Harris and Trump campaigns fight for crucial Latino voters in battleground Pennsylvania

By Danny Freeman, Camila DeChalus and Nicki Brown, CNN

Reading, Pennsylvania (CNN) — Fresh off his vice presidential debate, Tim Walz arrived Wednesday evening at a Puerto Rican-owned restaurant here in southeast Pennsylvania to speak with Latino voters.

“This thing’s gonna come down to our ‘blue wall’ states, come down to Pennsylvania,” the Minnesota governor said at Mofongo Restaurant as diners sipped on colorful drinks.

“Might come right through this restaurant,” he added.

At the same time, just blocks away, a campaign office for Donald Trump hummed with activity, as Latino supporters of the former president worked the phones in English and Spanish.

Marcia Heras, an immigrant from Ecuador, drove the hour from Allentown to make calls.

“Familia, la vida y fin de la guerra,” Heras told CNN were the longtime conservative’s reasons for supporting Trump: family, life, and the ending of war.

This snapshot of dueling outreach efforts on a rainy weeknight provides a small glimpse into how crucial the Latino vote is to the Trump and Kamala Harris campaigns in Pennsylvania, a key battleground state where the past two presidential elections have been decided by a single point.

A growing population

More than a million Hispanic or Latino people live in Pennsylvania, according to recent census data, with the Pew Research Center estimating that 615,000 of them will be eligible to vote in November. While the state remains predominantly White, Hispanic or Latino residents now make up about 9% of the population, census figures show, growing by more than 40% since 2010.

Much of the growth has occurred in the “222 Corridor,” a group of cities around US Route 222, including Reading, Allentown and Lancaster.

In 2020, Joe Biden won Pennsylvania by roughly 80,000 votes and carried the Latino vote handily, both in the commonwealth and nationally. Four years earlier, Trump had narrowly carried the Keystone State while losing Latino voters to Hillary Clinton.

Although Harris polled well ahead of Trump among registered Latino voters nationwide in a recent NBC News/Telemundo/CNBC poll, 54% to 40%, her 14-point margin lagged behind previous Democratic presidential nominees with this demographic. Biden won Latino voters by 33 points in 2020, while Clinton did so by 38 points.

Even at a recent Harris campaign event in Allentown, there were signs of that slippage in support among the many enthusiastic supporters of the vice president.

Hector Santana, who emigrated from the Dominican Republic, told CNN he has voted for Democrats for 20 years but is undecided this year

“I’m not decided yet because the fundamental basis that I have always looked for is which candidate has Hispanic people’s interest in mind,” Santana said in Spanish. “Today, as of now, I haven’t seen that (from any candidate).”

Bethlehem mortgage lender Carmen Dancsecs said she’s worried some Latino voters might stay home come November.

“I think there are too many people that are kind of … on shaky waters. They don’t know where they stand,” Dancsecs told CNN.

Multiple strategies for Harris

The Harris campaign is pursuing multiple strategies to boost support among Pennsylvania Latino voters in the final weeks ahead of Election Day.

Those include deploying campaign surrogates, gaining more Latino celebrity endorsements and investing in more advertising directed toward the Latino voters, according to several Harris advisers and allies.

“The more we’re able to effectively get out the vice president’s message on who the vice president is and where she comes from, that she’s like a fighter, that she’s been a longtime fighter for the people, and she has taken on bad actors, whether that was the big banks during the mortgage crisis, the for-profit universities who were scamming its students … this is a message that does resonate with Latino men and Latinos,” a senior Harris campaign adviser told CNN.

Last month, the campaign announced it was allocating $3 million to new advertisements on Spanish-language radio from September 15 to October 15.

The campaign is also holding more rallies and events in the battleground state. At a rally last month in Bethlehem, Walz tried to appeal directly to Puerto Rican voters, who make up more than half of the eligible Latino voters in Pennsylvania.

“We recognize the painful anniversary of the landfall of Hurricane Maria, which continues to have a devastating impact. In March, Vice President Harrison visited San Juan. She pledged to continue supporting the reconstruction, and when she and I are in the White House, you can count on our support,” Walz said.

“Hamilton” actor Anthony Ramos, who joined Walz at the rally, had a specific message for Latino voters.

“I feel the passion in the room, and so many people of you are different colors, races. … We are all here together, right? This is what our country is about,” he said. “I want to encourage y’all, don’t just get out and vote, vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz.”

A senior Harris adviser said that as the campaign looks to shore up more endorsements from Latino celebrities, it will utilize social media influencers, with big platforms, to help amplify the vice president’s message. For instance, in August, Harris appeared alongside content creator Carlos Eduardo Espina, who has more than 10 million followers on TikTok, to talk about why Latinos should support her.

“When you have an election that is going to be won on the margins, everything counts. And, of course, they’re going to try to do everything they can to get Bad Bunny endorsement,” Democratic strategist and CNN political commentator Maria Cardona said. “But at the same time, we know that the most important thing is to be speaking directly to these voters by the campaign, whether it’s surrogates, whether it’s Kamala, whether it’s Tim Walz.”

Trump also leans on celebrity support

Trump’s campaign has also been tapping into high-profile supporters to capture more Latino voters.

Trump has received the endorsements of three well-known reggaeton artists – Nicky Jam, Justin Quiles  and Anuel AA – and the latter two appeared with him in August at a rally in Johnstown in southwestern Pennsylvania.

“To all my Puerto Ricans, let’s stay united, let’s vote for Trump,” Anuel said during his brief remarks,“I personally spoke with (Trump). He wants to help Puerto Rico grow.”

Nicky Jam spoke at a Las Vegas rally for Trump, who mistakenly referred to the singer as “she” before inviting him onstage to speak. The artist later deleted his Instagram post supporting the former president, though popular Mexican band Maná later pulled their collaboration with him, posting in Spanish that the band “doesn’t work with racists.”

At an August rally in Wilkes-Barre in northeastern Pennsylvania, Trump brought up onstage Daniel Campo, a Venezuelan-born pilot who became a US citizen in 2022.

Campo helps the Trump campaign canvass Latino neighborhoods, especially in Allentown, speaking with voters about the former president’s platform. He often encounters people who feel Trump is prejudiced against Latinos.

“I say, ‘I’m a Latino. He invited me to speak at his rally,’” Campo said, explaining his response. “And not just that, he gave good feedback in front of everybody about me. So if he hated Latinos, first, he wouldn’t have had me there. Second, he wouldn’t have said all those good things he said about me afterwards.”

Other voters Campo speaks with are concerned with Trump’s “attitude.”

“Are you going to invite (Trump) to your wedding? Are you going to invite him to your birthday party, or your kid’s birthday party?” Campo said he asks them. “They get a chuckle. They laugh a little. They say, ‘No, not really.’”

“I’m like, OK, so you’re hiring him to do a job, correct? And they say, ‘Yes,’” Campo said. “You saw him doing the job four years ago, and you saw Harris doing the job currently – where were you better?”

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