Courting the Latino vote means remembering Latinos are not a monolith. Mike Madrid is a political consultant and a cofounder of The Lincoln Project, and he joins host Krys Boyd to discuss why both Democrats and Republicans have had trouble connecting with Latino voters – and why focusing on immigration is a turn-off for the middle-class. His book is “The Latino Century: How America’s Largest Minority Is Transforming Democracy.”
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Transcript
Latino Century Podcast Full.wav
Krys Boyd [00:00:00] More than 62 million Americans have a Latino identity, making them the largest demographic group behind those who identify as white. Those numbers add up to a huge amount of potential political influence that both Republican and Democratic strategists would like to rely on. But the truth is, both parties have a tendency to misunderstand Latino voters. From KERA in Dallas, this is think I’m Kris Boyd. Well, over two thirds of Latinos living in the U.S. were born in the U.S. they don’t all speak Spanish. They aren’t necessarily very culturally different from other Americans, and they don’t generally list immigration as their top voting issue, because politicians have been slow to catch on to these realities. My guest says Latino voters don’t feel entirely at home in either major party, but he’s convinced the first party to present an economic working class agenda tailored to Latinos will find itself in a very strong position in national elections. Mike Madrid is a political consultant at Grassroots Lab and co-founder of the Lincoln Project. His book is called The Latino Century How America’s Largest Minority is Transforming Democracy. Mike, welcome to think.
Mike Madrid [00:01:12] Thank you so much for having me. I’m looking forward to the conversation.
Krys Boyd [00:01:15] This is so interesting. You note that Latinos are to the right of most Democrats, to the left of most Republicans, and they are the fastest growing segment of the American electorate. So how might Latino voters change the priorities of both parties?
Mike Madrid [00:01:31] Well, that’s a perfect encapsulation. And the intro, I think, really grasped the moment here. Latinos are basically Latino voters anyway. Are the moderates in both parties? And the reason is because there’s much less emphasis on the cultural, wars that have sort of consumed both the right and the left in modern American political discourse. This is emerging, and it’s important to say, emerging. It’s not shifting to the right. It’s emerging as an entirely new, different voting bloc with much weaker Partizan anchors, much more economically and politically populist in its leanings. And it’s rejecting sort of the politics of racial and ethnic identity and replacing that with economic and pocketbook issues.
Krys Boyd [00:02:15] You’ve been frustrated by the conventional wisdom that Latino voters are somehow apathetic compared with other groups. What has fed that perception, and what context do we need to understand it better?
Mike Madrid [00:02:27] That’s a great question. Latinos are, you know, not just, as you mentioned, the largest ethnic, minority in the country, but we have, unfortunately, the lowest voter participation rates. And civic participation rates generally are pretty low. One of the reasons is because despite having some of the highest levels of trust and confidence in our social institutions very broadly, the two institutions that do not enjoy support are the Republican and Democratic parties. We have the weakest Partizan anchors, as I mentioned, were the most moderate voters. We also tend to vote more politically populist in rejecting, the the messaging of both parties. And that has unfortunately resulted in lower turnout, a lack of engagement, because while, again, we believe in the institutions of the country to a greater degree than virtually every other racial or ethnic group, we simply do not see either party for good reason as being a vehicle to affect change and to kind of uplift, and inspire our communities.
Krys Boyd [00:03:30] Understandably, Mike, both parties clearly would like to be able to count on Latino voters to put them over the top in competitive races. Before we get into why they have both struggled with this in detail. We should talk about the reason both Republican and Democratic Party leaders feel as if they’ve created spaces that make them the natural home for Latino voters. So start with Republicans. How does the GOP imagine itself to be the party Latino voters should broadly prefer?
Mike Madrid [00:03:59] That’s a really good question, because it’s changed a little bit as the Republican Party has changed during the Trump era. But fundamentally, what it breaks down to is this idea that, Latino voters, as Ronald, President Ronald Reagan once said, are Republicans. They just don’t know it yet. Set aside a little bit of that condescension there. Essentially what he was arguing. This is a socially conservative, economically conservative, upwardly mobile, aspirational, middle class voter. And while a lot of that is true, we have seen some of the a very market change in direction during the Trump era since those Reagan days. And now the broader sentiment seems to be, you know, you know, if you view yourself as more of a typical American as opposed to, somebody from another country, you’re going to find a stronger, better, more comfortable home in the Republican Party. That, in fact, is the exact reason why the Trump campaign changed the name of their Latino outreach operation to Latino Americans for Trump, speaking specifically to third and fourth generation, Latinos who are demonstrating some remarkably, remarkable assimilate of tendencies, they look a lot like what we saw with other Catholic ethnic groups at the turn of the last century, in some ways. So that’s that’s the goal of the Republican Party is to basically say, drop the hyphen, leave that at the sure, drop the ethnic distinction and become kind of wholly American, quote unquote, American, in that, in that, sense. And, the Republican Party is the pathway for you if you do. So, this.
