The Swing Vote: Coming of Age; America's largest minority, Latinos are clustered in key states and could well decide the election.

Byline: Arian Campo-Flores

If Sen. John Kerry winds up winning Florida in November, he can thank people like Marta Torres. A former tomato picker from Mexico who once had no clue what a Democrat was, Torres is now a foot soldier in the ground war for Latino votes. Most evenings, she and a dozen fellow canvassers knock on doors in seven Hispanic-rich precincts in Homestead, Florida, dodging irascible dogs as they urge residents to cast their ballots for Kerry. Torres didn't have much trouble with Mirta Garcia, 68, a spunky Cuban-American who answered the door last Tuesday night. Garcia has always heeded the advice of her first employer in Miami. "If you vote someday, always vote for a Democrat," he told her. "If you vote for a Republican, you'll end up eating out of a garbage can." As Torres was leaving, Garcia called out: "Don't forget to bring me a yard sign!"

These days, the nation is crawling with canvassers like Torres, as both campaigns compete fiercely for Hispanic votes. With good reason: now the country's largest minority, Latinos could well decide the 2004 election. They've packed the voter rolls with an estimated 2 million new registrants since 2000, for a total of nearly 10 million. They're concentrated in four of the most hotly contested states--Florida, New Mexico, Nevada and Colorado. And though they're mostly Democratic, Latinos have demonstrated a proclivity to swing from one election to the next. If either candidate succeeds in luring a few percentage points more into his column, he could win the presidency. Recent national polls show Kerry beating Bush among Latinos roughly 60 percent to 30 percent, compared with 62 for Gore and 35 for Bush in 2000.

The challenge for the campaigns is turnout, which has typically been low for Hispanics--45 percent in 2000, well below the 62 percent for whites. But a throng of suitors--the parties, unions, progressive political committees like the New Democrat Network (NDN), and conservative ones like Progress for America--aims to change that. They're hoping to awaken the Hispanic "sleeping giant" that's touted every election cycle--but has often disappointed. Latinos "have come of age," says a confident Lula Rodriguez, a Kerry campaign adviser. "They're going to come out to vote en masse this time."

Nowhere could Latinos influence the election more than in Florida. With a rich, rapidly changing mosaic of Hispanic groups, the state has a constant capacity for surprise. Bush won 65 percent of Florida's Hispanic vote in 2000--compared with 35 percent nationally--largely because of Cuban-Americans, who have long voted for anti-Castro Republicans. Since then, however, Puerto Ricans have flooded into the Orlando area, while Mexicans and Central and South Americans have swept into the South. That may bode well for Democrats. But, cautions Al Cardenas, state co-chairman for the Bush campaign, Republican dominance in Florida has "established a political culture that differentiates us ...