Latino group bets on bilingual AI to cut voter confusion before the midterms

A national Latino civic engagement group is turning to an AI app to help voters cut through an increasingly complicated election system — in English or Spanish. Why it matters: Nearly 39 million Hispanics can vote in this year's midterms, and their political loyalties are increasingly up for grabs. Hispanics have added 5.25 million eligible voters since 2022, more than any other racial or ethnic group, according to Pew Research Center. The Latino electorate remains highly fluid: About 1 in 7 Latino voters who backed Trump in 2024 now say they want Democrats to control Congress, according to a new NBC News/Telemundo poll. How it works: Mi Familia en Acción launched Nubi last week, a bilingual AI-powered app that answers questions about voting, voter registration, citizenship and Know Your Rights information. Users can ask questions in English or Spanish about where and when to vote, early voting, mail ballots and registration. Nubi operates in all 50 states and can tailor information to the local or district level. Unlike a general-purpose chatbot, Mi Familia en Acción president and CEO Héctor Sánchez Barba tells Axios that Nubi doesn't search the open internet for answers. The organization feeds it information from sources it considers reliable, with human review and guardrails around what the AI can answer. If Nubi doesn't have an answer, Sánchez said, it is designed to say so and direct the user to a trusted source or partner rather than invent a response. State of play: Nubi represents a five-year effort to marry Mi Familia en Acción's traditional organizing with technology. The organization launched a more basic chatbot about two years ago before developing the current AI version. Mi Familia en Acción financed development itself, Sánchez said, though he declined to disclose the cost, calling it a "very big investment." The organization says it plans to keep updating Nubi as voting rules, court decisions and government policies change. Zoom in: The goal is to turn a complicated search across election websites into a conversation. A voter could ask whether they're registered, whether they can vote by mail, where their polling place is or what early-voting options exist. Nubi then walks the user through basic questions before giving a locally specific answer. The tool is updated regularly and eventually could expand its answers on questions involving immigration enforcement or problems a voter encounters at a polling place. What they're saying: "People don't need to be a constitutional lawyer to find information about how they need to vote," said Sánchez, adding that the goal is to put reliable information in one place. He stressed that Nubi is nonpartisan and doesn't recommend candidates or causes. Sánchez also said the technology won't replace door-knocking and other traditional organizing, but could extend civic information into rural or overlooked communities that organizers rarely reach. Zoom out: Nubi arrives as Latino voters play an increasingly large — and less predictable — role in American elections. Pew projects Hispanics will account for 16% of eligible voters in 2026, nearly double their 9% share in 2006. Latino voters are also fragmenting into competing political identities rather than moving uniformly toward either party. In May, 52% of registered Latino voters surveyed in 17 competitive House districts said they were undecided or could change their minds.

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