The poll of the state's Hispanic population was the second in a series of surveys conducted by The Post, Univision and TRPI aimed at examining the potential political impact of Latinos, the fastest-growing segment of the population nationally.
The new Post-Univision-TRPI survey shows Bush leading Kerry by 61 percent to 32 percent. Bush received 81 percent of the Cuban American vote, while Kerry captured 42 percent among Puerto Ricans, the second-largest Hispanic group in the state, and about 48 percent among Hispanics of all other nationalities.
Nationally, Kerry claims 54 percent of the vote among likely Latino voters while Bush receives 37 percent, according to The Post tracking poll.
Four years ago, exit polls showed Bush and Gore splitting the Hispanic vote in Florida. But researchers urged caution in interpreting the 2000 exit poll results. They say Cuban Americans who overwhelmingly voted for Bush were under-represented in that survey because the polling consortium missed predominantly Cuban neighborhoods when it selected its sample of precincts.
TRPI researchers surveyed randomly selected Latino registered voters in six counties with the highest Hispanic populations before and after Election Day 2000. They found that Bush beat Gore by more than 2 to 1 among Latino voters, and that Latinos of Cuban descent were about half of all Latino voters four years ago.
The Post-Univision-TRPI survey suggests that Bush now has about the same advantage among all Florida Latinos, similar to the 2000 survey. And while the evidence is incomplete, the numbers also suggest that Bush's narrower lead in part is the result of the changing profile of the Latino voter in Florida: About 40 percent of all registered Hispanic voters are of Cuban ancestry, and many are second-generation Americans with less attachment to the GOP than their parents.
Bush has a 2 to 1 majority over Kerry among foreign-born Hispanics, but Kerry has a slender advantage among those born in the United States. Hispanic voters older than 60 favor Bush by almost 3 to 1; among those younger than 60, Bush's lead is in low double digits.
The president has generally solid approval ratings among Florida Hispanics, with more than two in three saying they approve of the job he has done on terrorism. He receives just over 50 percent support for his handling of the economy, Iraq, immigration and relations with Cuba. In all cases, his ratings among Cuban Americans are significantly higher than among non-Cubans, although his ratings on terrorism top 60 percent with the latter group.
Bush holds a large advantage over Kerry among Cuban Americans and a smaller lead among non-Cuban Hispanics in Florida on who is trusted more to handle terrorism, Iraq, education, Cuban relations, immigration, abortion and same-sex marriage.
On the economy, neither candidate has an advantage among non-Cuban Hispanics. Bush's Cuban policies have divided Florida Hispanics, with a narrow plurality saying they favor new travel restrictions that limit Cuban Americans to visiting Cuba once every three years. A similarly small plurality approves of restrictions on the amount of money that can be sent to family members in Cuba.
But six in 10 Florida Hispanics say the changes will not affect their vote for president. Among those who say the changes will, by 2 to 1 they say they are more likely to vote for Bush. Among Cuban Americans, 34 percent said they are more likely to vote for Bush because of the restrictions, with 5 percent saying they are less likely.
The Post interviewed a random sample of 1,001 adults in Florida between Oct. 4-10, including 823 self-described registered voters and 655 likely voters, to produce the overall statewide results. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points for the overall sample and plus or minus four percentage points for the sample of likely voters. The Hispanic results are based on a sample of 800 Hispanic registered voters in Florida, who were interviewed between Sept. 23 and Oct. 1. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.
Senior polling analyst Christopher Muste contributed to this report.
