In this special episode, on the week after the Inauguration, Juleyka speaks with political scientist Geraldo Cadava, author of The Hispanic Republican, who helps us unpack the complex political identities of Latinos in the U.S. And, he offers insight into how and why we should engage with loved ones with whom we disagree politically.
Featured Expert:
Geraldo L. Cadava (Ph.D., Yale University, 2008) is a historian of the United States and Latin America. He focuses on Latinos in the United States and the U.S.-Mexico borderlands. Originally from Tucson, Arizona, he came to Northwestern after finishing degrees at Yale University (Ph.D., 2008) and Dartmouth College (B.A., 2000). Cadava teaches courses on Latinx History, the American West, the U.S.-Mexico borderlands, migration to and from Latin America, and other topics in U.S. History, including Watergate, the 2016 election, and the musical Hamilton. His new book is “The Hispanic Republican: The Shaping of an American Political Identity, From Nixon to Trump” (Ecco, May 2020). In The Hispanic Republican, Professor Cadava seeks to answer questions such as “Why have Hispanics continued to support the Republican Party, even President Trump’s Republican Party?” “How has the Republican Party built a Hispanic base to withstand attacks by leaders who devalue them?” Learn more about his researchh and writing here.
If you loved this episode, be sure to listen to A Historical Wound He's Trying to Understand and Dad Denies Systemic Racism.
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Juleyka Lantigua-Williams:
Hi, everybody. It’s Monday after the inauguration of President Biden and Vice President Harris, and one of the things that we talk a lot about on this show with our guests is how difficult it is to talk to our parents, and our tías, and our tíos, and our aunties, and our uncles about politics. And so, because the inauguration was really symbolic, a big change for many people, I wanted to spend an episode talking and reflecting on the pivotal role that Latinos played in the election, but also in the increasingly complex political identity of Latinos in the U.S.
We tend to be lumped into being pro-immigration, into being very leftist and very liberal, but in fact there are all kinds of political affiliations to the left, to the right, in the middle, among Latinos. And one thing that was really clear during the Trump years is that there are lots of vocal and active Latino conservatives, as there should be, of any stripes. And so, I wanted to invite someone to come in and talk to us both about globally how political identities might fall among Latinos, but also specifically about how we might better talk with our families about politics, because it’s just gonna get more complex and more difficult.
So, let’s get into it.
Geraldo Cadava:
My name is Geraldo Cadava. I am a Professor of History and Latina and Latino Studies at Northwestern University. And I also recently wrote the book The Hispanic Republican: The Shaping of an American Political Identity From Nixon to Trump.
Lantigua-Williams:
So, big day today.
Cadava: Yes.
Lantigua-Williams:
Inaugurations are typically full of symbolism, right? From who’s invited, to who gets to speak, et cetera, et cetera. Did you find any meaningful symbolism in the events of today so far?
Cadava: Oh, man. I mean, I think there was a little bit of a run up today with Biden’s announcements about having ready to go 17 executive orders that will begin to undo some of the damages of the past four years. So, it has felt to me today like people are really eager to just turn the page and move on and see what the Biden Administration will bring.
Lantigua-Williams:
There’s this refrain that we’re now hearing a lot, especially from political analysts, which is that Trump might be gone, but Trumpism remains.
Cadava: Yes.
Lantigua-Williams:
What does that look like in terms of the etiology that pervades Trumpism, and then what does that do for the agenda that Biden and Harris have to put forth to do some damage repair?
Cadava: Yeah. I definitely think that Trumpism, the phenomenon of Trumpism isn’t going anywhere. I mean, I think Trump kind of awakened and brought out into the open a lot of simmering ugliness that had been growing over the course of decades, and just because he’s not in office anymore doesn’t mean that the phenomenon is going anywhere. So, I think the Republican Party is going to have a lot of soul searching to do within their own ranks. I mean, I’m most familiar with Latino conservatives and Hispanic Republicans, and they’re not excited about the invasion on the capitol and the direction of the party that this kind of anarchy, chaos, lawlessness represents.
