First Lady Jill Biden is traveling to London with her husband to attend the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II. September 15 marked the first day of Hispanic Heritage Month, yet Jill has not even mentioned it. Perhaps it has to do with the unfortunate incident about three months ago when she was speaking at an event in San Antonio and compared Hispanic people to breakfast tacos.
Jill’s remark did not go over very well. Democrats are hemorrhaging Hispanic voters. Hispanic voters in Senate races in Arizona and Nevada will be crucial. Since the election of Trump, Hispanic voters who traditionally vote for Democrats have begun to shift to voting for Republicans. Jill Biden’s tone-deaf way of speaking about Hispanics – in Texas, of all places – has something to do with the shift. It’s not just her remark, it is the fact that Hispanics are noticing that liberals talk down to them. Democrats take their votes for granted. Or, at least they did. Trump’s term in office changed things for many Hispanic voters. Many are conservative by nature. They support border security, their families, religious freedom, and they are entrepreneurial, the same as most other Americans. Yet, Democrat politicians have pushed them off into their own little box and only bother to address them in election years.
Trump made the Republican Party more of a party comprised of working-class and middle-class voters. He spoke about border security – he made it his top campaign priority in 2016. He was extremely business-friendly which allowed the economy to explode. All demographics benefitted from his economic policies, despite what lyin’ Biden and other Democrats say now. Hispanic voters noticed and have been rewarding Republican candidates with their votes. Look no further than the election of Republican Rep. Mayra Flores. It was a special election in a south Texas district that has gone Democrat in elections for more than 100 years. She changed that. Her husband is a Border Patrol agent and border security was a big issue in her campaign. The voters responded. The fact is that Hispanics who are here legally, like Flores herself, resent illegal immigration. America is a nation of laws and that means for all people.
Jill has been silent about Hispanic Heritage Month. Typically, she is one of the first voices coming out of the White House to acknowledge every special recognition that checks an identity box. So, when her staff was asked about celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month, they assured the reporter that there will be a reception. Sometime.
“Yes, the first lady will host a Hispanic Heritage Month reception at the White House and continue to engage the community as she travels the country,” Elizabeth Alexander, communications director for the first lady, told Fox News Digital Friday. The date and further details of the reception have not been announced.
Biden never apologized for her breakfast tacos remark but her spokeswoman did it for her. “The first lady apologizes that her words conveyed anything but pure admiration and love for the Latino community,” the statement said. Clueless Jill probably still doesn’t realize she offended the audience.
Jill Biden was part of a three-city tour to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month in 2021 and was leading the charge to attract more voters in the Hispanic community to lean Democratic this November but has been fairly quiet since the controversial taco comments.
Sept. 15 marked the first day of Hispanic Heritage Month, and several Democrats running in this year’s midterm election have made statements to celebrate the community.
Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., tweeted, “Today marks the start of #HispanicHeritageMonth. My state is home to vibrant Hispanic & Latin American communities, and it’s an important time to celebrate our rich traditions and contributions to this country. It’s the honor of my life to serve as the first Latina in the Senate.”
Catherine Cortez Masto is an endangered incumbent. Republicans hope to flip the seat in their quest to gain majority control of the Senate. As of today, the RCP aggregated average has her Republican challenger Adam Laxalt up over Cortez Masto by one point. It’s a very tight race. I wonder if Cortez Masto dares to have either Biden come and campaign for her before election day in November. Most endangered incumbent Democrats are running away from Joe Biden and don’t want to be on the same stage with him.
Democrats find themselves having to court Hispanic voters and compete with Republicans for their votes.
The RNC attributes its progress with Hispanics and Latinos to its 35 minority community centers across the country and heralds its new “Republican Civics Initiative.” That program prepares some of the more than 9.2 million lawful permanent residents, or green-card holders, who became eligible voters as of January 2021 to pass the civics component of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ naturalization test.
The RNC only describes “a multimillion-dollar commitment” to Hispanic and Latino outreach and organizing before the 2022 elections. The Democratic National Committee is only slightly more specific, disclosing $70 million in midterm spending, an increase from $30 million in 2018. The DNC, for example, is paying more than $500,000 for print, radio, and online ads during National Hispanic Heritage Month, which starts Thursday. The ad buy supplements its “Adelante” program and its train-to-hire campaign readiness project.
During last week’s DNC meeting in Maryland, Chairman Jaime Harrison told the Hispanic Caucus that Democrats cannot take the community for “granted” nor think of it as “monolithic.”
We’ll see how it all shakes out in November. I think it’s looking pretty good for Republicans.
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