Young Hispanic Americans have become an increasingly important demographic for presidential campaigns, as they cast around 21 percent of the votes in the 2016 race. As the 2020 election approaches, both campaigns are looking for ways to engage with this segment of potential voters. One strategy they have been utilizing is diversifying their outreach by using Spanglish.
Spanglish is a language which consists of Spanish and English. It is a popular form of communication among Hispanic Americans, especially young ones, as it is the language in which they grew up. As such, both campaigns have started producing Spanish-language outreach materials that also contain a bit of Spanglish.
The Biden campaign was the first to use Spanglish in their ads. They created ads which contained both Spanish and English words, such as “Luchamos. Unidos.” (We Fight. United.) The messages were targeted at young Hispanics in Florida, Nevada, and Arizona, who are seen as the potential swing states in this election year.
The Trump campaign followed suit shortly afterwards. They produced Facebook advertisements which also used Spanglish. These ads used the tagline “Yo voto Trump 2020” (I vote Trump 2020) and featured images of Hispanic Americans. Additionally, they also ran a Spanish-language outreach program aimed at Hispanic voters in New Mexico.
While acknowledging that this strategy is being employed for the purpose of getting Hispanic votes, some experts have voiced their concern that the messages being disseminated are not accurate. This is because Spanglish is not a standardized language and can be considered as informal.
Nonetheless, it appears that using Spanglish has been an effective outreach strategy in the 2020 US presidential election so far. The fact that both campaigns are using it shows that they are conscious of the importance of reaching out to the Hispanic community. It remains to be seen if this move will be successful in attracting young Hispanic voters to their sides.