‘Saving Newsom’ was never about: How Latino voters played a major role in California | California

It’s not that he’s particularly invested in Newsom’s career.

“For us, the recall was never intended to save Gavin Newsom’s political future,” said Sánchez, executive director of PowerCA Action, which has focused its efforts in the state’s central agricultural valley. “It was about making sure that this state does not retreat from a time when the state and the administration were much more xenophobic.”

Newsom, a Democrat, handily defeated the Republicans-led effort to remove him from office last week in a rare recall as governor. In an election that depended on turnout, it’s clear the Latin American vote played a decisive role in the results, experts say.

About 40% of the population in California and about 30% of registered voters are Latinos, and although the votes are still counted, it appears they voted largely Democratic.

Discouraged by Republicans who portrayed brown immigrants as “punch bags and scapegoats,” naturalized Latino immigrants and the children of Western immigrants – including those with conservative views – have long voted overwhelmingly with Democrats, Sánchez said.

It was no different in the recall. The effort to remove Newsom from office was started by a former Central Valley sheriff’s deputy who previously advocated microchipping migrants. Newsom’s main opponent in the election – conservative radio host Larry Elder – has often called Latino residents criminals.

“For a lot of Latino voters, it kind of ended the debate over how to vote,” said Hairo Cortes, executive director of Chispa, a progressive political group based in Orange County.

Yet despite the stakes in the election, Cortes said, candidates from both parties made no real effort to engage Latino voters until the very last minute, when tight polls suggested a distracted electorate. and disappointed might not vote.

“A similar thing happened in 2020, 2018 and 2016,” he said. “It feels like once the campaign season is over, raising awareness among Latinos is part of a mad race for the votes.”

Newsom, who used to appoint Latino civil servants to key political and administrative positions, and expand access to education and health care for undocumented migrants, initially did not focus on those wins and reported more to come before the recall, said Christian Arana, vice president. -President of the Latino Community Foundation.

Thus, the responsibility of securing the vote was left largely to grassroots organizations led by Latinos – many with tight budgets that did not include enough funds to cover canvassing costs in an unexpected special election. .

Without significant campaign awareness, many Latino voters in California’s Inland Empire and Coachella Valley had not noticed the ballots in their mail, said Luz Gallegos, executive director of TODEC, a non-partisan group based. in Perris.

Others had deliberately turned away from the election, she said, angry and disappointed that Democratic and Republican lawmakers forgot or abandoned their communities.

Statewide, Latino workers in farm fields, meat packing plants, grocery stores and other industries deemed ‘essential’ to the worst of the pandemic have fallen disproportionately ill and died from Covid-19. Latino Californians remain disproportionately unvaccinated, even as hospitals in parts of the state are overwhelmed by a new wave of the pandemic.

“People were healing from disease and healing from loss,” said Gallegos. “We knew the community wasn’t thinking about civic engagement, it was thinking about survival. Many organizers had to get creative, she added – her own group rallied a troop of volunteers and a group of mariachi bands to serenade future voters.

Such efforts have paid off statewide, including in the Central Agricultural Valley, once a Republican stronghold, where progressive organizing prowess appears to have helped close the gap between Democrats and Republicans.

In the county of Merced of the valley, the first returns suggested that about three-quarters of Latino voters rejected the recall, while three-quarters of white voters supported it. In nearby Fresno, where the Latin American population grew 15.5% between 2010 and 2020 while the white population declined by 10.7%, the recall effort only reached a few points. percentage.

Tight margins were important – a signal that “a new generation of young Latinxes are increasingly changing politics in California,” said Alicia Olivarez, director of narrative and policy at PowerCA Action.

Meanwhile, in trusted Democratic counties like Los Angeles and San Francisco, 84% and 82% of Latino voters rejected the recall, according to the UCLA Latino Policy & Politics Initiative.

Latino voters’ decisive role in recall results shows that ahead of the midterms of 2022, state candidates would do well to center Latinos in future campaigns rather than treating them after the fact, organizers said. .

“Latino voters are not a monolith, but at least in western California, it was Latino voters who essentially helped transform a red state – the state that gave us Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan – into a blue state, ”said Sánchez, director of PowerCA Action.

And while some preliminary analysis suggested Latino voters may have sided with Democrats this year at a slightly lower percentage than in previous elections, sparking debates over Republicans’ ability to make inroads, Cortes of Chispa said such discussions were irrelevant.

“Of course, political opinions vary between Latinos in Los Angeles and Orange County, rural and urban California, between young and old,” he said. “But at the end of the day, what matters is whether there is a real and substantial investment in connecting and listening to voters,” he said.

Although they turned out to be more likely to vote on the recall that in previous special elections, Latinos remain under-represented among California voters, said Mindy Romero, founder of the Center for Inclusive Democracy, a non-partisan research organization. .

“Just think about what more outreach could accomplish,” she said. “If there is one lesson to be learned from this recall for Newsom, it is that there is a real opportunity here to build a better relationship and connection with voters.”