Latinas Strike Back

Since the U.S. presidential election on Tuesday, Latina activists, journalists and leaders have been forced to go on the offensive as some news media and tweeters highlight incomplete or decontextualized information about the Latino vote.

The early focus was on Florida, where a longtime conservative base of Latinos is influential. Largely non Latinos appeared to be surprised that Trump would have any significant Latino support and then began centering posts and discussions around the Latino vote in Florida. “Overnight, Twitter users began building a narrative that Latinos hadn’t really showed up for Biden, which explains his razor-thin margin nationally ahead of Trump,” wrote Elvia Diaz for AZcentral.com

The narrow lens was also applied to Texas.

Author Julissa Arce ripped the New York Times for its headline claiming that Latinos delivered Texas to Trump and suggested that there would have been fuller coverage if Latinos had reported the story. “This headline is trash,” Arce tweeted. “Trump gained in some counties with Latinos. He didn’t win the Latino vote in Texas.”

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was also pointed about the narrative.

“The overall fixation on Latinos is a scapegoat,” she told told POLITICO. “Because what's implicit in that is the assumption and the entitlement that a hundred percent of communities of color must turn out for Democrats and anything less is a failure while we just … allow us to lose vast majorities of white voters without any introspection.”

Journalists Arelis Hernández and Jose D. Real explained that losses to Trump were not about Latinos letting down Democrats, but instead the Democratic party repeatedly failing to heed warnings and invest in outreach: “The preliminary results underscored the extent to which the broad range of Latino communities, from Cuban Americans in South Florida to Mexican Americans in Arizona, have been often taken for granted and misunderstood by the Democratic political establishment.”

Latinas took to social media to applaud the work of Latino organizations that had invested as the Democratic party lagged. In Wisconsin and Arizona and other states like Pennsylvania, Latina voters and organizers were a decisive force for Democratic victories that included flipping Arizona blue.

In the Americano, Araceli Cruz named some of the Latino organizations that have been on the ground for years, mobilizing Latino communities as well as campaigning for local Latino candidates. And Marlena Fitzpatrick of MiJente emphasized the swell of organizing in Pennsylvania after the Hurricane Maria aftermath forced, by some estimates, 32,000 Puerto Ricans to migrate from Puerto Rico to the Keystone state.

Latinas overwhelmingly, by 73%, voted for Biden, according to the polling firm Latino Decisions.

The issues with some of the early framing of the Latino vote raised the question of who was telling the Latino story. Criticism emerged over the lack of Latino journalists and analysts included in election night and next day coverage.

Thought leaders like Tiffany Cross echoed the criticism and showed solidarity by ticking off names of Latino experts who could be tapped for participation in panels and interviews.