Krys Boyd [00:05:41] Wholly American in that context imply wholly white.
Mike Madrid [00:05:45] It does, I believe it does. Anyway. You know, look, technically, Hispanics are racially white. Unless they are not. There are a lot of, African Americans or, black, Latinos as well, especially from the Caribbean. About 5% of Latinos meet that criteria. But but racially and again, race is a construct of of the government’s perception of what race is and what it means racially. Hispanics are white. But the question as to whether, how, how Latinos view themselves in this, in this construct is very different between first generation who the recently naturalized, who do view themselves distinctly different than the broader Americanized white community and third generation, which which relate far more to whiteness than they do to, to to the country of origin.
Krys Boyd [00:06:36] So what about the Democrats? What do they think gives their platforms more enduring appeal to Latinos?
Mike Madrid [00:06:43] Well, the Democrats are the exact reverse. The Democrats really believe that nonwhite voters essentially will respond to messaging that speaks to systemic racism, immigration issues in the case of Latinos, any sort of, aggrieved or progressive, you know, perspective as best as best ameliorated, through the Democratic Party. And so there’s this very strong emphasis on issues related to immigration. And it has become sort of inconceivable, to to the leadership in the Democratic Party, that any nonwhite voters would somehow vote for Republicans, in fact, anti-Republican and or rejection of that, that, a similar tendency is central to, to, the Democratic Party’s, perspective, at least on the way they believe that nonwhite minorities should be voting. And that’s, I think, what’s caught most of, the Democratic strategists, pundits, elected officials off of kilter here, is they don’t recognize that Latinos, the explosive growth of the Latino community in terms of voters and on the voter rolls are overwhelmingly US born, as you mentioned in the introduction, but also overwhelmingly third generation and now fourth and beyond. And that changing perspective is changing the politics of these voters. So when given a choice between these two perspectives, these two Partizan ized hyper, you know, divided, perspectives that are increasingly choosing the Republican Party.
Krys Boyd [00:08:20] Democratic candidates have historically claimed a larger share of the Latino vote in many races than Republican ones. What are some of the reasons for that?
Mike Madrid [00:08:30] Well, it’s we have about 150 years of, of, of data that looked back at recent migrants who have come to this country for economic reasons. And overwhelmingly, about 70% of the time or more, they have voted with the Democratic Party, largely because the Democratic Party has done a much better job of welcoming, you know, nonwhite people specifically, but immigrants generally to this country and, engage them in the, practice of politics and civic life and civic engagement. They’ve also tailored a number of their policy issues to those that, are recently migrated, and have generally been more welcoming to immigrants. Republicans have been the opposite of that. They basically rallied a lot of those that were not comfortable with demographic change, that wanted more immigration restrictions, and have used a lot of anti-immigrant rhetoric to drive up the turnout numbers of its largely white, sometimes nativist base. So what’s happening, though, and that has worked for the past 30 years for Democrats, I should say, for, for for most of the past 30 years. But in 2012, 2014, we started to notice a chipping away of Democratic support amongst Latinos. And it coincided specifically with this dramatic growth with third generation Latino voters and beyond. 71% of the US population growth is Hispanic. I mean, it’s a jaw dropping number on how fast this country is changing and is about to change even faster. But almost all of that growth is coming from us born Hispanics. And so the Democrats, habit of speaking to the recently naturalized, speaking to immigrant issues, using Spanish as the primary medium. Joe Biden’s campaign, for example, is called Latinos Con Biden. It’s in Spanish. That’s where they’re emphasizing most of their efforts. That’s to a small and shrinking share of the Latino electorate. While Donald Trump is speaking to the fastest growing segment of the electorate. So they’re speaking to very different generational audiences, where the math is increasingly leaning more towards where the Republican messaging is going.
