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Veteran Latino journalist: the Latino vote is as diverse as the people

Julio Saenz is currently the Director of Communications for Ibero-American Action League
provided by Julio Saenz
Julio Saenz is currently the Director of Communications for Ibero-American Action League

Latino voters are more complex than one label can capture. 

Veteran journalist Julio Saenz, who has covered Hispanic communities across the U.S. and currently works with Ibero-American Action League, said that it comes as no surprise that there would be a split within a community so rich with various histories and cultures.  

“We have to remember that even the category Hispanic is something that was created by the Census in order to track this larger trend,” Saenz said. “Within it there are all these individual communities that see themselves as such, and have different agendas.”

Cuban-Americans in Florida traditionally vote Republican and oppose socialism, which he said goes back to the Reagan era. However, in Rochester, the majority of Latinos in Rochester are Puerto Ricans who tend to vote Democrat.

Those leanings aside, Saenz said that for some Latinos from countries where there is no freedom of the press, they can be more susceptible to misinformation.

“People come from, sometimes, other countries where the press is already aligned with the government,” he said. “So true journalism and what that represents and the impartiality it’s supposed to have is not something people are used to.”

Because of this, he said that many get their news through social media, and similar to what other families around the U.S. are experiencing, there are growing divides between loved ones over fact and fiction as conspiracy theories spread.

“I was actually shocked to talk to a relative in Costa Rica a few weeks ago and they were believers in QAnon,” he said. “They believed it.” 

While Saenz said it fills him with pride to see a relatively high turnout among Latinos in this election, the fact that social media and digital platforms are profiting from the spread of fake news and misinformation is undermining democracy.

Noelle E. C. Evans is WXXI's Murrow Award-winning Education reporter/producer.
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