“@GoyaFoods is doing GREAT. The Radical Left smear machine shot out, people buy like crazy! Trump previously stated on Twitter.
For the President, it is the latest cultural wedge issue to take advantage of in an effort to persuade Hispanic voters that the left is too radical, from redefining Spanish to removing gender nouns for Latinos to be called “latinx.” until attacking a popular brand that is synonymous with Latin American cuisine.
“Even kibble wouldn’t be safe in Joe Biden’s America. Pass it on, “the Trump campaign’s Latino Twitter account, Equipo Trumpo, said Monday in reaction to former Labor Secretary Robert Reich calling for a boycott of the company.
The campaign is also discussing whether and how to get the message beyond social media and into paid television and radio commercials in Spanish.
The Joe Biden campaign, which has so far dismissed Trump’s approach as an act of desperation by a president deeply unpopular with Latinos, should be cautious of dismissing the controversy as a distraction, said Chuck Rocha, who devised the good. Considered Senator Bernie Sanders. Latino reach during the presidential primary.
“It is more than something to make people laugh. It’s real, “he said, noting that his Instagram page has been clogged for days with videos of people throwing Goya products.
“You have all this fire, all this hatred for President Trump in the Latino community,” said Rocha, “and then you have the most reliable thing in the Latino home, which is Goya’s spices, Goya’s beans, everything. And it was a shock to the stomach to see the head of something so culturally iconic for Latinos, Goya, standing with the most hated figure that symbolizes that everything is wrong in our society. It was just a tsunami of anger. “
Rocha, the head of a new Latino-focused super PAC that helps Biden, said Democrats and the Biden campaign can effectively use the attention of the Goya controversy to get back to what really matters to Hispanic voters: the failure of the president The coronavirus response, its immigration policies, its harsh rhetoric that equates many Mexicans with rapists and drug traffickers, and its difficult management of Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria decimated the island in 2017.
Despite that litany, Trump continues to essentially vote against Biden among Hispanics as well, if not better, as he did against Hillary Clinton in 2016.
Trump follows Biden by about 35 percentage points, 3 points better for Trump than in the 2016 national exit polls, according to a new survey of six heavy Hispanic states conducted by Latino Decisions, a company Biden recently hired. The Latino Decisions poll showed the president followed Biden by 26 points in Florida and 27 points in Arizona, essentially where exit polls had Trump in 2016.
A Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday showed the president with 38 percent support among Hispanics against Biden, a 10-point improvement for Trump compared to 2016 exit polls. The poll also showed that Biden is much worse than Clinton by receiving only 45 percent support. However, the 10-point difference between Trump and her opponent could be much larger because Quinnipiac had a relatively small sample of Latino voters that affects the margin of error for respondents in this demographic.
Still, though Biden is outperforming Trump overall in almost every national poll, Democratic support among Latinos has been relatively weak for more than a year. The Trump campaign does not claim that it can win Latino voters, but it seeks to define Biden negatively to minimize the size of the Democrats’ margins and dampen the enthusiasm of Hispanics to keep their participation low.
That’s where the Trump campaign’s interest in Goya’s food fight comes into play.
Former Republican Lieutenant Governor of Florida Carlos López-Cantera said the Democrats’ boycott attempt against Goya will not work because the brand is too popular and, in any case, could backfire because people will resent the overreach.
López-Cantera recalls that, during Governor Rick Scott’s re-election in 2014, his last stop on the campaign was at Goya’s massive new distribution center in Doral, a two-person event where the Republican ticket showed local business and outreach. Latin.
In 2011, López-Cantera noted that Goya CEO Robert Unanue attended a White House event with President Obama without incident. On Thursday, Unanue stood with Trump at the Rose Garden and said, “We are truly blessed at the same time to have a leader like President Trump who is a builder.”
López-Cantera said the different reactions were remarkable.
“The conservatives did not say ‘boycott Goya!’ when they participated in an event with the Obama administration, “said López-Cantera, a Republican.” But now that Goya is having an event with Trump, which highlights the policies that help the Hispanic community, is it time to boycott? That is the problem. with the left. It’s not about politics. It’s about politics and Trump. “
But Latino Decisions pollster Matt Barreto said Trump went overboard trying to exploit a well-known brand, prompting the outraged response. “Trump did not understand what that was going to do with the average Hispanic American psyche to see this brand they associated with … and not only associated with Trump. He was lying that he was ‘truly blessed’ to be associated with this president. It is a really shallow scope. ”
Trump’s daughter Ivanka Trump was widely mocked for tweeting a Tuesday night photo of her holding a can of Goya black beans and giving the English and Spanish versions of the company’s catchphrase: “If it’s Goya, you have to be nice. If it’s Goya, it has to be good. “
Trump followed up with his own messages on social media the next morning. Barreto said it’s reminiscent of Trump’s tweet on Cinco de Mayo in 2016, when he held his thumbs up on a heel and proclaimed, “I love Hispanics!”
“It is a complete mistake. In the long run, it will end up being counterproductive, ”said Barreto. “People will realize that he is not honest about this effort and that that is the kind of window dressing he offers to Latino voters: ‘hey, I’m friends with the guy who sells black beans in a can.'”
