The nation's most prominent Latino political engagement group says it's helped more than a quarter million people register to vote this fall, the most in the four presidential campaigns during the group's 15-year history.
Despite the coronavirus pandemic dampening "Get Out the Vote!" campaigns across the country, Voto Latino said Tuesday it is more than halfway to its ambitious goal of registering 500,000 people by Election Day.
Engaging and energizing the steadily growing Hispanic population could be pivotal in November: This will be the first presidential election in which they constitute the largest minority voting bloc — at almost 14 percent of all eligible voters. But there has been some recent angst, especially among prominent Latino Democrats, that their party is not doing enough to maximize support from Latino communities.
Just 40 percent of eligible Latinos cast ballots in the 2018 midterm, the smallest share by far among the four major racial groups. Boosting that percentage could help Joe Biden's efforts to carry the four competitive states where Hispanics as a share of all voters stand out: Texas (30 percent), Arizona (24 percent), Florida (21 percent) and Nevada (20 percent).
But Julián Castro, the former Housing and Urban Development secretary who was the only Latino to run for the Democratic nomination this year, says his party is not doing enough to support and attract Latino voters.
"I think that we could win the battle and lose the war," he told Axios. "We could win in November, but you could see a potential slide of Latino support for Democrats."
Hillary Clinton took 66 percent of the Latino vote nationwide in 2016, but that was a 5-point drop from Barack Obama's showing four years earlier.
"Ensuring that the Latino community is a robust part of this coalition going forward" should be a goal of the party, Castro said, "Or else you're going to see a slide that will benefit the Republicans in the years to come."
With 11 weeks to go, Voto Latino hopes to build on its momentum and continue its digital-first voter outreach efforts. Of those registered so far, 70 percent are younger than 35 and almost three-fifths may now vote in Texas — which is becoming more closely contested at the presidential level than at any time in four decades and has 38 electoral votes, second only to California.
Part of Voto Latino's success comes from its decision to conduct an online-only campaign at the start of the year, months ahead of when other groups were forced to switch to digital due to Covid-19. "We turned the traditional model for voter outreach on its head and it's paying off," said the group's president, María Teresa Kumar.
The organization also pointed to the recent protests against police brutality and racial injustice as evidence young people are more motivated to vote this fall.
For the last presidential election, the group registered only 177,000 people but two years ago grew the number to 202,000.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.