Hispanic Right Wing Media Figures Scramble To Anoint “Most Hispanic” Label To Jeb Bush And Ted Cruz

Written by Cristina López G.

Published

Hispanic conservative media personalities rushed to defend whether GOP presidential hopefuls Jeb Bush or Ted Cruz “deserve” to be labeled the most Hispanic candidate, ignoring polls that show Latinos care about policies, not personality, and both candidates advocate conservative policies at odds with the vast majority of Latino voters.

After former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush announced his intentions to explore a 2016 presidential run, Hispanic media outlets praised Bush as a “Hispanic candidate,” ignoring his conservative policy stances at odds with most Latino voters.

When GOP Sen. Ted Cruz announced his intention to run for the Republican nomination, right wing Hispanic media figures began to scramble to crown which candidate was the “most Hispanic.”

In a New York Post op-ed, the Heritage Foundation's Mike Gonzalez defended Cruz from detractors who claimed Ted Cruz “does not speak for Hispanics,” arguing that Cruz's family story and upbringing speak to his immigrant background. But during a guest appearance on Univision's Al Punto con Jorge Ramos, Miami Herald columnist Helen Aguirre defined Jeb Bush as “much more Hispanic” than Cruz, “in way of thinking and culture” (her remarks have been translated from Spanish).

On the April 7 edition of CNN's New Day, CNN contributor and conservative strategist Ana Navarro suggested that Bush may have some “Hispanic identity,” arguing that he could beat many Democrats in the Congressional Hispanic Caucus if they were tested on “Spanish grammar, and reading, and comprehension, and Latin American history, and culture.”  

But polls show Latino voters care about policies, not name or culture. October 2014, Pew polls found that education, jobs and the economy, health care, and immigration are the most important issues to Latino voters.

Hispanic media outlets have slammed Cruz's extreme conservative policies and studies show Jeb Bush's policy stances are at odds with most Latino voters. In a policy roundup about “Hispanic” conservative candidates, columnist Maribel Hastings noted in La Opinión that “the last name doesn't make a candidate [Hispanic].”