About

Matt A. Barreto is a Professor of Political Science and a Professor of Chicana/o & Central American Studies at UCLA, with a courtesy appointment in Public Policy at the Luskin School of Public Affairs. He joined UCLA in 2015, holding a joint appointment in Political Science and the César A. Chávez Department of Chicana/o Studies. Prior to UCLA, he was a Professor in Political Science at the University of Washington, Seattle, and served as the director of the Washington Institute for the Study of Ethnicity and Race. His research focuses on the political participation of racial and ethnic minorities in the United States. Barreto has taught courses on racial and ethnic politics, Latino politics, the Voting Rights Act, elections, statistics, and American politics. He is a co-author of notable works including 'Change They Can’t Believe In: The Tea Party and Reactionary Politics in America' and 'Latino America: How America's Most Dynamic Population is Poised to Transform the Politics of the Nation.' In 2007, he co-founded Latino Decisions, a political polling firm specializing in surveying and analyzing the Latino vote, and in 2021, he launched BSP Research, a firm that surveys Latinos and communities of color nationally. Barreto is also a senior advisor to the Biden White House aligned group Building Back Together and participates regularly in White House briefings. He earned his Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of California, Irvine, in 2005.

Research topics

• Sociology
• Political Science
• Psychology
• Social psychology
• Law
• Medicine
• Social Science
• Criminology
• Political economy
• History
• Demography
• Gender studies
• Economics
• Demographic economics
• Development economics

Selected publications

• The ever-evolving Latino vote is rapidly shifting away from Trump and Republicans

  2026-03-23

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Introduction to the Collaborative Multiracial Post-Election Survey (CMPS) Oversamples

  PS Political Science & Politics · 2025-02-25 · 3 citations

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Catalysts of Insurrection: How White Racial Antipathy Influenced Beliefs of Voter Fraud and Support for the January 6th Insurrection

  The Journal of Race Ethnicity and Politics · 2025-02-24 · 5 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Abstract On January 6, 2021, the belief that voter fraud was to blame for Trump’s 2020 loss led thousands of people to storm the Capitol during election certification, aiming to occupy it by force to stop this process. While only thousands participated, millions more voiced their support for the insurrection, and this begs the question: What explains perceptions of voter fraud and support for the January 6 insurrection? Recent studies establish that White conservatives are more likely to believe that voter fraud is a rampant problem, linking these perceptions to state efforts to expand access to voting systems where racial minority groups stand to gain equality. Using a combination of pre-election, post-election, and post-insurrection survey data, we examine the link between White racial attitudes and perceptions of voter fraud and views toward the insurrection. We argue that White racial attitudes are pivotal in explaining the perceptions of voter fraud that led to the January 6 insurrection. We find that White Americans with a bias for their own racial in-group over racial out-groups are likelier to doubt the election results after Donald Trump was declared the loser, though not before. We find these same attitudes are statistically associated with sympathy for the insurrection and insurrectionists.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Race and the Capital Riot: How Racial Attitudes Relate to Anti-Democratic Beliefs Following the January 6th Insurrection

  The Journal of Race Ethnicity and Politics · 2025-03-01 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access1st author

  thousands of supporters of President Donald Trump stormed the U.S. Capitol building in an effort to block the certification of the 2020 presidential election.United States Senators and House members had to run for cover and hide as the insurrection became violent, with both extensive property damage and physical violence resulting in loss of life.Scholars of American democracy, elections, and racial/ethnic relations in the U.S. have argued that this event should not be viewed as a political protest that went too far.Instead, January 6th marked a significant departure from political norms related to the peaceful transition of political power, which the U.S. has observed since Reconstruction.This moment in American history, and the movement and ideology that kindled January 6th, deserve an in-depth analysis to unpack the theoretical foundations of the January 6th insurrection and what it signals for America's future.Many insurrectionists often publicly stated that they were motivated by so-called "voter fraud."However, there remains no evidence that widespread illegal voting activities existed in the 2020 presidential election.Where did the insurrectionists' ideas originate?How did they come to accept that the 2020 election was stolen, and who did they believe stole their election?Further, did other Americans beyond those directly involved on January 6th sympathize and support the insurrectionist ideology?The collection of cutting-edge research represented in this special issue of the Journal of Race, Ethnicity and Politics demonstrates that the insurrectionists, and their supporters, were specifically motivated to overturn the election because of their conspiratorial views on issues such as voter fraud.The overwhelming empirical evidence suggests these views were in turn closely related to conspiratorial beliefs regarding the political power that Blacks, Latinos, Asians, immigrants, Muslims, and members of the LGBTQ community held or sought to usurp from "true" Americans.Rather than an objective and fact-driven debate over valid or invalid ballots, the January 6th insurrectionists advanced messages of white supremacy, coupled with specific opposition to the Black Lives Matter movement, immigration from Latin America, anti-Chinese and anti-Asian sentiment, as well as negative

