Hispanic women are helping the GOP gain ground in communities in southern Texas. Six Hispanic Republicans are now running for office in these districts along the border. Politico reports it’s evidence that Trump’s gains among Hispanics in the 2020 election were not a fluke.

It’s some of the clearest evidence that Trump’s 2020 performance there may not have been an anomaly, but rather a sign of significant Republican inroads among Texas Hispanics — perhaps not enough to threaten the Democratic advantage among those voters, but enough to send ripples of fear through a party that is experiencing erosion among Hispanics across the country.

“For so long, people here just never had Republicans knocking on their doors and calling them the way we did in 2020. The majority of us are women that did it then and are doing it now because we feel it’s our responsibility to keep the American Dream alive,” said Mayra Flores, aleading candidate for the GOP nomination in a South Texas-based congressional seat…

A family member asked if she knew what both parties stood for, and after looking into it, Flores felt that her religious, anti-abortion and pro-border security views were more conservative than she’d ever thought and more in line with the GOP. Five years ago, she got involved in her local GOP and now a majority of her family votes Republican, too.

In response to the 2020 results, the GOP has beefed up its presence in southern Texas by opening four new community centers in heavily Hispanic cities along the border.

“It’s unprecedented what we’re seeing because prior to 2020 we didn’t have this kind of support at all,” said Flores. “I can only imagine how much more we’re going to be able to do with their support.”

So there is some evidence this is happening and there have been plenty of articles published in the last couple months suggesting Democrats are worried about it. For instance, there was a WSJ poll published in December showing Hispanic voters evenly split among the parties:

In Florida, Trump won 46% of the Latino vote, a performance that allowed him to win the state more easily than expected. In Texas, Trump took 41% of the Latino vote, again helping him to a win in the state.

Nationally, he won 32% of the Hispanic vote, an improvement from the 28% he had taken in 2016.

New polling from The Wall Street Journal suggests those 2020 numbers weren’t an anomaly.

Asked whether they would vote for a Democratic or Republican candidate for Congress in 2022, Latinos were split right down the middle, with 37% choosing each side.

There’s no doubt there has been some movement but last week Gallup poured some cold water on the idea that we might see an even split among Hispanic voters in the next election:

Gallup interviewed 1,338 Hispanic respondents in 2021, and the results show this group followed the same basic trends in party identification as noted nationally, although in a more muted fashion. Hispanic Americans’ party identification shifted from a 32-point Democratic advantage from January through June (58% Democrat to 26% Republican) to a 28-point Democratic advantage from July through December (54% to 26%). This reflected a four-point decrease in Hispanic Americans’ Democratic identification from the first half of the year to the second half; Republican identification was constant.

The aforementioned Wall Street Journal poll showing a tie among Hispanic Americans on the congressional trial heat ballot was in the field Nov. 16-22, which coincided with the shift observed in these Gallup data in the second half of the year. But the change in Gallup’s party identification data among Hispanic people was relatively slight. The 28-point Democratic advantage among Hispanic adults in the second half of the year in Gallup data certainly does not provide support for a generalization from the Journal’s November poll that Hispanic voters will split their choice between the two parties in this year’s congressional election.

Hispanic party identification for the full year 2021 was 56% Democrats/Democratic leaners and 26% Republicans/Republican leaners. This represents a 30-point Democratic margin. The trend line since 2011 shows some fluctuation in this gap over time, but no indication of a major or sustained shift.

So maybe what we’re seeing is that some Hispanic voters are more open to moving to the right than they have been a few years ago but that doesn’t guarantee a shocking outcome this November. If Republicans want to see this trend continue they’re probably going to have to work for it.