Having grown up in California, I was privileged enough to conveniently get great Mexican food, my favorite cuisine, whenever I wanted. In California, there were plenty of immigrants from all over Mexico - from Guadalajara to Chiapas - that opened restaurants or ran taco trucks, and their food was often better than the cuisine one would find on a trip to Mexico.
In Virginia and along the east coast, great, authentic Mexican food - or at least the type I’m used to having grown up in California - is hard to find.
So why I am writing about how much I miss authentic Mexican food on a reputable and influential Virginia political blog? Because, like with the cuisine, most Virginians of Hispanic descent do not hail from Mexico.
So often, especially during the recent (and heated) debates over immigration, Hispanics often get stereotyped as a monolithic group and “Hispanic” often gets conflated with “Mexican.” But there are many Hispanics that have no ties to Mexico, and their experiences and political preferences will have an ever-increasingly important role in shaping our country’s and state’s political destiny.
Last week, The Washington Post profiled Tito Munoz, better known as “Tito the Builder,” whom Sarah Palin often highlighted and mentioned on the stump in 2008. The article profiled Munoz and his fledgling conservative Hispanic talk radio show, his conservative political beliefs and his entrepreneurship. Munoz is a naturalized citizen who was born in Colombia and he could symbolize the types of Hispanics who could be receptive to messages from both parties, becoming a true swing vote in every sense of the word.
It is worth nothing that Tito The Builder is from Colombia.
I think it’s even more significant that Munoz is a Virginian.
According to a 2008 survey by the Pew Hispanic Research Center, 7% of Virginia’s population was Hispanic, but this number will surely increase a tad in the coming years. Of those 7% (528,000), only 27% were of Mexican origin while 73% were from other countries, the most predominant of those being in Central and South America.
Hispanics are by no means a monolithic group, and immigrants not from Mexico, who’ve had to make more sacrifices and travel a greater distance to get to America, can often have more in common with European and Asian immigrants, who’ve also had to travel great distances to get to the States.
Because they do not come from a country that shares a border with the United States, such immigrants may be more receptive to more conservative stances on immigration, such as a focus on assimilation as the best way to succeed and an emphasis on not rewarding illegal immigrants for proverbially “cutting in line.”
Heated rhetoric, backlash, and controversy surrounding immigration in parts of Virginia predated the recent brouhaha surrounding Arizona’s immigration legislation. Prince William County has often been the region where both sides of the immigration debate have often waged the fiercest battles.
Regarding the great number of non-Mexican Hispanics in Virginia, Republicans would be foolish to think the sarcasm and the harsh rhetoric that sometimes percolates on the right will not dissuade Central and South Americans from joining their coalition. On the other hand, Democrats would be equally foolish to take these voters for granted solely because they may share a common language and religion with Mexican immigrants.
As we’ve seen in the last decade, Virginia is emerging as a bellwether state on a host of issues. This bellwether trend seems likely to be something that will continue. And as Hispanics continue their upward trend toward becoming the nation’s biggest minority group, they will be heavily courted by both parties. And non-Mexican Hispanics, particularly of Central and South American descent, may be the ultimate swing constituency. How their experiences and worldview differ from those of Mexican descent, if at all, and how it may differ in a non-border state like Virginia should be interesting for the political class to write and think about.
In the years ahead, it’ll be interesting to see if Virginia produces more conservative Hispanics like Tito Munoz. Even more importantly, it’ll be fascinating to see if Hispanics of Central and South American descent are more receptive to the conservative message than those of Mexican descent.
If the Republican Party has any hopes of putting together an enduring coalition for the long term, this segment of voters will be crucial to their relevance. Likewise, Democrats cannot lose segments of the Hispanic vote and be a strong party.
How this dynamic plays out in Virginia will most likely be instructive on the macro level. It’ll be interesting to see if Tito The Builder’s message can catch on with Hispanics in Virginia. For if it does, it may have greater national implications, particularly concerning how both parties court Hispanics in non-border states, especially those of Central and South American descent, over the course of the next decade.
Tony Lee is a conservative writer. Follow him on Twitter: @TheTonyLee.
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