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• How Latinos’ perceptions of environmental health threats impact policy preferences

  Social Science Quarterly · 2024-03-26 · 3 citations

  articleSenior author

  Abstract Objective This article examines the relationship between environmental health threats, personal experiences with climate change, and their association with attitudes toward global warming and willingness to pay for clean energy. Methods Using a nationally representative survey of Latino adults ( n = 1200), we use categorical regressions to examine the relationship between environmental health threats and policy preferences. Results Latinos who have personally experienced climate change and who view air pollution as a threat, are more likely to be concerned with climate change and believe that passing stricter environmental laws will improve the economy as opposed to reduce econonic growth. Latinos who have experienced climate change and worry about the impact of climate change in their homeland are also more willing to pay $5 or $10 for clean energy. Conclusion This study has implications for our collective knowledge of Latinos’ connections to the environment and policy outcomes and contributes to the growing area of environmental public opinion among ethno‐racial groups.

  PublisherDOI

• Immigration concerns and social program avoidance: The roles of legal status and family composition among asian and latino communities

  Journal of Migration and Health · 2024-01-01 · 1 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Objectives: Immigration policies significantly affect immigrants and their families' access to social programs. This study examines the role of legal status and familial composition in Asian and Latino adults' avoidance of social programs and assesses differences between the groups. We categorized respondents' familial composition based on whether all household members had the same citizenship status. We created two groups: respondents with cross-status ties and those without. Methods: We use data from 1000 U.S. adults with proximal or distant ties to noncitizens (collected in September 2021) to employ multivariable generalized linear models with binomial family and logit link to assess avoidance of needed social programs due to immigration concerns. Results: Our fully adjusted model reveals that compared to U.S. citizens without familial cross-status ties (i.e., all-citizen household members), legally precarious immigrants (LPI) without cross-status ties (odds ratio (OR)= 3.64, 95 % CI: 1.67-7.96), LPI with cross-status ties (OR=1.71, 95 % CI: 1.14-2.57), and U.S. citizens with cross-status ties (OR=1.66, 95 % CI: 1.14-2.40), were more likely to report avoidance of needed social support programs. Further, an interaction analysis shows that Asian lawful permanent residents with cross-status ties exhibit a higher likelihood of avoiding social programs due to immigration concerns compared to their Latino counterparts. Conclusion: The far-reaching consequences of anti-immigrant policies on noncitizen individuals and their families, including U.S. citizens, may lead to disparities in access to social assistance programs that may exacerbate health disparities. Further, our findings suggest that immigrants' cross-status ties to U.S. citizen family members may be protective against the harmful effects of anti-immigrant policies.

  PublisherDOI

• Health Care Discrimination and Immigration Fears: Unpacking COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy in Latino Adults

  American Journal of Public Health · 2024-07-01 · 11 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Objectives. To examine the relationship between health care discrimination and COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy attributed to fears of immigration status complications among unvaccinated Latino adults and to determine whether the association differs among immigrants and US-born individuals. Methods. After universal adult eligibility for the COVID-19 vaccine, a nationally representative sample of 12 887 adults was surveyed using online and mobile random digit dialing from May 7 to June 7, 2021. The analytic sample (n = 881) comprised unvaccinated Latino adults. We examined the association between individual and cumulative health care discrimination measures and COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy assignable to immigration-related fears. Results. Using a cumulative measure of health care discrimination, each additional experience corresponded to a 28% higher odds of reporting vaccine hesitancy Because of immigration-related fears. Findings were consistent across US-born and immigrant Latino adults. Four of the 5 discriminatory experiences were positively associated with vaccine hesitancy, including the absence of optimal treatment options, denial or delayed access to necessary health care, physician communication barriers, and lack of specialist referrals. Conclusions. Findings confirm a positive association between health care discrimination and COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy attributable to immigration-related fears among Latino adults, regardless of immigration status. ( Am J Public Health. 2024;114(S6):S505–S509. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2024.307668 ) [Formula: see text]

