Las Vegas NowDemocratic Debate Breakfast Held to Invigorate The Hispanic Vote

Democratic Debate Breakfast Held to Invigorate The Hispanic Vote

The nationally televised Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas is les than a week away on Thursday, Nov. 15. As candidates stump for supporters, the push is heating up for the Hispanic vote.  

Nevada is the first state in the west to hold a caucus, and one of the reasons is because of our fast growing Hispanic population.

Eyewitness News found out why so much energy is being put into getting Latinos to register and to vote.

It's 7 a.m. at Dona Maria's Mexican restaurant. But there is a lot more to breakfast Wednesday morning than tamales, beans and tortillas. It's the last meeting of one of the state's most powerful groups before next week's big democratic debate.

This is the first time I've seen this much intensity geared towards Hispanic voters in Nevada," said Andres Ramirez.

Ramirez is the Hispanic outreach coordinator for the Nevada Democratic Party. He says the push to get more Latinos interested in the election process is the strongest it's ever been.

"Every Hispanic that we have who can vote, we reach out to them through phones, mail, knocking on doors, going out to community events, whether it was the Cinco de Mayo, or Fiesta Patrias," he continued.

Nevada was a swing state in the last presidential election, but now it's more important than ever to the candidates.

John Hunt is the chair of the Democratic Party for Clark County. "One of the reasons Nevada was chosen as a caucus state is because of its Hispanic community, minority community, labor interest community, which is really a diverse community," he said.

During Wednesday's breakfast, he led a drawing where representatives for each candidate drew the order they will be speaking at a dinner following the debate.

Ramirez says the candidates' commitment to stick around for this dinner is one more way these hopefuls are reaching out to Latinos.

Every democratic presidential candidate who has come into town has done a town hall forum, or event catered specifically to getting Hispanics educated about their candidacy and to get them involved in the caucus process.

And don't be surprised if you start seeing commercials from the democratic candidates within the next week. Many of them have started to air paid advertisement in English and in Spanish.

The candidates have agreed to attend the dinner following the debate because many potential precinct captains will be at that dinner, and they will be the ones who will be heading the precincts during the Nevada Caucus in January.

E-mail your comments to Reporter Chris Saldaña.