Donald Trump over-performing among key voter group by double-digit margin

Former President Donald Trump, the GOP presidential nominee, is doing better with Latino voters than in his past two presidential campaigns including a double-digit jump from his 2016 run, according to a poll released on Sunday.

There are 36.2 million Latinos eligible to vote in November’s election, making them the second-largest group of eligible voters after white voters. This voting bloc is seen as particularly crucial in the Southwestern swing states of Arizona and Nevada. Currently, Trump leads Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, by one point in Arizona (47.9 to 46.9 percent), according to poll aggregator FiveThirtyEight’s polling averages, while Harris is ahead of Trump in Nevada by 1.5 points (48 to 46.5 percent).

While Harris is leading Trump among Latinos, the former president is doing better with the demographic than in both his 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns.

A national NBC News/Telemundo/CNBC poll conducted from September 16 and 23 found that 54 percent of registered Latino voters support Harris compared to 40 percent who would vote for Trump. Meanwhile, 6 percent say they are unsure or wouldn’t vote.

The poll surveyed 1,000 registered Latino voters and the margin of error for this sample is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

This is a double-digit improvement from Trump’s Latino support during his first run for president. In 2016, only 19 percent of Latinos said they’d vote for Trump, according to NBC News polling data from that election cycle. The former president’s current numbers among Latinos are also better than during his 2020 campaign, in which he had 27 percent Latino support, according to NBC News’ past polling data.

Newsweek has reached out to Harris’ and Trump’s campaigns via email for comment late Sunday afternoon.

While Trump gained Latino support in each election cycle, the Democratic presidential candidates lost support, according to NBC News’ past polling data. In 2016, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had 69 percent of Latino support and in 2020, Joe Biden had 63 percent.

However, NBC News reported that Harris’ advantage over Trump among this demographic is an improvement from Biden’s numbers in this election cycle before he exited the race at the end of July.

When asked about how they felt about specific issues, Trump did better than Harris among Latinos on securing the U.S.-Mexico border and controlling immigration (47 to 34 percent), dealing with inflation and the cost of living (46 to 37 percent) and dealing with the economy (45 to 41 percent).

Meanwhile, Latinos thought Harris would be better for the humane treatment of immigrants and protecting immigrant rights (57 to 18 percent), dealing with abortion (56 to 24 percent) and addressing the concerns of the Hispanic community (53 to 23 percent). She also did better than Trump on personal characteristics like trustworthiness and mental and physical ability to be president.

Harris’ campaign has focused on outreach and advertising to maintain Latino support. Since the beginning of August, the vice president and her allies have spent $13.4 million on advertising in Hispanic media compared to the $609,000 that Trump and his allies have spent, NBC News reported, citing political ad tracker AdImpact.

Meanwhile, Trump has relied on Latino entertainers such as Puerto Rican reggaeton musicians Anuel AA and Nicky Jam to reach this demographic. Anuel AA, born Emmanuel Gazmey Santiago, told rallygoers in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, in August to “vote for Trump.” Meanwhile, Nicky Jam, born Nick Rivera Caminero, said at a rally in Las Vegas earlier this month, “It’s been four years and nothing has happened. We need Trump. Let’s make America great again.”