PRINCETON, N.J., July 16 (UPI) -- Hispanics of all ages in the United States are more than twice as likely to identify with the Democratic Party as the Republican Party, a Gallup poll indicated.
In all age demographic breakouts, Hispanics identifying a party preference skewed toward the Democratic Party by a minimum of 50 percent, while those identifying with the Republican party was no higher than 24 percent, results released Tuesday indicated.
U.S. Census Bureau data indicate 33.2 percent of Hispanics living in the United States are under the age of 18, compared with 19.7 percent of non-Hispanic whites, Gallup said. Calculations based on census data indicate that between 2010 and 2015, the U.S. Hispanic population below 25 years is expected to grow by about 14 percent, while the non-Hispanic white population demographic is expected to decrease by about 0.5 percent.
More than half of U.S. Hispanics younger than 30 identified themselves as political independents when asked which party they support, the Princeton, N.J., polling agency said.
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The high percentage of independents among younger Hispanics could suggest some flexibility in party identification, Gallup said. However, Hispanic independents who say they lean to one party or the other in response to a follow-up question broke 20 percent to Democratic identification compared with 12 percent to the GOP.
Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican presidential nominee, fared poorly among Hispanic voters, capturing 27 percent of the vote. Republican leaders have said they must reach out more to Hispanics as the percentage of this key voting bloc expands for future elections.
Results are based on nationwide phone interviews with 7,901 Hispanic adults conducted Jan. 3-June 27. The margin of error is 2 percentage points.
