The 2018 mid-term elections brought up a significant change in the make-up of the U.S. Congress, as more Latinos entered the political mix, and ran and won their respective congressional contests.
There are some 36 Latinos, predominantly Democrats and including El Paso County Judge Veronica Escobar and state Sen. Sylvia Garcia (D), who now sit in the U.S. Senate and House.
Escobar and Garcia became Texas’ first two Latino women members of the U.S. House of Representative when they defeated their Republican opponents.
Read Escobar's interview with HISPOLITICA here.
Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who is undoubtedly the new face of her political party, spoke to HISPOLITICA about the increase in Latinos or Hispanics running for public office.
Ocasio-Cortez believes the influx of elected Hispanic officials is just a natural process that is “part of having government that represents the American people,” adding that the because the “Latino electorate is growing very rapidly,” that the “Latino population is becoming an “increasingly a decisive vote.”
Like Ocasio-Cortez, Hispanic leaders see the increase in the Latino voting electorate in the southwest United States as being the ‘pathway to victory’ for Democrats in future elections.
“We are able to turn out in the southwest, and in some ways, the southwest could become this new kind of path of swing state (sic). It’s because the Latino population,” said Ocasio-Cortez, adding “we don’t just get that because those populations exist. We have to have representation that can effectively vocalize our needs.”
Democrats may have a point, considering that Arizona, New Mexico, and even Texas, seem to have been trending Democratic over the past several election cycles.
