The rising Latino tide: in Florida and Texas, as in California, the immigrant influx is creating a Democratic future (if not necessarily a Democratic present).

I. I CAN HELP MCBRIDE!

"When I go door-to-door, and they open it up, they don't really listen to me," says Patrick Vilar, a fresh-faced young Democrat who is seeking election to the Florida House of Representatives this November in a district that, the conventional wisdom says, is Cuban, Republican and, for a Democrat, a fool's errand. "They read down the piece until they come to the line, `Colombian Bar Association,'" he says. "That stops them. They look up and say, `You're Colombian?' Then we start speaking in Spanish. It's a match."

Vilar ...

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