Krys Boyd [00:10:44] That said, your sense is that Latino voters are not fully understood by either major party. What are some of the mistakes each has specifically made that caused Latinos not to feel fully at home in either party?
Mike Madrid [00:10:57] The party that’s able to capture the hearts and minds of a multi-ethnic, working class voting bloc is going to be the dominant party in this country for the next generation. Democrats have had problems with the working class piece for about ten years or so. The working class voter has slowly been drifting away from the Democratic Party and voting increasingly with the Republican Party as part of this larger phenomenon we call the education divide. Those with college degrees are rapidly moving towards the Democratic Party. Those without are moving equally as rapidly towards the Republican Party. And for the moment, Latinos are disproportionately represented in the blue collar workforce without college degrees. And they’re behaving that way. So the Democratic Party really has to move away from the cultural drift that it’s been experiencing for the past ten years. Get back to kind of when Bill Clinton brought his party back to the center and focused on the the famous its economy, stupid branding and start talking about bread and butter issues and recognizing and feeling the pain of a lot of these workers that have suffered through this inflationary cycle. And not saying, you know, the stock market’s doing well, so the economy’s doing well. There’s a lot of people at the lower rungs of the economic ladder that are truly suffering Republicans for their effort. Again have a problem with the multi-ethnic piece of that equation. The diversity part is truly problematic for them because they have to try to balance the need to increase dramatically their share of rural non-college-educated whites. They have used anti-immigrant rhetoric in the past decade to do that quite effectively, but that is also slowing the natural progression for economic reasons that Latinos are exhibiting. So Donald Trump, for example, a lot of people wonder what it is specifically about Donald Trump that is attracting so many of these voters, Latino voters. When Ron DeSantis in Florida, Greg Abbott in Texas all overperformed Donald Trump with Hispanic voters. That’s very strong data that suggests that Donald Trump is actually stifling further growth to the right. He’s not bringing it with him. He’s slowing what would be probably a ten point greater move towards the Republican Party if he were just, could just tone down the, the, the native anti-immigrant rhetoric.
Krys Boyd [00:13:21] That’s a really interesting perspective. So you’re saying Trump is actually doing less well than he ought with Latino voters?
Mike Madrid [00:13:28] That’s exactly what I’m saying. And that’s that’s data taken not only from, governors elections from Republicans, but every swing district, every congressional swing district, is measuring Republicans that hold those seats doing better than Donald Trump performed, in Hispanic precincts and with Hispanic voters. And Republicans will be doing far better, without him.
Krys Boyd [00:13:51] To go back to, what you were saying earlier, Mike, I mean, for Democrats, one primary appeal to Latino voters has been based on the Democratic Party’s treatment of immigrants. But as with other ethnic groups in the history of this country, people’s priorities tend to change a great deal as they become generations removed from the immigrant experience. Can you foresee a time when someone’s surname is just their surname, and they don’t even necessarily identify with a particular ethnic group, in the same way that a lot of white Americans may not hearken back to wherever in Europe their families might have come from.
Mike Madrid [00:14:28] The answer is yes. That’s where this is all heading. And that’s why the title of the book is The Latino Century and How We Are Transforming Democracy. There are look, there are many similarities to assimilate of groups in the past. There are some very distinct differences that we can talk about, but we are going to hear increasingly, phrases in the future like, you know, white voters are not monolithic as as white as whites share a shrink as a share of the electorate. That’s going to be much more specificity and specificity added to these voters to look at some of their tendencies, not necessarily country of origin, although culture does play a part of that. But things like, you know, church attendance, and regional affiliations or regional, regional, designations, all of these things are going to make us, as political consultants, have to really kind of sharpen our pencils and do a much better job of defining what the differences are as the population, does become more blended. And that’s really, I think, the right term. Latinos have the highest interracial marriage rates of any race or ethnic group. And that’s broadly it’s not just with whites, it’s not just with African Americans, it’s with Asian Pacific Islanders, too. And that’s changing. America is going to make it incredibly difficult and challenging for, for politicians, for the parties and for consultants to speak to these voters, to nonwhite voters, you know, in a black and white sense, that’s literally the chapter. The first chapter of my book is Beyond black and white for 250 years. That’s the way we have viewed race in America. And that description no longer applies in large part because of this rapid Latin ization of America and the blending of different, races, cultures, ethnicities, just making it impossible, to to draw these distinctions out in any meaningful way.
