Did you know that the Texas redistricting depends upon Hispanics voting GOP again?
While women in a border-town nail salon chatted in Spanish about a local economy the owner called worse than the pandemic, client Iris Martinez hung her head and hid her face.Then, she admitted whom she voted for in the last election: President Trump. “I thought he would help the economy—he’s a businessman,” she said. “I regret it.”
Martinez was among thousands of South Texas Hispanics who last year, after a lifetime of voting mostly Democratic, swung their votes to Trump, and the GOP is betting the shift is permanent.
At Trump’s instruction, Republican members of the Texas Legislature are moving forward on an unusual mid-decade redistricting effort to add five more GOP Texas congressional seats, four of which are majority Hispanic. The strategy hinges on newly-red voters continuing to vote Republican, especially in the Rio Grande Valley.
But there are signs Hispanic voters in Texas and nationally are souring on Trump, which makes the party’s redistricting strategy a risk ahead of the consequential midterm elections. The rightward shift in the region, which began in 2020, came largely in response to economic factors, especially the cost of food and goods. Now, voters say they are feeling the pinch of those things more than ever.
Their economic concerns are also colliding with Trump’s deportation agenda. Several small-business owners said they believe immigration raids are scaring away some clients and Trump’s rhetoric overall is keeping clients in nearby Mexican cities from driving across the border for shopping and other services. And tariffs have lessened import truck crossings in a region where many depend on trade.
An April poll by Unidos US, a nonpartisan Hispanic advocacy organization, measured the support of Trump’s first 100 days among Hispanic voters and found 61% of respondents in Texas and 59% nationally disapproved of his performance. The group overwhelmingly ranked cost of living and the economy as the most important issues, and a majority of Texas respondents said they believe current policies will make them worse off next year.
Nationally, a Reuters/Ipsos poll this week found 32% of Hispanic voters approve of Trump’s performance, the lowest approval rating this year. And some 21% of Hispanic Americans support his handling of immigration, compared with 35% of all Americans, a June Gallup poll found.
Wouldn’t it be something if those four new districts went for the Democrats? What poetic justice it would be.
So much depends on the state of the economy in November of 2026. But there is every reason to expect that it isn’t going to be any better than it is right now and it’s very likely to be worse. Combine that with the mass deportations and you have a recipe for Texas Latinos to stage a surprise.