Washington (EFE).- The vice president of the United States, Kamala Harris, tried to mobilize the Latino vote ahead of the 2024 elections with a speech focused on the economic measures that her government has taken to create jobs, help small businesses and lower the prices of medicines.
Harris spoke at the annual conference of UnidosUS, an organization that defends the civil rights of the Hispanic community and that this year met in Chicago.
“Think of all the work we have done together and what it has meant to so many people in the last two and a half years. Before we took office, many will remember that small businesses were having a hard time. Factories were closing across our nation,” Harris began.
The importance of the Latino vote
However, Harris continued, with the arrival of US President Joe Biden to the White House in January 2021, 13 million jobs have been created, of which 800,000 are in the manufacturing sector, and unemployment among Latinos is at its all-time low.
Specifically, the unemployment rate for Latinos stood at 4.3% in June, according to the Department of Labor.
Apart from talking about the economy, Harris mentioned the need for the US Congress to approve an immigration reform that regularizes the millions of undocumented migrants living in the States.
Especially well received by the public was Harris’ mention of migrants who work in the fields, the “dreamers” who came to the US as children illegally and the beneficiaries of the so-called Temporary Protected Status (TPS) that the Government grants to nationals of countries in conflict.
“Congress must create a path to citizenship for dreamers, those with Temporary Protected Status, and farm workers!” Harris yelled as the audience erupted in applause.
The abortion
Worse received were Harris’s words on abortion and the ruling that the US Supreme Court issued a year ago to end federal protections to that right, allowing each state to set its own rules about when and how a pregnancy can be terminated.
When Harris advocated for the right of women to decide about their bodies, there were several tables that did not applaud.
According to data from the Pew Center, Hispanics in the United States have more conservative views on abortion than the national measure.
Specifically, a majority (57%) believe that abortion should be legal in all cases, a lower percentage than the national average of 62%. In addition, four out of ten Hispanics consider that this procedure should be illegal in all cases.
The economy, however, the issue on which Harris focused the most, is one of the areas that Hispanic voters give the most importance to, regardless of whether they are Democrats or Republicans, according to the Pew center.