MIAMI (AP) — Areas with large numbers of Hispanics, from Pennsylvania to Florida to Texas, had little in common on Election Day other than supporting Republicans. Donald Trump on democrat Kamala Harris for the president.

President-elect Trump has made headway in Puerto Rican-dominated areas of eastern Pennsylvania, where the vice president spent his last full day of campaigning. Trump has made the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas a Democratic stronghold for decades, populated by both new immigrants and Tejanos who have traced their roots in the state for several generations.

He also considers his standing with Hispanic voters along Florida’s Interstate 4 corridor, which connects the Tampa Bay area, home to people of Cuban, Venezuelan, Nicaraguan, Colombian and Puerto Rican descent, to Orlando, where Puerto Ricans make up about 43% of the local Hispanic population. developed. population. Trump became the first Republican to win Miami-Dade County since 1988, which is home to a large Cuban population and is a metropolitan area with the nation’s highest rate of immigrants.

This was a realignment that, if permanent, could transform American politics.

Texas and Florida are already reliably Republican, but more Hispanics moving away from Democrats in future presidential races could further collapse the party’s “blue wall” of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, which helped catapult the party to the White House before Trump bypassed all three. this time. This shift could even make it harder for Democrats to win in the West, in states like Arizona and Nevada.

Harris tried to highlight how Trump has insulted or threatened Latinos.

Trump in his first term restricted use related to Temporary Protection StatusDemocratic President Joe Biden expanded thousands of Venezuelansand tried to end the Obama era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. Room delayed publication Trump, who brought relief aid to Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria in 2017 until almost the end of his term, has long accused the island’s officials of being corrupt and incompetent.

Trump promises to stage when he returns to the White House The largest deportation operation in US history. This could impact millions of families living in mixed-status households with people living in the United States illegally with American citizens or legal residents.

However, Democrats’ warnings do not seem to have won Harris enough voters. Now the party must figure out how to win back votes from a rapidly growing critical group.

“Trump is a very confusing figure,” said Abel Prado, a Democratic operative and pollster who serves as executive director of the Cambio Texas advocacy group. “We have no idea how to organize against him. We have no idea how to respond. We have no idea how not to take the bait.

Ultimately, concerns about immigration did not resonate as much as the pocketbook issues of many Hispanics.

According to AP VoteCast, a nationwide survey of more than 120,000 voters, nearly 7 in 10 Hispanic voters were “very concerned” about the costs of food and groceries; this was just over two-thirds of the overall electorate. Nearly two-thirds of Hispanic voters said they were “very concerned” about housing costs, compared to about half of total voters.

Trump had a clear lead among Hispanic voters who were “very concerned” about the cost of food. Half of them say she would handle the economy better, compared with about 4 in 10 for Harris. Trump had a similar advantage among Hispanic voters who were concerned about crime in their communities.

“When they looked at both candidates, they saw who could improve our economy and our quality of life,” said Marcela Diaz-Myers, a Colombian immigrant who heads the Pennsylvania Republican Party’s Hispanic outreach team. “Did he get offended sometimes? Yes. But this happens in political campaigns. “Most of those who voted for President Trump were able to get through this and trusted that he would move the country in the right direction.”

Harris vows to lower grocery prices by now cracking down on corporate price gouging and increasing federal funding for first-time homebuyers.. Also recent violent crime rates refused in many parts of the country.

Shen also spent much of the final days of the campaign trying to capitalize on the opportunity. On the words of a comedian speaking at a Trump rally in New York and joked that Puerto Rico was a “floating island of garbage.” He even turned to Puerto Rican celebrities. Bad Rabbit with Jennifer Lopez – condemn racism.

But Trump still gained ground in some of the largest concentrations of Puerto Ricans in Pennsylvania, where Harris spent more time campaigning than others. He won Berks, Monroe and Luzerne counties and lost Lehigh County to Harris by less than 5,000 votes. Biden had nearly triple that margin in 2020.