Krys Boyd [00:16:20] Let’s talk about that Latin ization of America. I found this so interesting in the book. You say that because of the intermarriage that you just cited, you expect non-Latino Americans will become as much or more like Latinos as Latinos will become like other Americans. Dive in for us and explain what you mean by that.
Mike Madrid [00:16:40] Well. And this is I think one of the beauties of what’s happening is we have this sort of mythology of America about this melting pot where you could kind of come and jump in and suddenly, you know, everybody would, would melt into one another. The truth is, numerically, that really historically, what that has meant is you were essentially becoming white after 2 or 3 generations with, with, with black Americans being a very notable and important exception, but also in many cases being the test case of what a similar assimilation meant and did not mean. All other groups have largely come and assimilated and essentially become white by the third generation or, in more diplomatic nuance, a more quote unquote American, more Americanized. But but the melting pot mythology is not that old in this country. It actually started, in Teddy Roosevelt’s administration. And there was never a vision of America being a nonwhite majority country. The United States, in eight short years will be a nonwhite majority country. Whites, non-Hispanic whites will be, a plurality, but not a majority anymore. And that’s going to dramatically change our perspectives of our own American identity, the way we view our role in the world, the way we engage with nonwhite groups. And perhaps, as importantly, what you just mentioned, the need for a shrinking share of our population, meaning whites adopting the cultural characteristics of emergent groups like Latinos. So specifically, you’ve got an artist like Bad Bunny who, who, who sings only in Spanish and yet is one of the top producing artists, in history, in large part because most of his customer base is overwhelmingly whites. That type of, you know, the food, the assimilate of food, the fusions of our food, the, fusions of even faith based and religious, traditions. All of our culture is becoming, less melting pot and a little bit more of a stew where those discernible differences are very visible. They’re very palpable. They’re celebrated, but nobody questions anybody’s American identity if it’s not all blended into one sort of. Blandness, if you will.
Krys Boyd [00:19:08] When you say in the book that Latinos are broadly committed to family values conservatism, how is that different from the kind of social conservatism often assumed by pundits?
Mike Madrid [00:19:20] And this is a mistake I’ve seen Republicans make for many, many years, is there’s this sort of stereotype that all Latinos are either Catholic or very socially conservative. The truth is, there’s never been any evidence to suggest that social conservative issues like abortion rights or marriage equality, even gun control, as I point out in the book, are compelling messages, for Latinos. But specifically on marriage equality and abortion rights, Latinos are at best ambivalent on these issues. And when presented with them, in heavily Latino populated states, they have voted pretty strongly with more progressive positions. The Dobbs decision, for example. These third generation voters that we’re talking about that seem to be assimilating to the Republican Party. That’s actually not happening, to as near the great extent as it is with Hispanic women who are voting a very strong pro-choice position. So catholicity has never really been much of an impetus for decision making on any voters, really, except with maybe a few small exceptions, on social conservative issues, the way evangelicals are, the social conservatism that we find in our politics, is very different than the sort of family values conservatism that are exhibited by Latinos that I refer to, I refer to as family values conservatism. What it really means is sort of the playing by the rules, elevating your individual role only in the construct of the how your family, a broader, broader community is doing, which is a very prized characteristic of Latino culture. That rugged individualism, that Protestant, you know, individualist ethic, is not a part of Latino culture at all. It’s a much more communal perspective. And your own success is viewed only through the prism of the success of those people around you. So that that’s the type of conservatism, that it’s strong adherence to the family structure rather than the family rules, if you will, that are kind of imparted, by evangelicals and that most Mexican Catholics don’t, don’t have much of an affinity for.
Krys Boyd [00:21:38] It can be tempting to feel like we get all this when we point out that Latino voters are not a monolith. And your take on this is that no, you’re not. But yes, you are. So explain that.
