How the Hispanic vote helped a red wave sweep through Florida

On Tuesday, Donald Trump became the first Republican presidential candidate to win Miami-Dade County in 36 years.

It was the first in a sweep of red wins across the county. But what is the reason behind the shift?

Experts said the impact of the Hispanic vote helped to sway the county red.

“I think it’s something that’s explainable, in a sense, I don’t know about you, but it almost felt that there wasn’t as much intensity in this cycle as in the past. And I think that’s because Florida was out of the game, and as a result the National Level Democratic Party did not invest anything in Miami-Dade or Florida at all," said Michael Bustamante, a professor at the University of Miami.

Bustamante said there are multiple reasons for the red wave. He cited a lack of voter turnout, something Democrats were specifically surprised with. And he states that Latino voters should no longer be put into their own category, but rather categorized with other American voters.

“We have to look beyond comparing two candidates, there are broader trends that have shaped the Latino vote," he said.

Sebastian Arcos, with the Cuban Research Institute at Florida International University, said most Cuban Americans, the largest group of Hispanics in Miami-Dade, voted red because of the GOP’s stance on foreign policy, and the Democratic Party not being the same party they once were.

“Cubans have escaped a communist regime, and for Cubans and Cuban Americans the dramatic shift of the Democratic Party to the left concerns everybody, because it reminds them of what happened in Cuba back in 1959. And I am not implying that the Democratic Party is communist, but I am implying that it has moved significantly to the left," Arcos said. “This is by far not Bill Clinton’s party, and there are way too many signals that concern the Cuban American community and essentially push them to the right, to the Republican Party.”

NBC6 conducted a poll in October surveying more than 600 Florida voters that illustrated Hispanic voters in the presidential and senate races were leaning towards the Republican vote.

But what about the younger, progressive Cuban vote?

“That’s been a fascinating development. Let me make a clarification first, Cuban Americans, those born here in the United States, tend to be more equally divided between Republicans, Democrats and Independents,” said Arcos. “So that narrative, of a more liberal Cuban American community, is now outdated. Now that narrative was true for those coming in 1994 to 2015."

Arcos said things have changed in the past decade.

“There was a narrative, a trend in the polls back in those years indicating that the new arrivals tended to be more willing to engage with Cuba, and in some ways the coronary of that was the Obama opening between 2014 and 2016. What happened there, the way the Cuban government reacted to that opening, demonstrated without any question that the idea of engaging with Cuba was better than sanctioning the regime was a mistake. And especially those Cubans that had just arrived here recently and had the hope that engagement would work better, became so disappointed in engagement that they moved dramatically to the right," he said.

Thomas Kennedy, a political activist, said younger Hispanics like himself this election cycle were concerned about the economy.

“I think that leaves people very susceptible to their anxieties being exploited for political gain," Kennedy said.

The NBC6 poll reflects that, as 32% of voters across the state, regardless of race, said that the economy was the most influential issue in deciding a presidential candidate.

And 48% of Hispanics said their financial situation is worse than it was four years ago.

It’s something Kennedy believes Democrats in Florida didn’t capitalize on.

"Quite frankly we must admit that they did not build the infrastructure or the message to counter this. It’s indicative of what happened yesterday, just a major wipeout for the Florida Democrats," Kennedy said. “The Biden Harris Administration spent four years telling people things are going to get better, things are going to get better, and they clearly had a disconnect there with what folks were seeing.”

FIU’s most recent Cuban Research Poll found that the approval rating for Trump among Cuban Americans was his highest ever at 68%. The 2016 poll registered 35% approval for President Trump, while the 2020 came in at 59%. According to the poll, the 2024 approval rate is also greater than the actual Cuban American vote for Trump in the last two presidential elections.

Arcos was asked why Hispanics did not favor Harris, compared to another Democratic nominee like Hillary Clinton.

“When you look at the two characters, Hillary Clinton was a policy wonk, which she has been defined many times over. And I was just recently watching an interview with her regarding US policy and Israel, and her position is very much hardline in foreign policy," he said. “Even though she was clearly on the left, she was part of that old Democratic party, that Clinton Democratic party. So, while her policies, even though they were more liberal, were not seen as crazy, woke, off the deep end, that we have seen in the last four years.”