Hillary Clinton is doubling down on her appeal to Latino voters. Her campaign released two ads in Spanish, accompanied by a clip from a pro-Hillary super PAC. One of the ads features Carlos Gutierrez, the secretary of commerce under George W. Bush.
“Vote for Trump? I can’t,” Gutierrez says in the ad, according to a translation by the Washington Post. “It’s dangerous and we don’t want to go back. Hillary Clinton has the experience and I trust her. For me, country first, and then party.”
Gutierrez supported Jeb Bush in the Republican primary, warning immigrants about voting for Trump.
“Donald Trump doesn’t have the qualities necessary to be president,” Gutierrez says in the new ad. “I know, because I served in the Cabinet of George W. Bush for four years. I was born in Cuba, but this country gave me my success. I’ve been a Republican my entire life, but first I’m an American.
Gutierrez endorsed Clinton in August:
Clinton leads among Latino voters by a wide margin, but despite running against an opponent who is vehemently anti-immigration (and with a running mate who is respected within the community), she isn’t necessarily doing better than Democratic candidates in the past, and she has lower favorability among Latino voters than the Democratic party overall. Florida and Nevada, where Clinton’s new Spanish-language ads will air, both have large Latino populations, and are both battleground states.
The second ad Clinton campaign released is juxtaposes Trump’s insults against immigrants with Hillary Clinton’s “real strength,” her lifelong devotion to working on behalf of children.