President Joe Biden has cancelled his expected participation in an event organized in Las Vegas by Unidos, one of the largest Latino organizations in the United States. The president was going to close the association’s day at around 1:30 p.m. local time. After almost two hours of delay, Unidos president Janet Murgía came on stage to announce that Biden would not be attending. “The president has just informed me that he has tested positive for Covid and it is best that he take the necessary precautions for everyone’s safety,” Murgía said.
The president gave a speech on Tuesday to the African-American community gathered at the NAACP conference in Las Vegas. Before taking the stage, Biden gave an interview to the Black Entertainment Channel, where he was again asked if he would drop out of the race after his disastrous performance in the debate and the criticism it has brought him. The president said he would consider it if a health issue arose.[Lo haría] “If a doctor told me I had this or that problem,” Biden says in a clip from the conversation. The full interview will be broadcast tonight.
Biden has had a positive result in his second day of activities in Nevada, one of the seven swing states in the race, and whose Latino population is close to 30%. In the morning, the president visited a supermarket in the city. His campaign also scheduled a visit to a Mexican restaurant in East Las Vegas, an area with a Hispanic majority. During the tour, Biden shook hands and hugged several people.
The announcement at the conference has provoked surprised faces and some gestures of disappointment among the participants. The president was expected to announce here that some undocumented spouses and children of US citizens will be able to begin a process to regularize their immigration status on August 19. It was the latest effort by the president to stop the loss of support among a decisive sector of the electorate.
Donald Trump has gained ground among Latino and African-American voters, two sectors of the electorate that turned their backs on him four years ago. Biden has lost 20% of support in these two groups since then. Some national polls even show a tie between the two candidates among potential voters. This is despite the fact that the current president won Latino support by 28% in 2020.
President Biden has promised to tone down the assassination attempt on Donald Trump. But some convention attendees believe the president needs to go on the offensive if he wants to win. “His administration has to be more aggressive in executing the policies of this administration. He is the leader, but the Cabinet is also responsible for advancing them, they need to be tougher,” said Alexandra Moya, 49, of Cleveland, Ohio. Moya is a registered Republican, but says that as a Puerto Rican, she could never vote for Donald Trump because of his treatment of the territory.
The Biden administration has moved to maintain this vital support heading into the fall. The president had announced in June a program to give papers to children and partners of citizens who have been in an irregular situation in the United States for more than 10 years. According to White House estimates, this measure could benefit half a million adults and some 50,000 minors who are already in the country. Authorities say that these people could begin the process without abandoning their families.
The government has also pledged to speed up the processing of work visas for young people who have been educated at American universities. This includes those who have protections against deportation, known as DACA, and Dreamers. The State Department has recently modified its public guidelines to allow students to add their university degrees to the visa application process, as long as the work will be performed in the United States.
Biden is trying to defend his record with Hispanics. The government estimates he has created five million jobs for Latinos, a third of the 15 million jobs he has created in his three years in the White House. The figure has been underlined in an election cycle where the economy is more of a concern than immigration for those who identify as Hispanic.
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