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Latino Victory Fund Declares Tim Kaine Clear Winner Of VP Debates After ‘That Mexican Thing’

By Christine Beswick
Published on: 07:17 PST, Oct 5, 2016

Minorities are clearly going to be a tipping point in the 2016 elections. Pew Research Center reports that one in three voters will be Hispanic, black, Asian, or another ethnic minority. As such, the Hispanic vote is considered a potential “game changer” by VOA News.

In a separate report, Pew Research tells us that Hillary Clinton has the Latino vote locked in and leads Donald Trump by 42 points in that demographic.

That appears to be confirmed via a press release last night by the Latino Victory Fund, citing Senator Tim Kaine the “clear winner” of the VP debates. The letter also cites strong support for Hillary Clinton.

During last night’s vice presidential debate, GOP VP hopeful Mike Pence made an offhand comment about “that Mexican thing” when responding to Senator Tim Kaine about an immigration issue and comments that presidential nominee Donald Trump had made about Mexicans.

Mike Pence said to Senator Kaine, “You whipped out that Mexican thing again.”

Twitter erupted.

By the end of the debate, #ThatMexicanThing was trending on Twitter, two new domains were registered under that trend, and the tweets about #ThatMexicanThing were firing faster than people could type.

Today, the Latino Victory Fund released a press release citing Democrat Senator Tim Kaine as the “clear winner” of last night’s VP debate. As we know, elections are a numbers game. Mike Pence may have lost some numbers from the critical Latino vote last night.

VOA News reports that Latinos represent over 17 percent of the American population, a number that is expected to reach 28 percent by 2060. Worse, for Trump, Salon reports that his polarizing campaign is driving up voter registration in minority groups and key demographics, especially Hispanics and women.

Salon says that registration for voters in the Latino community is so great that as many as two million more Latinos will be voting in this election. The surge in registration is being seen in key swing states of Colorado, Nevada, and Florida. This could explain why the polls are currently tipping in Clinton’s favor today.

It’s a tough spot for Trump to be in, as he doesn’t have a whole lot of time to swing back those votes in his direction. As Salon notes, the Latino vote was ultimately what “doomed Romney’s campaign” in 2012.

Today, the Latino Victory Fund (LVF) issued a press release, noting Senator Tim Kaine as the “clear winner” of last night’s vice presidential debates.

In addition to citing Kaine the winner, the Latino Victory Fund said, “No matter how hard Pence and others in the Republican Party try to distance themselves from Trump, Trump is their leader and their nominee. His insults against women, veterans, Latinos, immigrants, the LGBTQ community, and Muslims, are real and very well documented. Trump and Pence are running on the same ticket and Trump has made very clear what his divisive and backwards agenda is for our country.”

It wasn’t just Trump who the Latino Victory Fund had harsh words for. In their press release, the Latino Victory Fund made a point of highlighting the policies that Mike Pence has pushed as the governor of Indiana.

They say, “During his time in Congress and as Governor of Indiana, Pence pushed forth policies that harmed LGBTQ individuals, restricted woman’s access to health care, and hurt working Americans and immigrants. Pence is no different than Trump and their agenda is one and the same.”

The Latino Victory Fund is “proud” to stand with the Democratic ticket, noting, “we’re stronger together.” The Latino Victory Fund also tweeted the #ThatMexicanThing hashtag.

While many are making light of Pence’s inflammatory statements last night, “that Mexican thing” could cost Trump and Pence the Oval Office. And some just aren’t laughing about it.

During the course of the debate, Senator Kaine repeatedly asked Mike Pence to defend his own comments or some of the more incendiary comments Donald Trump has made during the campaign.

Mike Pence repeatedly responded with the statement “There you go again!” during last night’s debates, as if to suggest that requesting transparency on inflammatory comments was odd. He made a similar statement when Tim Kaine addressed a comment of Donald Trump’s, where he asked Pence to explain Trump’s December 2015 comments about how Mexicans were “criminals and rapists.”

When asked about that, the Guardian reports that Mike Pence’s response was, “Senator, you whipped out that Mexican thing again.”

And then came the fury. Before the debate was over, #ThatMexicanThing was trending, the domain names of thatmexicanthing.com and thatmexicanthing.org had been registered. The.com domain goes back to Hillary Clinton’s website. The.org domain leads to a man in Portland, Oregon.

Senator Tim Kaine did a very skillful job in weaving many key elections issues together. After that comment, he asked Mike Pence about tax returns. The Social Security Administration website shows that undocumented immigrants paid approximately $12 billion in taxes last year.

Donald Trump, it was claimed last night, paid none. Tim Kaine took that debate moment and ran with it — and so did Twitter.

Pew Research notes that with the Hispanic vote, Hillary Clinton leads by 42 points, having a 66 percent to 24 percent advantage over Donald Trump. It’s not the only minority she leads in.

The Los Angeles Times’ demographic tracker shows that 81.9 percent of African Americans are on Team Hillary. That number is up from the 74 percent African-American support reported by the International Business Times last week. This suggests that the debates are having a heavy impact on the polls, at least with the minorities.

That uptick could also be due to a letter recently tweeted by NBA star LeBron James. LeBron James wrote an op-ed supporting Hillary Clinton for Ohio.com, saying he wants his fellow citizens to vote for Hillary Clinton because she’s a “champion for children and their futures.”

Speaking to residents in key swing state, Ohio, James said, “My kids in Akron are proof of the hope and motivation that come from knowing college can be in their future….We must address the violence of every kind. I don’t know everything it will take to end the violence. But I do know we need a president who brings us together and keeps us unified. And Hillary is running on the message of hope and unity that we need.”

Before LeBron James wrote that letter and tweeted it on October 3, Ohio was leaning red for Donald Trump by a very small margin. This is not the case today, according to new data from Project 538. Ohio has just flipped and literally changed colors overnight.

In addition to the Latino and African-American vote, Hillary Clinton also leads women by a wide margin — 48.7 percent to Donald Trump’s 39.6 percent, according to the Los Angeles Times tracker. Donald Trump continues to lead white men, but that group in the voting demographic is a very small minority, and he can’t win the Oval Office with white men alone.

Donald Trump’s campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, recently talked with Megyn Kelly of Fox News about that. Kellyanne seemed to think that Donald Trump had the women vote pretty well sewn up. Megyn Kelly fact-checked her on that, Kellyanne Conway was wrong. Watch Megyn Kelly call that out right here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCVPzVhaEGQ

Donald Trump is desperately trying to get the women vote. As the Inquisitr previously reported, his daughter Ivanka Trump just released an ad called “Motherhood” as her attempt to garner more female votes for her father. Many women were offended by the ad, notably the first line, telling women everywhere the most important job they would ever have is motherhood.

The polling data we have seen concurs with Megyn Kelly’s, that Hillary Clinton’s lead with women is wide. As the Los Angeles Times tracker reports, she leads with all minorities and women who make up the majority.

Donald Trump leads with white men, and white men only. With the Latino Victory Fund endorsing Tim Kaine as a win last night, that’s only going to send more Latino votes to the Clinton/Kaine ticket.

As we previously reported, the next presidential debate is set to occur this Sunday, October 9. Anderson Cooper of CNN will be moderating with ABC’s Martha Raddatz. Debates will begin at 9 p.m. Eastern Standard Time and 8 p.m. Central. What is your reaction from the two debates so far?

[Featured Image by Julio Cortez/AP Images]

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