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Black Lives Matter and the Racialized Support for the January 6th Insurrection

  The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science · 2023-07-01 · 14 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Does support for the January 6th insurrection come mostly from concerned citizens worried over illegal voting, or from racists spurred to action by the highly visible Black Lives Matter protests and Donald Trump’s 2020 defeat? We field a survey experiment aimed at disentangling links between old and new racial grievances, anti-immigrant beliefs, Black activism, and support for the January 6th insurrection. We find that the people most likely to be supportive of the insurrection are whites who hold negative attitudes toward immigrants and subscribe to white replacement theory. Beliefs about the George Floyd protests also explain January 6th support, above and beyond demographics and other racial and political views. These results are validated by the 2020 Collaborative Multiracial Post-Election Survey. We also conduct a survey vignette experiment and find that anti-BLM rhetoric spread by Trump and right-wing news sources likely soured opinions on the movement and set the stage for widespread insurrection support.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Perceived racial efficacy and voter engagement among African Americans

  Politics Groups and Identities · 2023-07-06 · 1 citations

  articleSenior author

  This paper seeks to provide clarity on the link between Black people’s perceptions of racism in American institutions and society and voter engagement. We hypothesize that Black people with high feelings of racial efficacy, or the belief that government and society operate in a racially equitable manner, the more likely they will be to vote. Conversely, Black people with low racial efficacy are discouraged from voting. However, confidence in in-group leaders and movements can counteract the demobilizing risk of low racial efficacy. Our analysis uses data from an African American Research Collaborative national survey of 1200 Black voters. Analysis of turnout in 2016 finds that Black people with low racial efficacy were significantly less likely to vote, all else being equal. However, we find that having highly favorable attitudes toward Barack Obama, Black Elected Officials, and Black Lives Matter recovers the propensity to vote for low racial efficacy Blacks back to levels comparable with their racially optimistic peers. Finally, we conclude with a survey experiment which demonstrates that priming Black people with a low racial efficacy environment results in reduced faith in government, in part corroborating the causal direction theorized in our study.

  PublisherDOI

• Comparing Methods for Estimating Demographics in Racially Polarized Voting Analyses

  Sociological Methods & Research · 2023-08-28 · 3 citations

  article

  We consider the cascading effects of researcher decisions throughout the process of quantifying racially polarized voting (RPV). We contrast three methods of estimating precinct racial composition, Bayesian Improved Surname Geocoding (BISG), fully Bayesian BISG, and Citizen Voting Age Population (CVAP), and two algorithms for performing ecological inference (EI), King’s EI and EI:RxC using eiCompare. Using data from two different elections we identify circumstances in which different combinations of methods produce divergent results, comparing against ground-truth data where available. We first find that BISG outperforms CVAP at estimating racial composition, though fully Bayesian BISG does not yield further improvements. Next, in a statewide election, we find that all combinations of methods yield similarly reliable estimates of RPV. However, county-level analyses and results from a non-partisan school board election reveal that BISG and CVAP produce divergent estimates of Black preferences in elections with low turnout and few precincts. Our results suggest that methodological choices can meaningfully alter conclusions about RPV, particularly in smaller, low-turnout elections.

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Gary M. Segura

  University of California, Los Angeles

  42 shared

• Loren Collingwood

  University of New Mexico

  26 shared

• Bryan Garcia-Rios Wilcox-Archuleta

  The University of Texas at Austin

  20 shared

• Elizabeth Bergman

  Texas Woman's University

  20 shared

• Kassra A. R. Oskooii

  University of Delaware

  20 shared

• Gabriel R. Sánchez

  Firalis (France)

  17 shared

• Christopher S. Parker

  University of California, Santa Barbara

  15 shared

• Karam Dana

  University of Washington Bothell

  9 shared

Education

• Ph.D., Political Science

  University of California, Berkeley

  2009

• M.A., Political Science

  University of California, Berkeley

  2005

• B.A., Political Science

  University of California, Los Angeles

  2003