Mike Madrid [00:21:50] Well, that’s exactly right. And a lot of people are saying, well, what does Latino even mean at this point? Right. If if you’re saying there are differences, but no, there aren’t. What does that mean? And that, in a nutshell, is the beauty of the moment and the beauty of what is happening. The culture itself, Latino culture, by definition, is both indigenous and European. It is a blended culture that respects and understands that you can be both at one time. And in fact, that’s our approach to not only the world, but to our politics. And so that’s what makes us more moderate. It’s these ideological extremes, these these zero sum considerations that politicians are forcing voters into, we are rejecting. We are summarily rejecting, in large part because we are so indefinable. That’s sort of the superpower. And and that, I think, is the future of what the country looks like is a lot of these issues that we are using to divide ourselves and our political construct don’t work nearly as well with Latinos, because we are literally a divided within ourselves by our own, by our own culture, by our own DNA. And so as a result, I think we’re much more comfortable relating to those differences and recognizing that it’s not zero sum, it’s not one way or the other. We have literally learned to navigate the world by by leaning on the experiences of both. And that’s what I think is the hope. Ultimately, the book is very optimistic. It’s very hopeful because I think that’s what fixes so much of what ails our country. It’s the culture that needs to change in order for us to get back to a place where we, trust and believe not only institutions, but one another. And that is probably the single most significant cultural characteristic that is coming online as more and more Latinos, step into the civic arena.
Krys Boyd [00:23:44] So one size fits fits all strategies, designed to appeal to Latino voters often fall flat. But you note, you know, bicultural campaign messaging is really difficult to get right. The parties need to dispense with what you call sombrero politics. What what is sombrero politics?
Mike Madrid [00:24:03] Well, I mean, I’m going to pick on, the president right now. Again, is when you when you have a campaign themed Latinos con Biden and you start it at a Mexican restaurant in Tucson with folklorico dancing and mariachis. That’s something that’s a relic of the 1970s. Like, that’s not where 90% of the community is at anymore. And even then, it’s just kind of a crass stereotype. That’s not the way to approach the Latino electorate. There needs to be something much more sophisticated, nuanced and understood. We are, like everybody else on the jobsite working. We’re working and living and operating in English. We’re watching the same mediums. There’s certainly a cultural affinity, but you can easily tip over into, again, what I characterize as sombrero politics, which is just these crass, cartoonish caricatures of who we are when everybody in that room standing there supporting him knows this is not what common life is like for Latinos. We’re not all, you know, dancing, folklorico dancing during lunchtime at a Mexican restaurant. And that’s where I think we need our politics to get a lot more sophisticated and move beyond those stereotypes if they’re going to actually be meaningful to people where they live, work, and play.
Krys Boyd [00:25:25] Like Americans as a whole, are broadly proud of our work ethic, which historically has been defined as a white Protestant value. How is the Latino work ethic at least as strong but fundamentally different?
Mike Madrid [00:25:38] Boy, that’s such a fantastic question. And again, a lot of this goes back, I think, to some of our own mythology. Both on both sides, both Latino mythology and American mythology is let the truth of the matter is, there are demographic reasons why the workforce in America that we need is reliant on immigrant labor. The average age of Latinos is 30 years old, and it’s largely, overwhelmingly non-college educated, at least recently naturalized. The second and third generation, we, of course, see those numbers creep up not as high as other racial or ethnic groups. But there’s a reason why 1 in 5 Hispanic men, are employed in the residential construction space were disproportionately employed in blue collar industries. Large part of the energy production, workforce is Latino. The same thing with manufacturing. And then you can go on and on. Agriculture, mining, forestry, all of these industries where, just simple age means that these, employees, these men, overwhelmingly men, are working in these industries. So, you know, Latinos have the highest Latino men, have the highest workforce participation rate of any race or gender. So, but, but but for the purpose of work, I think, is what we’re really getting at here. And the purpose of work, as I mentioned earlier, culturally, is not to strive as an individual and to lift yourself up and achieve success that way. Your success is very much viewed in the construct of the success material success anyway, of your family. So you go to work to support the family. And that is very uniquely different from, I think, the Protestant perspective, certainly in modern times. And what we’re seeing with Latinos, at this moment in time, a lot more multigenerational households. You don’t see a lot of elderly Latinos in convalescent homes, for example. You don’t see, as much of a, of a health, of a child care need either, because we’ve got grandparents for that. And those are those, those types of, of workforce changes, those types of social changes, are really a throwback to previous generations, but they are in many ways based on what sort of, the American mythology is based on.
Krys Boyd [00:27:51] How would you say the party’s failed to fully grasp the importance of Latinas, of women as a force within politics?
