Latino Mobilization and Vote Choice in the 2000 Presidential Election

Abstract

Previous scholarship on Latino politics has demonstrated that mobilization has a statistically significant effect on voter turnout, suggesting the importance of get-out-the-vote campaigns to increase Latino political participation. Although nonpartisan organizations exist to mobilize Latino voters, most of the phone calls are made by political parties and candidates. I argue that the real test of effectiveness for partisan mobilization is vote choice. Using data from the 2000 presidential election, I model vote choice to determine whether or not Latinos who were contacted by Democrats and Republicans were more likely to vote for Al Gore and George W. Bush. I find that party mobilization by other Latinos is crucial to influencing vote choice. Specifically, Latinos who were contacted by Latino Republicans were significantly more likely to prefer Bush, whereas Latinos who were contacted by non-Latino Republicans were significantly less likely to prefer Bush. Several models are explored.