Martha Casamayor, middle, says Joe Biden “stabbed Cuban Americans in the back” and regrets voting for him. South Florida Latinos like her are key to Republicans increasing their political attain in future elections.

Claudia Grisales/NPR

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Claudia Grisales/NPR

Martha Casamayor, middle, says Joe Biden “stabbed Cuban Americans in the back” and regrets voting for him. South Florida Latinos like her are key to Republicans increasing their political attain in future elections.

Claudia Grisales/NPR

Republicans didn’t see the pink wave they have been betting on throughout final yr’s midterms, so now they’re setting their sights on increasing success tales that did break via, resembling the large features they made in South Florida.

The largely conservative Latino group in Miami-Dade County turned pink final yr for the primary time in twenty years.

Who are they? The Latino group in South Florida is basically conservative, and consists of immigrants from Cuba, Colombia, Venezuela and different Latin American nations.

What’s the large deal? South Florida marks a group the place politics seemingly by no means sleeps. And it is also the place the political floor recreation for 2024 is already underway.

• Kevin Cooper, vice chairman of the Republican Party of Miami-Dade County says he is gotten calls from Republican Election Committees and different GOP teams in Texas and past hoping to duplicate the South Florida mannequin.
• Florida International University politics professor Eduardo Gamarra says an early, relentless floor recreation by Republicans helped flip the Miami-Dade area pink. Gamarra says Democrats arrange their floor recreation too late and handled Latino voters there like a monolith, probably costing them a technology of voters.
• Former Florida Democratic Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell says depressed voter turnout, tradition warfare points and Republican disinformation performed a key position final yr. She additionally concedes her social gathering has deserted the state.
• Voters like Martha Casamayor, a 73-year-old Cuban American, says President Joe Biden, his administration and Democrats have betrayed voters like her. Casamayor says they have not utilized sufficient stress on the Cuban communist regime and issued proposals to expand trade with the nation.

Want to study extra? Listen to the NPR Politics podcast episode on how Latino GOP voters have embraced the culture war.

What are folks saying?

Casamayor on Democrats:

(Biden) stabbed Cuban Americans within the again … The Biden administration has betrayed the Cuban Americans … He has betrayed the Cuban Americans who voted for him.

Cooper on listening to from totally different Republican Election Committees, or REC, asking in regards to the Miami-Dade County mannequin:

We take that message throughout throughout the county and shortly will take it throughout the nation as we clarify to totally different RECs and totally different events the right way to construct their operations.

Mucarsel-Powell on why Democrats should not surrender on Florida:

If you care in regards to the surroundings, it’s worthwhile to care about Florida. If you care about minority teams, in the event you care about Latinos, it’s worthwhile to care about Florida. And we have been deserted.

Gamarra on Republican successes in South Florida:

Republicans perceive higher the concept of the Latino American dream and Democrats nonetheless, for probably the most half, method Latinos as a part of the civil rights wrestle within the United States.

So, what now?

• It might be a key space to look at within the run as much as the 2024 presidential election.
• Republicans are working to carry onto and increase on their midterm wins in South Florida, whereas Democrats are an extended highway again to attempt to rebuild their Florida operations.

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