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Political expert who said one state would become 'dependably Democratic' completely changes tune
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Political expert who said one state would become 'dependably Democratic' completely changes tune

A political scientist who once predicted Nevada would become "dependably Democratic" has completely changed his tune.

What are the details?

Democratic political scientist Ruy Teixeira famously predicted in a 2002 book that Nevada would become "dependably Democratic in the next decade."

Now, two decades after making that prediction, Teixeira is completely changing course — and for the same reason that he made his pro-Democratic prediction in the first place.

Teixeira predicted that a growing coalition of Hispanic voters in Nevada would transform the Silver State into a blue state. But after years of Democrats assuming Hispanic voters will support them without doing anything to earn those voters' support, Teixeira has wisely observed that many Hispanic voters are switching their allegiance to the Republican Party.

"I think both parties have a job to do if they want to be the party of the working class, but recent trends look good for the Republicans," Teixeira told the Washington Post.

Aside from backfiring assumptions, Teixeira said he recently sat in on a Democratic-led focus group with Hispanic voters. Those Nevadans expressed great concern over the economy and immigration — two winning issues for Republicans.

The phenomenon that Teixeira is highlighting can be easily understood through polling for Nevada's U.S. Senate seat.

In 2016, Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto became the first Hispanic woman to win election to the U.S. Senate. But six years later, she now trails Republican challenger Adam Laxalt.

Nevada has been particularly hard hit by economic woes, which is playing into Laxalt's campaign messaging. In fact, FiveThirtyEight says Nevada is "Republicans’ most likely pickup opportunity" in the 2022 U.S. Senate election.

Anything else?

Teixeira, in fact, has been sounding the alarm for months.

"My data show that in the 2020 election, Hispanic working-class voters moved away from the Democrats by 18 points. So this is a big deal. We're continuing to see these shifts as we move into the 2022 cycle," he said on CNN in July.

"Democrats can no longer assume that Hispanics assume that 'we will vote for the Democrats no matter what because they're on our side,'" he added. "That's no longer the case."

Expert says Democrats face a 'big problem' winning future electionswww.youtube.com

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