And then for Democrats, I do think there is a small danger of wanting to turn the page too quickly and pretend that the past four years didn’t happen and forget that these people existed. I mean, I do think that as they have in the past during Democratic administrations, I think Trump supporters and the people we saw invading the capitol, I think they will kind of move underground. But just because they move underground doesn’t mean that they’re not organizing and mobilizing, so I think we’re gonna have to keep one eye on what’s happening with them even as we turn the page and give the Biden Administration a chance.
Lantigua-Williams:
I want to focus a little bit on Latino Republicans, because they have to be in a weird space right now.
Cadava: Yeah. They’re in a super weird space right now, I think, if their Twitter feeds are any sign. I mean, I think some of them have been remarkably quiet over the past couple of weeks. I think others have forcefully denounced what they saw at the capitol. But on the other hand, I mean, Enrique Tarrio, an Afro-Latino head of Proud Boys, was arrested in Washington after tearing down a Black Lives Matter banner, and I don’t know how representative this was, but I saw a couple Latinos for Trump signs during the coverage of January 6th, so I think they’re in a really weird space. Mainly because they have done… They’ve been in a kind of celebratory mood since the election. I mean, even though their candidate lost, they were very encouraged by the fact that Donald Trump increased his support, and so I think they’re in a very weird space of kind of having coming off of what felt like a high to them because of the election with a very dismal end to a president who they had a lot of good things to say about.
Lantigua-Williams:
In terms of the makeup of the Latino Republican voter, how does generation and birthplace impact the adoption of conservative ideology?
Cadava: Yeah. I think there’s a lot to that. I mean, it’s hard to generalize, and I also think it depends on where you’re looking, so in Texas, for example, many surveys have found that citizenship status and length of residency in the United States does have a lot to do with your political beliefs. So, Texan families or Tejano families who’ve been in the state for more than a hundred years, and generations, they have little in common with the immigrant experience. And so, immigration, for example, isn’t going to be the issue for them that it is for others, and they might be more likely to lean conservative.
But then Latin American immigrants in Miami, or Cuban exiles, or Venezuelans, or Colombians who’ve come in more recent years, even though they haven’t been here for generations and generations, have embraced the Republican Party for a long time. So, I think in general you might be able to say that, but I think that there are a lot of counterexamples, and I think the point for me in pointing out all of the exceptions is just to paint a much more complicated picture of who Latinos are. Because I think that’s what will really help us understand their diversity and different motivations.
Lantigua-Williams:
So, part of the Biden-Harris Administration’s day one agenda is a path to citizenship.
Cadava: Yeah.
Lantigua-Williams:
That obviously is in response, I believe, to massive DACA demonstrations of the last few years. Also, to the incredible voter turnout efforts of Latinos, specifically in Georgia, where Mijente announced that they had actually reached every registered voter in the state prior to the special election. What else can the Biden-Harris Administration focus the energy on that will help solidify Latinos’ political power beyond the ballot and down the ballot?
Cadava: Yeah. I think you’re probably right. I also think that it’s a response to the sense that they hadn’t done enough to recruit Latinos seriously and invest in Latino communities early enough in the campaign, and you know, a fear that maybe Latinos are slipping away a little bit or could potentially slip away. So, I think there are those things in addition to the fact that Donald Trump over the past few years, especially when it comes to immigration and kind of turning over immigration policy to someone like Stephen Miller, that there’s a lot of damage that needs to be undone.
So, I think that’s why you’re gonna see a strong push on immigration, but then beyond that, I mean, I think a lot of the COVID relief package is going to benefit Latinos, and other plans on healthcare and education. I think education’s gonna be really important and doesn’t get talked about enough. You know, I think from my perspective, pretty much any economic, social, political issue you can think about is going to be one that the Biden Administration is going to have to work on in order to bring Latinos more into the fold.
