Beto O’Rourke has blamed Joe Biden’s actions during the 2020 election as playing a part in Latino voters’ rightward political shift in recent years.
“You got to be locking eyeballs with the people that you want to fight for and serve and whose votes that you want to win.”
In South Texas, a historically Democratic stronghold, Hispanic votes shifted significantly. For example, Zapata County, where Clinton won by 33 percentage points in 2016, flipped to Trump in 2020.
“Republicans showed up with a very strong, compelling economic message,” O’Rourke said Saturday when asked why the Hispanic voters in Texas shifted to GOP candidates.
“From Trump, it was literally one syllable, one word,“ O’Rourke continued. ”It was ‘jobs,’ and he kind of offered a false choice: ‘I can either keep you holed up in your house during this pandemic, or I can open up all places of employment and prioritize the economy.’”
“What did we have on our side? Nothing,” he added.
Upcoming Governor Race
O’Rourke, who is facing off against Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in the upcoming midterm election, said he would not repeat the same errors Democrats made two years ago.“I am making sure that we do not commit the same sin as some Democrats before me have committed, which is take voters of color—Black voters and Latino—for granted,” he said, adding that his Spanish language skills gave him a “competitive advantage.”
But the 49-year-old shrugged off the survey results.
“I take these polls with a grain of salt,” he said.