WASHINGTON — Latino voters, a group that moved toward President Donald Trump in 2024, now favor Democrats for control of Congress by a wide margin, according to an NBC News/Telemundo poll released Sunday. The shift could reshape competitive races in states and districts with large Latino populations.
The survey found that 59% of Latino registered voters want Democrats to control Congress after the Nov. 3 midterm elections, while 35% prefer Republicans. That 24-point gap is twice the Democrats’ 12-point lead among Latino voters at the same stage of the 2024 campaign, though well short of the 43-point edge the party held at this point before the 2018 midterms, NBC News reported.
Trump’s overall job approval among Latino voters stands at 27%. Exit polls showed he won about 46% of Latino voters in 2024, CNN reported.
Prices and immigration drive the shift
The cost of living dominated the survey: 33% of Latino voters called inflation and living costs their most important issue. The poll found 78% disapprove of Trump’s handling of the cost of living and 74% disapprove of his handling of the economy, while 65% say his policies have made economic conditions worse.
Two-thirds also say the administration has gone too far on deportations. While 83% support deporting immigrants in the country illegally who have committed serious crimes, only 37% favor deporting everyone in the U.S. illegally. Border security was Trump’s strongest issue of the five tested, with 39% approving and 58% disapproving, according to NBC News.
Micah Roberts of Public Opinion Strategies, the Republican pollster who ran the survey with Aileen Cardona-Arroyo, a Democratic pollster at Hart Research Associates, said the findings suggest Trump’s strong 2024 showing with Latino voters was unusual. “What we can really say from this data is that 2024 was the outlier,” Roberts told NBC News.
The results also carry warning signs for Democrats. Sixty-two percent of Latino voters view the Republican Party negatively, up 16 points from 2024, but 42% now view the Democratic Party negatively, a 4-point increase. And Republican support among Latino voters remains higher than it was in any NBC News survey conducted before the 2024 cycle, going back to 2012. Cardona-Arroyo said any Democratic gains in November would be driven mainly by voters’ opposition to Trump and frustration with the economy rather than enthusiasm for Democrats.
A separate CBS News/YouGov poll released Sunday found Latino likely voters favor Democratic House candidates 60% to 39%, CNN reported. Among all likely voters in that survey, Democrats led by 9 points. CBS News said Republican House candidates are drawing a smaller share of Hispanic likely voters than Trump won in 2024.
Trump dismissed unfavorable polls at a rally in Vandalia, Ohio, near Dayton, on Saturday night. “These fake polls, they don’t account for one thing. They don’t account for the fact that Trump is out campaigning,” he told supporters, according to Fox News.
The NBC News/Telemundo poll of 800 Latino registered voters was conducted Sept. 21-28 through a mix of phone interviews and online surveys sent by text message, with 20% of interviews in Spanish. Its margin of error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.
What to watch
Several new House districts that Republicans drew in Florida and Texas, heavily Latino and comfortably Republican by 2024 results, are now looking competitive, NBC News reported. Statewide races in Texas and Nevada will also test the Latino vote. Turnout is a key variable: 72% of Latino voters in the poll rated their interest in the election a 10 on a 10-point scale, up from 54% at the same point in 2024.
