Vice President Kamala Harris leads former President Donald Trump by 18 percentage points (53 percent to 35 percent) among Nevada Latino voters, according to a new poll from the media firm Entravision that shows the Democratic nominee shoring up her support with a key voting bloc.  

The survey, released Wednesday, found that Harris is viewed favorably by nearly all Latino demographics groups in Nevada. Sixty two percent of respondents said she has a better chance than President Joe Biden at defeating Trump, though Trump is slightly favored (34 percent to 32 percent) among self-described independent Latino voters. 

It’s the second poll this week to find Harris winning over more Nevada Latino voters than Biden, after the president dropped out of the race in July facing pressure from sagging poll numbers and a faltering debate performance. Harris was favored by 51 percent of Nevada Latinos surveyed with a positive approval rating (+13) — higher than the approval ratings for Biden (-7) and Trump (-13).  

The poll, fielded from July 24th to Aug. 6th in collaboration with BSP Research, surveyed 800 registered voters across Nevada and South Texas, 400 of which were in Nevada. It was conducted online in both English (80 percent) and Spanish (20 percent) with a margin of error of 4.9 percentage points. 

Making up roughly one in five of the state’s eligible voters, Latino voters are a crucial voting bloc in the state, but with nearly half registered as independents, they are an especially “persuadable electorate,” said Marcelo Gaete, Entravision’s Executive Vice President of Public and Governmental Affairs. Entravision owns Univision affiliates in both Las Vegas and Reno.

Nearly 50 percent of Nevada Latinos have changed their mind on a candidate after watching an ad, and more than half said they do not have all the information they need to make their vote this November, according to the poll. 

Latino voters’ top issues this cycle — like other demographic groups —  are economic concerns, principally inflation, the economy, and health care costs, the poll found.

Project 2025 —  a proposed policy agenda for the next Republican presidential administration   — is  among Latino’s largest concerns about Trump’s candidacy. A majority of Nevada Latinos surveyed (55 percent) say that Trump should not be elected due to his role in the January 6th insurrection. 

But Trump’s platform is attractive to a sizable chunk of those surveyed. Forty four percent of those surveyed agreed that Trump would be better on border security and on immigration than Harris, and another 46 percent said he would be better on economic issues.

The Trump campaign has blamed Harris for the surge in border crossings, and labeled her as the Biden administration's “border czar.” A plurality of poll respondents (44 percent) said Trump — who has pledged to deport millions of people not legally in the country — agreed that he will “bring safety to our border and solve the immigration crisis.” 

The Entravision poll found 53 percent of Latinos support Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-NV) compared to 22 percent in favor of Republican candidate Sam Brown. Interparty support may play a role — 60 percent of Latino Republicans say they are voting for Brown versus the 85 percent of Democrats who say they will vote for Rosen. 

About a quarter of Latinos remain undecided about the U.S. Senate race. 

“Nevada is right at the center of the political universe in 2024,” Gaete said. “Because it is such a crucial state, Latinos are pivotal in both determining who the next president will be and determining who can hold the majority in the Senate and in the House.”