Rick Scott is using a cheap old trope to court Hispanic voters. Why it might just work | Opinion

Can U.S. Sen. Rick Scott “out-Hispanic” a Latina candidate in his November reelection bid?

He might. The wealthy former Florida governor has proven he’s capable of dumping as much of his own money as he needs to win elections by razor-thin margins. Ahead of the 2024 elections, he may have another weapon: Hispanic voters, the Herald reported this week.

Scott has put in the work for years to build bridges with the community, even learning Spanish, and he recently released Spanish-language ads. Meanwhile, Democrats notoriously took Hispanic voters for granted for years. That probably cost Scott’s 2018 opponent, then-U.S. Sen Bill Nelson, at least a portion of his 10,000 voter-margin loss.

Scott’s Spanish may sound clunky and awkward, but his 2024 Democratic opponent, former Miami U.S. Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, who was born in Ecuador, would underestimate him at her own peril.

Scott has shown that he will fear-monger his way to reelection by claiming Democrats are trying to turn America into a socialist country — or that “socialist teachers” may teach children that a “man can become a woman” instead of math or English, as he says in Spanish in a new ad.

And why? Because it works.

Republican after Republican has beaten Democrats in South Florida by evoking one thing many voters with roots in Cuba, Venezuela and other countries fear deeply: a socialist take over.

Democrats might advocate for greater government involvement in things like taxes or the rights of workers. Many voters may dislike things like welfare or higher taxes on the wealthy. But the standard definition of socialism is something different: “the collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods,” according to Merriam Webster dictionary.

Sure, the idea of socialism has been distorted by both its advocates and critics over time. Along with the rise of politicians like U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, who calls himself a “democratic socialist,” that has made it easier for Republicans like Scott to use it to label anyone with whom they have ideological disagreements.

It’s all very clever yet misleading — and the underlying message appears to be that America is on the verge of a socialist takeover like Cuba’s in 1959. That plays directly into the trauma of many Miami-Dade County citizens whose private property the Cuban regime stole from their families.

And it doesn’t matter that many of the programs Americans broadly support, like Social Security and Medicare, were once wrongly labeled as socialist. Or that some of the same South Florida voters who fear socialism are also signing up for healthcare under the Affordable Care Act, which many Republicans wrongly described as the epitome of socialism when it launched. Hialeah and Doral have the largest number of Obamacare sign-ups despite increasingly supporting Donald Trump, the Herald reported.

Go figure.

Obviously, lecturing voters on what socialism is and the nuances of different political systems is fruitless. The power of the label is in that it provokes a gut reaction, not an academic discussion. If socialism means something as far removed from its historical definition as teachers talking about transgender issues, as Scott hinted in his ad, then it can mean anything that people feel is too extreme.

Meanwhile, Democrats have been on the defensive. Few have been able to successfully fight back against the socialist label. Many Democrats over the years have blamed the party’s poor messaging. But their divestment from Florida and inability to keep Latino voters engaged over the years is probably the bigger issue.

By now, Democrats should have figured this out. They haven’t and Scott and others will use that to their benefit. The socialist accusation sounds like tired old line, but it’s only used because it works.

Click here to send the letter.