Latino Voters in Charlotte

I was interviewed for Spectrum, a local TV news station, about Latino turnout in last month's primary election. The upshot is that registration and turnout jumped in Mecklenburg County (where Charlotte is). It's still small, but moving upward.

Some quick numbers:

May 8, 2018 midterm election: 1.5% of voters in Mecklenburg County were Latino versus 0.64% in the 2014 midterm election

As of today, according to the North Carolina Board of Elections 4.2% of all voters in Mecklenburg County are Latino versus 3.8% for the 2016 presidential election. Meanwhile, as of today 2.7% of NC voters are Latino.

Mecklenburg County is more urban and votes more Democratic, which makes it more likely to have a greater share of Latino voters. Both the party itself and independent activists have made strides to register voters and get them to the polls. In NC as a whole, 29% of the Latino population is registered, whereas it is 32% in Mecklenburg County.

So this cohort is still a "sleeping giant" but some important advances have been made.