The battle for the Latino vote in the United States is hotting up, as both Republicans and Democrats realize the value of the Hispanic electorate.

MESQUITE, Nevada — Laura Aguilera is 19 and works seven days a week in this city in the baking Nevada desert to earn money for nursing school. So, she explained after a 10-hour shift at Los Lupes Mexican restaurant, “I haven’t had time to focus on who is running for president yet.”
But unprecedented efforts to get Aguilera’s attention are beginning all around her because her vote, and those of the growing number of Latinos who live in battleground states like this one, are considered vital to winning the White House in 2016.

Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio, the two Republican presidential candidates seen as having the greatest chance to make inroads with the Latino vote that traditionally leans Democratic, recently stopped in Nevada, Bush showcasing his fluent Spanish and Rubio highlighting that he is the son of Cuban immigrants. Hillary Rodham Clinton addressed 1,200 Latino leaders gathered in Las Vegas last week and said that she would do more than US President Barack Obama — and certainly far more than any Republican rival — to stop deportations and enact immigration reform.

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