Mike Madrid [00:27:59] Women are really, I think, the most dynamic part of this whole story. And I dedicate a chapter on this. I wanted to write, frankly, a whole book on this, but I’m hoping, a Latina will step up and kind of fill that void because I think it might be more appropriate. Hispanic women have a much higher likelihood of going to college than our men do. And that’s going to have dramatic impacts, not just in politics, but in, C-suite, in corporations and nonprofits, in academia, in leadership, in our institutions, broadly, in very short order. We also as a community, as a, Hispanic community, elect women to office at greater rates than any other race or ethnicity in the country. Places like California, deep blue, California. We have more women than men in our state legislature. Hispanic women than men. 55% are women, 45% are men. But even places like Texas, are almost near parity. In Florida, the same thing. New Jersey has many more women than men. So it’s not a regional thing. It’s not an ideological thing. It’s not a country of origin thing. It is many ways, a cross cultural thing against Latino diasporas where women are very, very much viewed as leaders and that translates into our politics. We also have the largest gender gap, voting gender gap of any race or ethnicity. Women, especially as they, assimilate into further generations removed from the immigrant experience, become much more Democrat and vote more for Democrats. Men vote more Republican. We attribute that largely to the education divide that I mentioned earlier. Women are going to college at much faster rates than men. So the future is Latina, as we say. So much is going to change with this new female perspective, not just for our community as Latinos, but for for America, for for the way we perceive ourselves. And again, our own perspective of who we are as Americans is increasingly going to be led through a female lens. And our story is that journalists tends to be much more female. Latina journalists tend to be much more female than than male. Who is reporting, who is covering what are the issues that are important? What are the stories being told? All of this is going to change our perspective as our institutions change, with much more female dominated leadership in the in the very in very short order.
Krys Boyd [00:30:24] Mike, you think George W Bush understood better than any other Republican how to reach the Latino community? What was it that he conveyed to Latino voters that others in the party have failed to do as well?
Mike Madrid [00:30:39] Well, the first, as he was very welcoming. You know, he famously said, anybody willing to walk across 300 miles of desert to work in Texas for minimum wage is somebody I want working here? You would never hear that kind of rhetoric in today’s Republican Party. And he was also very aspirational, about where the American dream was, what its potential was, and viewed the immigrant really as refreshing that value, into our American culture, which which is a it’s a broad thematic of what conservatism used to be, this universal belief that we are all endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights. Right. Going back to our founding documents. There was a time, and I describe it very specifically when it changed in the book to to 911, the the crashing down of the Twin Towers. Conservatism before that was, you know, even Reagan’s, Reagan’s famous city on a Hill speech was an immigration speech. It was talking about being a beacon of hope for all that wanted to come here, being able to find refuge here, and finding finding hope and future and, and the ability to give your, your children a better future than you had. That’s ultimately what the American idea, the American dream is. That was central to conservatism, that was central to conservative beliefs during the Reagan Bush era. And again, I described very specifically the moment when I saw that change markedly was was 911. You know, there was no more talking about comprehensive immigration reform, which was a centerpiece for George W Bush when he ran in 2000. There was no more talk about, anything other than being much more protectionist, much more isolationist. And unfortunately, the rise of nativism, came with that, where there was a fear, a cowardice, really, of all nonwhite peoples. And Latinos, of course, were wrapped into that. And so that was when the party, I think, was forever changed. I do think it’s mildly ironic that the two Republican presidents who did the best with Latinos were the most pro Mexican, the most forward thinking on immigration, and those most committed to the idea of this universal belief in conservatism. That was Reagan and Bush. Reagan, of course, signed the Immigration Reform and Control Act, which granted amnesty to 6 million, Mexicans, largely. And George W Bush, who was promising, to fix the, the, the immigration reform system yet again. And believed firmly as somebody who was involved with that campaign, believed that a new majority of the party required a greater engagement with Latinos. And, that’s why they did so, so remarkably well with those voters.
Krys Boyd [00:33:29] You write in the book that Trumpism emerged with the collapse of Reaganism, and I’m quoting you exactly there, because I think your choice of words is important. If I understand you correctly, you’re not saying Trump himself destroyed whatever spirit Reagan had infused into the Republican Party with regard to Latinos and other groups, you’re saying he capitalized on the shift from confidence and abundance to this mentality of anger and scarcity?
