President Joe Biden arrived in Puerto Rico Monday morning, flying over the Hurricane Ian-ravaged state of Florida on his way there. The fact that he’s going to Puerto Rico first already has many people angry, but it honestly shouldn’t be much of a surprise.
Most trips that presidents take outside of Washington, D.C., are politically strategic in one way or another. Biden’s trip to Puerto Rico — two weeks after Hurricane Fiona ravaged the island — is no different. If you haven’t already guessed, I’ll let one of the New York Times’s latest tweets be the big reveal.
“A New York Times/Siena College poll found Democrats faring far worse than they have in the past with Hispanic voters,” the tweet read. Boy, I bet typing that one had to sting for whoever’s in charge of the Gray Lady’s Twitter account.
Poll after poll continues to show that Hispanic voters, who will be absolutely clutch in the upcoming midterms and especially in 2024, are abandoning the left in droves. Former President Donald Trump gets the credit for the switch as Latino voters began moving toward the center and right during his time in office. Clearly, they realized that life under a strong Republican leader wasn’t only tolerable, it was fantastic. Oh, and Hispanic voters might also be disgusted with how far left Democrats have moved in just the past few years.
The Times was forced to admit the problem in a recent piece on the Hispanic voter shift:
Whatever the full explanation, Hispanic voters have moved to the right over the past several years. As a group, they still prefer Democrats, but the margin has narrowed significantly. In 2020, Joe Biden won the group by only 26 percentage points. And in this year’s midterms, the Democratic lead is nearly identical to Biden’s 2020 margin, according to the latest New York Times/Siena College poll — a sign that the shift was not just a one-election blip.
As Fox News reported over the weekend, in a recent survey conducted by NBC News and Telemundo, Dems are bleeding Latino votes:
A survey of 1,000 Latino registered voters, conducted by NBC News and Telemundo, found that the majority – 54% – prefer Democrats to keep control of Congress as a result of the midterm elections in November. That’s down five percentage points since October 2020 and down a whopping 13 points since November 2018, according to the poll.
Nilsa Alvarez Morales, a Puerto Rican and Republican political strategist, nailed it in a July piece:
And that is the problem. Democrats have moved too far to the left for mainstream Hispanic voters, who are choosing the Republican Party. It may be temporary, and Hispanic voters likely will be perceived more as swing voters, yet it should worry Democrats going into the midterms that Hispanics are unhappy with the direction of a country led by Democrats and who have extra disdain for the president.
Perhaps Democrats should stop with the “Latinx” malarkey to begin with. Regardless, the damage has been done, and Democrats at the highest levels, including the president, are scrambling to shore up some of that crucial Latino vote ahead of the 2022 midterms, which will unfold in just over one month.
Related: The GOP Must Capitalize on the Huge Opportunity in Front of Them With Hispanic Voters
The president made his trip political the instant he told a reporter that he believes Puerto Ricans “haven’t been taken very good care of,” which was obviously a shot at President Trump and the controversy that arose in the wake of Hurricane Maria in 2017.
BIDEN: "I'm heading to Puerto Rico because they haven't been taken very good care of. And they're trying like hell to catch up from the last hurricane, I want to see the state of affairs today and make sure we push everything we can." pic.twitter.com/7reEBiqDoY
— JM Rieger (@RiegerReport) October 3, 2022
Biden loves to bribe demographics for votes. The student loan relief program is a prime example, but bribing voting blocs can also happen in times of disaster. In addition to making an appearance on the ground in Puerto Rico on Monday for some juicy photo ops with what Jill Biden believes are “breakfast tacos,” Biden will also announce a $60 million aid package to “shore up levees and flood walls, and create a new flood warning system to help residents better prepare for future storms,” a tweet from the president read.
A quick scroll through Twitter Monday morning revealed many people who are frustrated and confused as to why President Biden would give Puerto Rico, a U.S. territory, priority over an actual U.S. state.
Biden’s handlers in the White House will sit back and enjoy the saturated mainstream coverage of the president on the ground in Puerto Rico, hoping to God he gains a few points, while justifiably angry Americans wonder who the president will skip over next in the name of political expediency.
