Latino voters: More evidence the South is competitive

Despite the claims of a handful of pundits that the 2006 elections show the South isn't competitive for Democrats, evidence continues to roll in that all the trends in the South point to a region that will only become more competitive in the future.

A great example is Latino voters. As the Denver Post reports today:

Latino voters leaned heavily Democratic in the recent midterm elections, indicating the heated debate over immigration reform may have cost Republicans support in some key races, an analysis released Monday indicates.

A study of exit polls by the Pew Hispanic Center (pdf) showed 69 percent of Latino voters supported Democrats, up from 58 percent in 2004. That compares with a 6 percentage- point increase in Democratic support among white voters.

As we noted earlier, this growing Latino support for Democrats happened in the South a well: exit polls from House races in Southern states found 57% of Latinos supporting Democrats.

Why is this important for Democrats? Because the South is the region where the Latino population is growing fastest. As the National Center for Health Statistics reported in May 2006:

Hispanic births are skyrocketing in the Southeast, where an increase of at least 40 percent was recorded in five states between 2000 and 2003, according to a new government report.

Among the states with the largest increases were Kentucky (80 percent), South Carolina (62 percent), Alabama (53 percent), Tennessee (53 percent) and Arkansas (40 percent), the report found.

Most significantly, the rapidly growing Latino population in the Southeast is moving more states towards becoming "majority minority" states.

Last year, the Census Bureau reported that Texas had joined California, Hawaii, New Mexico, along with D.C., as the fourth state where the majority of people aren't white. It also reported that Georgia and Mississippi are on the verge of joining them, with "minority" populations of over 40%.

The huge immigration demonstrations that rolled through the South this year -- as well as recent events like the massive labor walk-out of mostly immigrant workers at North Carolina's Smithfield Foods -- clearly show that Latino communities in the region aren't, as some suggest, afraid to be politically active.

The dramatic rise of the Southern Latino population presents both short-term and long-term challenges for the Democrats. In states with large and long-standing Latino populations, including Florida and Texas, the Pew study shows that Latino voters are having a key impact on elections. It also shows the Democrats can't take them for granted: for example, 44% of Latinos voted for Republican Kay Bailey Hutchinson for Senate in Texas, a situation that Democrats can turn around only with an expanded presence in the state.

In states where the Latino community is fast-growing but relatively new, the age and legal status of the population means their full political impact won't be felt for several years. But that raises another question: if the Democrats were to write off the South, what would be the impact on the next generation of Latino voters if the party wasn't a presence in the region?

For Democrats to ignore Southern Latino voters now, with a vague plan to swoop in later and court them when they become a dominant political presence in the future, would seem like a strategy doomed to failure -- and an example of short-sited thinking having long-term political consequences.