Lantigua-Williams:
All right, so here’s an impolite question-
Cadava: Yeah.
Lantigua-Williams:
What do you do with someone like Ted Cruz, who is trying to use the Cruz in his name in ways that seem counterintuitive to what the masses want in terms of a Latino agenda?
Cadava: Yeah. You know, I think Ted Cruz’s place in the Republican Party is a really interesting question, and you know, I think he’s gonna do something that a lot of Republicans are gonna try to do over the next few years, which is how to harness some of the enthusiasm for Donald Trump among his kind of base, but also among Latinos. I mean, say what you will about Trump, and there’s all kinds of criticism to be leveled against him, but he did some things in terms of being able to really bring in new supporters, that a lot of people didn’t think was possible. And I think a lot of Republicans… I mean, just to be a little more concrete about it, I think the Latino conservatives I’ve talked to, they were really excited about how Trump tried to remake the Republican Party as a party for the working class, and how he kind of brought in, even if the gains were marginal, African American and Latino voters.
And so, I think all Republicans are gonna have to figure out how to harness some of what Donald Trump did, while also trying to reject some of the… I don’t know what to say, like less savory aspects of the Trump years, including what the past couple weeks have seen. So, I think you’re gonna see Ted Cruz caught in that same kind of web that many Republicans are, but you know then, as you mentioned, he’s also on paper a Latino, and so I think that he’ll try to use to his benefit, but I think he’ll get a lot of push back within the Latino community about how he doesn’t actually represent Latinos.
Lantigua-Williams:
Yeah. All right, so now let’s get to the real important thing. How do I keep from punching someone in my family when we get into a political argument?
Cadava: Oh, don’t do it. Don’t do it. Oh my God.
Lantigua-Williams:
No, no, no. I’m obviously joking. But you know things are gonna get more intense, so how do we keep our cool and engage in a way that is actually productive? Just for the sake of our relationships and for the sake of understanding that Latinos are really going through a massive almost evolutionary shift right now?
Cadava: Yeah. You know, how to avoid warfare in our own families. I think we all, as Latinos, have stories about our family members that we disagree with and how they can be hard to talk to, and you know, I think that… I have a couple ideas about how to deal with those kind of uncomfortable dynamics. I mean, first of all, the thing that made me want to write about Hispanic Republicans in the first place is that I have a grandfather who’s now 95, his birthday was a couple days ago, and he is a Hispanic Republican, and he became a citizen from joining the U.S. Air Force and voted for a Republican for the first time in 1980 when he voted for Ronald Reagan, and so he and I have been arguing about Latino politics for decades. And I think our kind of decades-long conversation about some of the more uncomfortable aspects of Latino politics and our disagreements actually really helped me approach all of the interviews I did for my book with a lot of empathy and understanding, and just kind of wanting to understand the political beliefs of the people who I don’t agree with.
And I understand that it’s an argument whether we should try to build bridges with people we don’t agree with or whether we should just leave them in the dust and work on other solidarities and kind of forge stronger alliances with folks on our side. You know, just take for example you have Joe Biden entering the White House today talking about the need for unity, and the country coming together, and I think on a large scale, that’s an allegory for the same kind of coming together we can do in our own families, and I don’t know that everyone’s prepared for that or on board for that, because it can lead to some difficult conversations.
But I would say that just as a starting point, try to remind yourself that these are people that you love, and have at least loved at one point, and there’s a lot of intimacy between you and them, and use that as the starting point for a conversation.
Lantigua-Williams:
That sounds so great.
Cadava: Yeah, but hard, right?
Lantigua-Williams:
Yeah, but the reality is that on this very show, we’ve had people say, “You know, well, my dad just doesn’t believe that institutional racism is a thing, “ or, “My Jewish dad doesn’t get offended when people are being anti-Semitic.” And it’s very frustrating for the folks that come on the show to get a sense of why is it that you can exist in a reality that is so different from my reality.
