How Bernie Sanders’s Outreach into Latino Neighborhoods Is Working

[title theme music]

[orchestral music]

Welcome to Nevada.

This is the third stop on the road to the presidency,

and one of the most diverse.

Almost a million Latinos live in this state,

accounting for 30% of the population.

The majority are Mexicans,

but there are also plenty of Puerto Ricans,

Cubans, Salvadorians, and Dominicans.

Sanders has proved exceptionally popular

among these voters.

So we travel to Las Vegas

to learn more about how his campaign

is winning over Latinos.

[singing in spanish]

I am Stephania Taladrid,

and this is On The Trail.

In most campaigns I've ever worked in,

the Latino vote is an afterthought.

In this campaign it was one if the very first thoughts.

We're sitting here in this office in East Las Vegas,

it's the very first office that we opened in Nevada.

That's a signal to the community

that we're serious,

we don't take them for granted.

So it was one of the first things we did,

and so we've been here working in the community

for eight months.

Sanders wasn't all that popular

among Latinos back in 2016.

He puled well behind Clinton

in Latino heavy states.

I really wish I would've known about him though

back in 2016 when he was running.

This time around the senator seems determined

to win their votes,

and he's hired many staffers from the community

who've put a lot of thought

into how they're communicating with people.

People are unfamiliar with the process right?

Uh-huh with the process exactly.

So there's no word to translate caucus into Spanish.

Into Spanish.

This matters a lot to a group of voters

who have traditionally been taken for granted

by democratic candidates

and want to be properly courted.

[speaking foreign language]

[crowd clapping]

We have a candidate in Bernie,

who actually understands all of us,

who feels our lives.

[crowd applauding]

[speaking foreign language]

I think you have events in which you serve tamales,

you also organized a soccer tournament,

tell us a little about that,

perhaps unconventional approach.

Anybody who knows anything about the Latino community

knows there's a few things that really draw us together.

Some of it is food,

a lot of it is music,

and a lot of it is our family.

So we took those three big pillars

to build out the campaign.

Democracy is when we bring our people together,

and participate in the political process.

[crowd cheering]

For a long time, there's been a misconception

that Latinos only care about a single issue, immigration.

And while it is a priority to many of us,

we're also concerned with health care, the economy,

and many other issues,

I have not been able to get any pre-natal assistance.

We actually have to pay everything out of pocket.

He's cost out health care for everyone

no matter if you're an immigrant or not.

Yeah That's a big one.

And there's a lot of people who don't have papers here.

Well the vision that he had

about not charging the student loans,

and raise that up is a huge step for our country.

We're now in East Vegas,

and early voting started today,

and we're hoping to speak to some of the voters

who went to the polls today.

Are there any of his policy proposals

that particularly appeal to you?

Yeah, Medicare for all of course you know?

Everyone deserves to be alive, I think.

His take on health care.

It's something that is important

and people don't understand

that these people out here can't afford it

and it's something that should be a right to everybody.

[speaking in spanish]

Elizabeth

[speaking in spanish]

[Stephania] Okay.

[speaking in spanish]

Bernie Sanders

[laughing]

We spoke to about twenty-five people,

the majority voted for Sanders.

Three of them actually supported Warren,

and one of them voted for Pete.

So it seems that, the senator's policy proposals on

health care, immigration, and housing

are actually resonating with a lot of people here.

[crowd cheering]

We've done all this work

without having a Latino department.

There's no Latino Outreach Director

at the headquarters, or in Nevada.

Analilia Mejia, who is our National Political Director

is not the Political Director for women,

or for brown women,

or for Latinas,

she's the Political Director for the whole campaign.

Okay.

At the national level we have over 150 Latinos.

Many of those, I'm proud to say are dreamers

and DACA recipients and immigrants,

who obviously helped write,

our immigration platform with our policy committee.

And give us a sense of how many resources

you're investing in Nevada.

So there's 60,000 Latinos in Iowa

and we spend a million dollars.

So you can only imagine what we have spent.

We've left no stone unturned.

We spent millions.

[speaking in spanish]

These folks are only used to

getting any attention just a few weeks

before the elections happening.

But we've started so early,

we can start that dialogue.

You can go spend all the money you want

to talk to Latinos at the last minute,

but you can't get back that time

that we've been spending here on the ground

in these neighborhoods.

[spanish music]

[singing in spanish]

So why has Bernie Sanders

become [speaks in foreign tongue] among Latinos?

Part of the answer rests

on the trust he has instilled in voters

but also on his campaigns willingness to listen.

[shouting in foreign language]

[ochestral latino music]

Whether that is how he'll win the Latino vote

or even the election remains to be seen.

[singing in spanish]