Washington Post (The Fix)
By Janell Ross
June 30, 2015
Donald Trump is a man used to saying what he wants, when he wants, to whom he wants.
In
fact, Trump himself might say that's who he is and what he does. That's
the Trump way. The Trump brand. The Trump light. But Donald Trump's
mouth just ran headlong
into one of the major demographic forces shaping the United States:
Latinos.
Recently, Trump announced his plans to run for president. The speech included this:
The
U.S. has become a dumping ground for everybody else’s problems.
[Applause] Thank you. It’s true, and these are the best and the finest.
When Mexico sends its people,
they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you. They’re not
sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and
they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re
bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume,
are good people.
The
comments amounted to simply too much at Spanish-language network
Univision. Last Thursday, Univision officials issued a bilingual
statement announcing plans to sever
ties with the Miss Universe organization, an entity partially owned by
Trump. The network also canceled plans to air the Miss USA pageant. The
company said little else and declined a request to comment further. By
Monday, NBC, the network set to air the Miss
USA pageant in English and where Trump hosted a popular reality TV
show, "The Apprentice," was also facing public and behind-the-scenes
pressure to dump Trump. It did.
Trump's
lawyer, Michael Cohen, told me that Univision has tried to brand Trump
and his straight talk as racist. Trump plans to hold Univision
responsible -- down to the
dollar -- of the $13.5 million, five-year exclusive Spanish-language
broadcasting deal that the two finalized in January, according to Cohen.
Miss Universe has already collected $2.5 million of it, Cohen said.
And Trump won't wait quietly.
"You
can expect to see a major lawsuit filed against Univision," Cohen —
whose official title is executive vice president and special counsel to
Donald J. Trump — told
NBC News. "When someone makes erroneous and defamatory statements about
his character, Mr. Trump will always and totally fight back."
Something
about the Trump way apparently appeals to some voters. In a Suffolk
University poll of New Hampshire voters released last week, Trump ranked
a close second
behind former Florida governor Jeb Bush among the GOP contenders. The
problem that Trump faces is that the voters he's appealing to in a state
like in New Hampshire, site of the nation's first primary, aren't
exactly a growing force in the rest of the country.
Latino
voters not only represent one of the fastest-growing shares of the
electorate, but also a substantial portion of those eligible to vote who
remain unregistered.
That's
why in 2012, when the presidential debate commission declined to plan a
candidate event on Univision or put a non-white moderator at the helm
of an event on another
network, Univision demanded and got extended sit-downs with GOP nominee
Mitt Romney and President Obama. When it did, audiences tuned in at a
rate that fell short of the number who tuned in to watch the telenovelas
ordinarily scheduled for those time slots.
But the audiences were still considered substantial because Univision’s
audiences are big.
Here's
the thing that Trump and others must recognize: Way back in 2013,
Univision crossed another important threshold that helps to explain why
the 2012 candidates showed
up when Univision called. During a critical summer ratings period in
both 2013 and 2014, Univision's prime-time programming beat all four of
the nation's major English-language networks with the 18-to-49-year-old
viewers that advertisers desperately want to
reach.
In other words, it's a huge force.
Univision beasts big 4
What's
more, Latino consumers -- the vast majority of of those watching
Univision -- were expected to control about $1.5 trillion in consumer
buying power this year.
That figure represents what Nielsen's consumer research division last
year described as a "staggering 50 percent increase" from the group's
buying power as recently as 2010.
Latinos
-- and particularly Latinas -- represent an absolutely key part of the
market for beauty products, goods that other consumers are more likely
to view as optional,
according to a February Nielsen consumer analysis. And since these
products are not typically life-saving or sustaining, the companies
behind them have to invest more heavily in advertising them -- on
networks like Univision.
Hispanic Beauty Spending
Sensing
a pattern here? Advertisers want to reach Latinos. Politicians, and
particularly Republicans, need to appeal to them to win national
offices. And networks need
to convince bilingual and English-dominant Latino viewers that their
programming, the people on it and the companies behind their shows value
Latino viewers, or at least don't despise them.
This,
of course, brings us back to beauty pageants and one of the reasons
that Trump's Miss Universe organization signed a deal with Univision in
the first place. Pageant
ratings on English-language television networks have, with some recent
improvements, largely been in a state of decline for decades. It's not
hard to see why Spanish-language television powerhouse might represent
an important expansion space.
So
maybe overly broad, insulting statements about illegal immigrants are
your thing. Maybe Trump thinks it's helped to push him to second place
in a respected primary
state poll.
There's just one problem: Power -- cultural and political -- is moving in another direction.
In
addition to the unknown number of Americans of all races and
ethnicities who may have been more than a little bothered by whatever
Trump meant when he described people
coming over the U.S.-Mexico border illegally as "rapists" and exporters
of crime, there are about 9 million people in the United States who may
have felt deeply and personally offended. You see, there are roughly 9
million people in the United States who live
in so-called "mixed-status" households where some members may be U.S.
citizens, others undocumented and documented immigrants. The vast
majority of these households include an immigrant from Latin America.
So Trump's comments likely feel quite personal. And these families can vote at either the ballot box or with their pocket books.
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
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