Around half of Hispanics living in the U.S. say life has gotten worse under President Donald Trump, with more than 60 percent saying they are "dissatisfied" with the current direction the country is headed in, a new study shows.
Asked whether their lives had gotten "better," "worse" or had stayed "about the same" over the past year, 47 percent of Latinos said they felt their "situation in the U.S." had "worsened over the past year," the study, conducted by the Pew Research Center, found.
The number not only represents a significant increase in dissatisfaction from the 32 percent who felt life had gotten worse in the weeks after Trump won the 2016 presidential election, but it also represents the highest spike since the Great Recession, which marked a period of sharp decline in economic activity during the late 2000s.
Six-out-of-10 Hispanics (62 percent) said they were dissatisfied with the way things are currently going in the U.S., also up from 2017 and being the highest number since the Great Recession, when 70 percent of Hispanics said they were dissatisfied with the nation's direction.
Nearly half, or 49 percent, of Hispanics polled said that they have "serious concerns about their place in American society now" compared to 41 percent in 2017 and a majority (55 percent) said they have concerns that a family member or close friend could be deported from the country.
Many laid the blame for their dissatisfaction at the current administration's feet, with two-thirds (67 percent) saying that the Trump administration's policies have been "harmful to Hispanics." That number represents a significant spike from the 15 percent who had the same feelings about the Obama administration in 2010 and is also an increase from the 41 percent who found the Bush administration's policies harmful in 2007.
Latinos currently make up the largest minority group in the U.S., and the poll's findings could be a cause for concern for Trump with November's midterm elections just days away.
Still, the Pew Research Center study, which saw 1,501 Hispanic adults polled in a bilingual telephone survey, notes that attitudes among the Latino community are "not monolithic."
Just under a quarter of Latinos (23 percent) said they identified as Republican, or described themselves as leaning Republican.
Among that group, six-in-10, or 60 percent, said they approved of Trump's performance, compared with just 8 percent of Latino Democrats who said the same.
Related: Donald Trump Jr. Slams Beto O'Rourke as an "Irish Guy Pretending to Be Hispanic"
The study also found that half as many Latino Republicans as Latino Democrats felt that the Hispanic population's situation had grown worse over the last year, with 28 percent of the Republican group expressing that sentiment compared with 57 percent of Democrats.
In both groups, however, registered voters expressed roughly equal levels of enthusiasm around voting in the upcoming midterms, compared with the last congressional elections, with around six-in-10 (59 percent) of voters from both groups saying they feel "more enthusiastic about voting."
In the upcoming election, more than 29 million Latinos will be eligible to vote, representing a rise from the 25 million in 2014.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
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Chantal Da Silva is Chief Correspondent at Newsweek, with a focus on immigration and human rights. She is a Canadian-British journalist whose work ... Read more
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