PRI The World: Why Texas May Become a Blue State [View all]

[pampango]

Texans are taking to the voting booths today. And… so what? Mitt Romney has the Republican nominee for president wrapped up. And we knew long ago that Texas would vote for any Republican presidential candidate.

But Texas might not be such a Republican slam-dunk forever. The state’s demographics are changing quickly. Texas is 37 percent Latino, and demographers say the state could be majority Latino in less than 20 years. And those Texas Latinos have been overwhelmingly voting Democrat. But that wasn’t always the case.

In 2004, about half of Texas Latinos voted to re-elect George W. Bush. Four years later, the Republican presidential candidate, John McCain, captured only 35 percent of the Texas Latino vote. That doesn’t make sense to Robin Lennon, co-founder of the Kingwood Tea Party, located just north of Houston. She thinks Texas Latinos are natural conservatives.

I went to a get-out-the-vote barbeque in southwest Houston, dubbed “Tacos & Votes.” There were about 150 people there, mostly Latinos. I met people like 36-year-old civil engineer Adan Gallegos, a US citizen originally from Mexico.

“I used to be Republican, but ever since they started the Latino bashing, I actually switched sides.”

http://www.theworld.org/2012/05/texas-may-become-blue-state/

I read some commentator's analysis a few weeks ago that if Texas goes blue it is over for republicans. California and New York are already blue and the right can't compete nationally if the three biggest states all go blue. It's a nice thought.