Mike Madrid [00:33:54] That’s exactly right. Again, just kind of as a segue from from where I was just referring to the pre 911 post 911. Donald Trump didn’t create this, right. We’ve been we’ve been challenged by this new phenomenon in our body politic since 2016 and trying to come to terms with it. It is foundationally different than what Republicans stood for prior to 2016. And again, I really do believe that 911 was the moment when all of this changed. Just as somebody who works deep inside Republican politics and its apparatus, the idea that our strength came from our values or as as Abraham Lincoln said when he gave the Cooper Union speech that that it is right that makes might. It is our values that makes us strong. That is the exact opposite of what we hear in the Republican Party today. It is essentially that unless we use military might and the power of the state to direct people’s lives and control them, we are not a strong people. That is inherently, I think, a flawed way of thinking about things. That’s a really bad approach, not just for the Republican Party, but for the country. And, again, the type of I don’t it’s not really conservatism, it’s populism, it’s nationalism, it’s Trumpism, it’s its own brand of kind of meeting the moment where people’s fears are in both a changing America demographically, economically, technologically, are pushing people to want to revert back to this mythology, mythological, America that never existed for all, all Americans is making America great again. Is very much a throwback, in word and deed and in policy. It’s also important to point out that that Ronald Reagan actually used the Make America Great Again mantra. And it’s important to understand that what he was talking about was all very forward thinking about the strength of American values and getting back to those values and doubling down on those policies. It’s a very different tone, very different perspective. It’s what I call the difference between tribalism and pluralism in the book. They technically have the same definition. But if you’re if you’re afraid of the future, if you’re if you’re unhappy with the demographic changes that are happening, you subscribe to tribalism. If you’re optimistic and you’re comfortable and see abundance and benefit from a blended society, you’re much more pluralistic.
Krys Boyd [00:36:33] On the Democrat side of things, we’ve seen the Biden administration more open to crackdowns on illegal immigration than previous Democratic administrations, but half Democrats broadly overlook the way undocumented immigration might affect U.S. born Latinos.
Mike Madrid [00:36:49] They have completely missed the mark on this completely. And again, it’s not the problem, I think for Democrats that they believe that enhanced border security is is fundamentally racist, which I reject. The overwhelming number of Latinos reject, most Americans reject that border security is a foundational part of a sovereign nation. Now, you can you can be for border security for racist reasons. And as I point out in the book, you know, it’s like what Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart said when he was describing pornography. I mean, you can’t really explain it, but, you know, when you see it. And that’s the difference between what’s happening and the debate right now between both parties. I do think that Joe Biden’s signing of the executive action on restricting asylum, seekers was an extraordinary pivot for the Democratic Party, who realized very quickly that this was now a losing issue for them. And I posit in the book very strenuously as somebody who has been involved with immigration reform issues for 30 years, the fact that we haven’t gotten anything accomplished lies squarely on both parties doorsteps with, I would argue, equal blame. They both benefited politically from a broken system. But now, in this war of attrition as generation, generational changes affect the Latino community and Latinos are growing much more stronger in the line of border security. You know, Democrats are now playing a losing hand, and Joe Biden understood that. Or and I don’t want to suggest that it was anything other than a battlefield conversion. The numbers were showing it that they were losing Latinos and they were losing them on this issue. Some of the most significant rightward shift we’ve seen with Latinos have been on on the border in the Rio Grande Valley, in southern New Mexico, even in southern California and Arizona. That’s where a lot of this shift is happening, is Latinos are saying, stop this problem. It’s it’s not racist. It’s the problem. So fix it. And, I do think it’s is extraordinarily significant move a pivot by Biden away from, his party’s Latino, racially, focused base, to perhaps give them a roadmap out of this, this ethnic headlock that they put themselves in.
Krys Boyd [00:39:07] Did your sense of Donald Trump’s impact on the well-being of Latinos specifically play into your co-founding of the Lincoln Project, which was made up of a group of loyal Republicans working to prevent Trump’s election reelection in 2020?