Cadava: I know. Especially if we came from… You know, I think the hard thing to accept about our families is that we came from the same place. You know, I mean we all started in the same place together, and you know, maybe our parents have the same values, and they taught us the same way. So, you wonder about how those different perspectives arose. That’s a really tough one to tackle. I guess I would say some people are just wrong, I think, and you can conclude that, and if you think that… if someone says that racism doesn’t exist in the United States, or that when Donald Trump is talking about rapists and immigrants in the same sentence that he’s not talking about me, so it’s okay, I mean… I think you can challenge people on their beliefs and like, “Why do you think that?”
And you know, I think part of the problem is that we go around mostly I think harboring resentments toward others without actually having the conversation, so I actually don’t know if we’re all having difficult conversations and butting our heads up against the wall in disagreement. I actually don’t know that we’re having the hard conversations. I think during the Trump years, there was an especial offense to being a Latino Republican in the eyes of many Latinos, because he’s someone who in words at least directly attacked our community. So, it’s even more unimaginable that someone from our community could support Donald Trump than another run-of-the-mill Republican, if there is such a thing these days.
But gosh, what do you do? I mean, you keep trying, I think. I don’t know. Should we give up on conversation? If we give up on conversation and give up on trying to understand one another, and commit to the idea that it’s okay if we disagree, and disagreement is okay, but we can at least hear one another out… I understand why people would be reluctant to do that, because for many Latinos, I think the very idea of supporting someone who supported putting kids in cages and separating families, that’s like a moral issue that you can’t even get past that. It’s just like a nonstarter.
You know, at some level, I think this idea that we can all talk to one another, it sounds romantic, but it also sounds naïve and unrealistic to think that you can actually change other people’s minds, and that might be true. I don’t know. I feel like I wrestle with it, but you know, what’s the alternative to not continuing to engage one another? It seems like the only alternative is to just continue to drift apart and move in our different directions and continue to in many ways mischaracterize and caricature one another in ways that are only partially accurate reflections of what we believe.
Lantigua-Williams:
What a great place to end the conversation. Thank you so much.
Cadava: Yeah, thank you. I mean, these are hard questions.
Lantigua-Williams:
All right, let’s recap what we learned from Geraldo. Don’t rush to move beyond the past. These four years might be over, but they surfaced a lot of really uncomfortable parts of who we are and who people in our lives are. Sit with that a minute. Acknowledge it before we rush to move forward. Engage, engage, engage. Okay? Be prepared to be challenged. Be prepared for arguments to get messy. But engage in these necessary conversations because the only way is through. The only way for us to better understand each other, to better respect each other, is to keep talking and to keep listening. And remember, leverage the love. Maybe our parents and relatives are actually the best people to have these conversations with, because they love you no matter how much they disagree with you, and that love and that intimacy in those relationships can really create a safe haven for both of you to speak openly and to try and understand where each other is coming from.
Thank you so much to Geraldo for coming and talking to us. He was so smart. We’re probably gonna have him back on the show. How to Talk to [Mamí and Papí] About Anything is an original production of Lantigua Williams & Co. Virginia Lora produced this episode. Kojin Tashiro mixed it. Manuela Bedoya is our social media editor. Cedric Wilson is our lead producer. I’m the show’s creator, Juleyka Lantigua-Williams. On Twitter and Instagram, we’re @TalktoMamiPapi. Please, please subscribe and rate us on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Spotify, or anywhere you listen to your favorite podcasts. Bye, everybody. Same place next week.
CITATION:
Lantigua-Williams, Juleyka, host. “After the Election and the Insurrection, Where Do Latinos Stand?.”
How to Talk to [Mamí & Papí] About Anything,
Lantigua Williams & Co., January 25, 2021. TalkToMamiPapi.com.