Having spent most of my adult life living and working in different parts of Latin America as well as married into a Mexican family while living for almost the last 25 years here in Mexico, it’s my observation that the Democratic party today simply doesn’t have a very good grasp on the values, politics or simply what interests most Hispanics today.
Especially working class Hispanic men who vote.
They fall somewhere between moderate conservative to moderate liberal in their politics with the highest numbers probably considering themselves members of neither main party but independents. In fact, most of them are no different than other non-college educated, working class voters who get up early every day, work hard and lately have been struggling a bit to make ends meet.
After getting a sense of where the election was going with the help of the male Hispanic vote, I have spent a lot of time late last night and early this morning talking with members of my wife’s family living in the U.S., as well as many other Hispanic friends on the west coast.
Nearly all of the men I spoke with admitted that they voted for Trump.
Their reasons were mostly focused on a belief that Trump was better for the economy while a lot of them told me they want more control on who comes into the country, seeing uncontrolled immigration as a major driver of crime and increased availability of drugs.
One thing nearly every one of them mentioned was how much they were turned off by the left’s policies with transgender politics, citing Trump’s ads on sex change surgeries in schools and prisons.
Now before you start throwing things at me, I did my best to correct many of their misconceptions but one thing that many of us fail to understand is that a majority of our voting population — including a majority of Hispanics — no longer get their news from traditional news outlets, but Facebook, YouTube video channels, blogs and podcasts.
Did any of you watching the news coverage last night of the long lines at polling places notice the demographics of the people waiting in line? Remember how we were told that women were going to save us, and young men don’t vote? I saw an awful lot of young men in those long lines and a lot of them are loyal listeners of Joe Rogan’s podcast, and that includes a lot of Hispanic men.
When you factor in the news sources for so many voters with the exit poll data showing that over 90% of voters made up their minds on who to vote for a long time ago, it points to an outcome that couldn’t be anything other than Trump.
In fact I actually believe that it would have been even a lot worse if there hadn’t been a significant percentage of college educated Republicans who crossed over and voted for Trump. I know that to be true because I have talked with a lot of them in recent days.
Just not enough to overcome the inevitable.
If the Democratic party really wants to remain competitive in presidential elections with a voting public that is increasingly getting its news and information from Facebook, YouTube, blogs and podcasts, maybe it’s time to learn something from the “other side”.
The far right has been dominating those non-traditional news sources and yes, often they are outrageous but most of their listeners and followers know that. It’s the entertainment value that keeps them tuned in and that repetitive cycle of slanted news and stories demonizing the left eventually gets programmed in, becoming “hard facts”, and no DNC ad or Lincoln Project video is going to change their perceptions.
Maybe it’s time to accept that rather than trying to beat them via traditional campaigning, join them off the beaten path and begin to create a large, entertaining and influential presence on Facebook, YouTube and podcasts.
Yes, there already are some, but they are vastly outnumbered by the large community of right wing channels. And to be honest, most of the right wing sources are a lot more entertaining — even if they are full of half-truths and complete lies.
The lesson I have learned from this is that today, most voters want to be entertained 24/7.
Rachel Maddow, David Pakman and Brian Tyler Cohen are personal favorites of mine, but they put this crowd to sleep. Al Franken has a good podcast but even he spends too much time on serious matters with not enough humor to keep them interested.
We need some podcasters with the wit of a Jimmy Kimmel, Bill Maher or Stephen Colbert to really crank up the intensity and outrageous rhetoric to be able to draw in and keep listeners tuned in.
I know many of you scoff at the idea but with the number of followers of non-traditional news sources increasing, I don’t see any other way.
If you disagree, make your case for a better way to reach them today...