Mike Madrid [00:39:24] Yeah. You know, I was the only ethnic minority in the group of eight of us consultants who were who were engaged in it. And again, you know, I never went into this, you know, with, you know, a Pollyanna perspective. I’ve been a Latino Republican for 30 years. I’m keenly aware of a lot of the landmines are being a nonwhite person in the party. You know, I live here in California, which is only 35% white, but the Republican Party in California is 80% white. So there’s no question that there’s a racial correlation between, partizanship and race in this country. There clearly is. Latinos are starting to defy that now. They’re starting to break almost 5050, which again, I see is a very promising, for a whole host of reasons. It’s not just breaking the cultural gridlock, it’s breaking that racial and ethnic gridlock. But from the moment Donald Trump came down the escalator, and started attacking. And I make that point in the book, too, is, you know, I’m very frustrated by by people who will say, oh, the, you know, the TMZ moment, you know, was when I finally had it with Donald Trump, his attack on women or making fun of disabled people on stage or attacking John McCain as a veteran. That’s when the moment I realized it. And for me, the very first moment he attacked Mexicans first. Like, it’s so easy to dismiss that. Like if that was the disqualifying moment and anybody who had to find other moments after that is kind of telling on themselves. And I saw a lot of that in the Republican Party. A lot of the book covers my journey in dealing with some of this soft bigotry, and some of it not so soft, but a lot of this, the way we interact with one another is just it’s kind of like, oh, well, you’re not really Mexican that way, or you’re not really a Latino that we’re talking about. And you would never say that to a woman. You would never say that to a vet. You would never say that to a disabled person. And yet it’s somehow acceptable, to be anti, immigrant anti-latino, specifically in this country because of these stereotypes that we’ve developed. If you’re not Spanish speaking recently migrated, well, maybe you’re not as Latino. So we can kind of talk about them. And I explore that topic, I think in great detail because it’s really central to the way not only the parties and the party elites, but but Americans broadly, especially white Americans, view this changing demographic. And, and what they’re finding is that it’s not okay to do that. You can’t be, subtly racist in accepting, and of those ideas and accept, and believe that that somehow you’re going to get acceptance from a broad swath of the Latino community or electorate. That’s not going to happen. So so to me, that was that moment. That was that Republican, moment when I was asked to join the Lincoln Project. That was my rationale. That was very uniquely different than the others, because they’re all white. And, you know, the one moment that really stands out to me was when we were invited to speak at Cooper Union, on the 160th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln speech that founded the Republican Party. What an honor to be there on the same stage with the same Lincoln podium that he held on to as he gave the speech that catalyzed the Republican Party, on a mission of racial equality, to be able to speak and talk about the party where it was at 160 years later, largely on the premise of race. And I was the only member who was heckled because of that. Is is a race animates the Trump base like no other issue does is is we can talk about all these other changes. We can talk about economic anxiety. But once you start talking about a changing America, it strikes a deep, resonant chord in people that, that triggers them and just makes them. Unreasonable. I’ll be as diplomatic as I can.
Krys Boyd [00:43:26] We are less than four months out from the 2024 presidential election, and the situation at the moment is, let’s call it chaotic. To the extent that you still don’t want a second Trump presidential term. How would you and how would you advise the Democratic Party to move forward at this point?
Mike Madrid [00:43:44] Broadly, I mean, I just to me, as somebody who just looked at numbers and tries to find an evidence based solution in an area where, emotion overwhelms reason, nine times out of ten being politics, I find it very hard to see why changing a candidate at this time makes any sense at all. The Democrats and the Republicans are both so what we call negatively Partizan ized, even though you’re seeing these grave concerns amongst Democrats about his age and even ability to serve in office, you’re not seeing any slippage or maybe, maybe very minuscule slippage of his support levels. So why you would take that risk, is sort of beyond me politically when the stakes are so high. Now, having said that, if a change were made, the delta meaning the difference between, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, for example, or frankly, any other Democrat is somewhat negligible. It just seems to me, from a pure odds of winning perspective, Joe Biden’s weaknesses are baked in. The electorate knows who he is. They’ve made that determination. And it’s best, I think, mathematically, to stay the course. You’re taking a huge risk with any other candidate, including the vice president. And the downside, I think, is much greater than the upside.
Krys Boyd [00:45:07] Mike Madrid is a political consultant at Grassroots Lab and co-founder of the Lincoln Project. His book is called The Latino Century How America’s Largest Minority is Transforming Democracy. Mike, thanks for making time to talk about all this.
Mike Madrid [00:45:21] It’s such a great conversation. Thanks for the great questions and appreciate you having me on.
Krys Boyd [00:45:25] Again, I’m Chris Boyd. Thanks for listening. Have a great day.
