New UCLA and UC Berkeley polling shows the political priorities of California Latino voters vary sharply by gender, age, education and language.
California’s Latino electorate is often discussed as though it were a single political constituency. New research from the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Institute and UC Berkeley’s Institute of Governmental Studies suggests a more complicated picture.
The new UCLA-UC Berkeley analysis of California Latino voters finds that Latinas are more likely than Latino men to say protecting immigrant communities, fighting the Trump administration’s agenda, and defending democracy and voting rights are very important when evaluating candidates for governor. But the size of those differences changes sharply depending on voters’ age, education and language dominance.
The report, released Sept. 10, is based on the May 2026 Berkeley IGS Poll of 1,912 registered Latino voters in California.
Across the Latino electorate, the gender differences are substantial.
Protecting immigrant communities: 69% of Latinas said the issue was very important, compared with 52% of Latino men; a 17-point gap.
Fighting the Trump agenda: 68% of Latinas said it was very important, compared with 51% of Latino men; another 17-point gap.
Defending democracy and voting rights: 87% of Latinas said the issue was very important, compared with 77% of Latino men — a 10-point gap.
The findings add another layer to the broader picture of California Latino political diversity. Parriva has previously examined how Latino voters differ in their views and priorities rather than behaving as one political bloc.
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But gender alone does not explain the differences.
The gap is largest among younger voters
Among Latino voters under 30, the differences become considerably larger.
Protecting immigrant communities: 88% of young Latinas said it was very important, compared with 60% of Latino men — a 28-point gap.
Fighting the Trump agenda: 82% of young Latinas said it was very important, compared with 52% of Latino men — a 30-point gap.
Democracy and voting rights: 92% of young Latinas said the issue was very important, compared with 74% of young Latino men — an 18-point gap.
The report therefore shows that voters from the same generation do not necessarily place the same importance on the same political issues.
That is particularly relevant in a state where Latino voters make up a large and relatively young part of the electorate. UCLA’s broader State of Latinos in California 2026 report finds that the median age of California Latinos is 30, compared with 42 among non-Latinos.
The gender divide is also considerably larger among Latino voters without a bachelor’s degree.
Among those voters:
- Immigrant protection: 73% of Latinas vs. 51% of Latino men.
- Fighting the Trump agenda: 69% vs. 50%.
- Democracy and voting rights: 88% vs. 76%.
Among Latino voters with a bachelor’s degree, however, the differences narrow substantially.
The gender gap is four percentage points on immigrant protection, seven points on fighting the Trump agenda and four points on democracy and voting rights.
That makes it harder to describe the differences as simply a matter of gender. Age and educational attainment are also associated with how large the gender gap becomes.
Language adds another layer
Language dominance produces another striking difference.
Among English-dominant Latino voters, Latinas were 20 percentage points more likely than Latino men to say protecting immigrant communities and fighting the Trump agenda were very important — 68% compared with 48% on both issues.
Among Spanish-dominant voters, the gender difference on those two issues was only two percentage points.
The researchers identify possible explanations involving workplaces, community institutions and information sources, but the poll does not establish that any of those factors caused the differences.
The larger lesson is not that Latinas think one way and Latino men another.
It is that the phrase “the Latino vote” can hide important differences inside the electorate.
Gender matters. But so do age, education and language.
The differences are particularly pronounced among younger voters and those without bachelor’s degrees, while they narrow considerably among college graduates. Language also appears to be associated with substantial differences in the gender gap.
That complexity matters for understanding California’s 2026 political landscape. Parriva has previously examined both the importance of Latino voter participation and the challenge of understanding what motivates different Latino voters.
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What the data cannot tell us
The study measures how important particular issues are when voters evaluate candidates for governor. It does not measure which candidates those voters will support.
It also does not establish voters’ overall political ideology, predict turnout or determine how political views will change before Election Day.
And despite the obvious relevance to political conversations inside families, the survey does not ask whether husbands and wives, parents and children, or other household members disagree politically.
Those distinctions are important.
A voter can consider immigration protection very important without necessarily supporting the same candidate as another voter who shares that priority. Issue importance does not automatically translate into a vote.
The UCLA and UC Berkeley findings therefore offer no prediction about the outcome of the governor’s race.
What they do show is that California’s Latino electorate cannot easily be understood as a single group.
The more useful question may be: Which Latino voters are we talking about?
