showed as frustration with the economy, with the condition of democracy and with the intensity of immigration enforcement.
Why I won't take anything for granted
As a Venezuelan in Miami, I have learned to distrust readings that turn an election into destiny. Pew itself recalls that the Democratic advantage among Latinos in midterm elections went from 47 points in 2018 to 21 in 2022, and that much of that swing depends on who turns out rather than on people switching parties. Equis, also cited in Time, measures a 16-point shift toward Trump between 2016 and 2024. And García Bedolla notes that the fastest-growing party identification among Latinos is having no party preference.
Her column argues that Latinos are still looking for a political home. I share that view. Some 44% of Latino adults are immigrants, according to the same column, and many of us arrived with little inherited loyalty to this country's parties. We vote by looking at what is happening at home, and that changes from one election to the next.
What I take away for 2028
The AP wrote that these shifts will be felt in the 2028 presidential race, which in practice began on November 4. For anyone who wants the Latino vote, my impression is that the conversation will have to go through the cost of living and opportunities to start businesses, which is where this community has shown its strength.
From the markets, I see it with optimism. The community that accounts for two-thirds of the net growth of the labor force and starts businesses 3.7 times faster than the rest, according to the LDC, showed this Tuesday that it also carries weight at the ballot box. For me, looking at this country with the eyes of an economist and an immigrant, that is the story worth following.
Juan Carlos Carvallo, CEO of LifeInvest Wealth Management
Sources
1. Latino Donor Collaborative / ASU W. P. Carey (Seidman Research Institute), 2026 LDC U.S. Latino Economic Impact Report, Part Two. Cited via Part I of this series: https://www.juancarloscarvallo.com/post/latinos-in-the-united-states-the-worlds-fourth-largest-economy-heads-to-the-polls
2. AS/COA, "How Latinos Voted in the 2026 U.S. Midterm Elections," Nov. 4, 2026, with The Voter Poll (SSRS) chart. https://www.as-coa.org/articles/how-latinos-voted-2026-us-midterm-elections
3. Associated Press / PBS NewsHour, "4 takeaways from election night," Nov. 3, 2026. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/takeaways-from-election-night-young-voters-hispanics-shift-away-from-the-gop-as-voters-show-unhappiness-with-trump
4. Pew Research Center, "How Latino Voters Are Experiencing the 2026 Midterm Elections," Oct. 16, 2026. https://www.pewresearch.org/race-and-ethnicity/2026/10/16/how-latino-voters-are-experiencing-the-2026-midterm-elections/
5. Lisa García Bedolla, "The Texas Midterms Showed that Latino Voters Are Still Looking For a Political Home," Time (opinion), Nov. 4, 2026. https://time.com/article/2026/11/04/texas-midterms-showed-that-latino-voters-are-still-looking-for-a-political-home/
6. TX-15 results (AP, via TexPolls/DDHQ), Nov. 4, 2026.
7. RealClearPolling, Texas Senate 2026 (Talarico vs. Paxton), Oct. 8–21, 2026 average. https://www.realclearpolling.com/polls/senate/general/2026/texas/talarico-vs-paxton
8. Miami Herald, "Salazar appears to narrowly edge out Rodriguez for District 27 seat," Nov. 3, 2026. https://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/election/article317788440.html
9. Juan Carlos Carvallo, post on X, Nov. 3, 2026 (Part II). https://x.com/JuanCCarvallo/status/2117834406710984826
10. Steven Rattner, post on X, Nov. 3, 2026. https://x.com/SteveRattner/status/2117812293044154562
For informational purposes only; not investment advice.
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