Does the Hispanic Vote Matter Much?

In the article titled “Texas Sees a Surge in Latino Voters” by R.G. Ratcliffe in the Burka Blog, the author makes the claim that eligible voters with Hispanic last names could be the potentially factor that determines whether Secretary of State Hillary Clinton wins Texas or not. He concludes this because “there are 532,000 more registered Hispanic surname voters this year than in 2012”. While this is a good assumption, Hispanic surnames are not clear indicatives of guaranteed Democratic votes. While Hispanic voters do tend to side the Democratic Party in issues such as immigration, a considerable number have a more traditional view on issues such as abortion, marriage equality, and gun control. He acknowledges this point when he provides the fact that "in 1998 Governor George W. Bush received somewhere between 40 percent and half the Hispanic vote". A second reason that might explain why the Hispanic vote is not solely blue is that party identification is a concept that is fairly new or completely new for second and first-generation Hispanics. Because party identification is not a badge worn since infancy for the majority of Hispanics in Texas, the loyalty to either party that most Americans display is merely non-existent.  

He uses very good evidence for his claims about Hillary Clinton’s advantage over Trump’s slow decreasing support here in Texas. He cites an article from UT Austin’s College of Liberal Arts which finds that “the three most recent polls used methodologies, including modes, that were completely dissimilar, yet, as the results below suggest, yielded strikingly similar margins”. The three similar results support the credibility of this data.

Ratcliffe’s audience is mostly Texans who identify as democrats, or in the least, lean democrat because Texas Monthly’s is a progressive and mainly liberal magazine.

Overall, I agree with Ratcliffe’s last words when he states that “if [Hillary Clinton wins], Republicans can blame Trump, and Democrats can praise the strength of a new Hispanic voting bloc”, because I don’t believe that the surge of the eligible Hispanic vote is as powerful as Trump’s damage to his own political career. Although Texas’ Hispanic population is significant, current Hispanic political involvement is insignificant when compared to that of older white Republicans.