The Native American Quinnipiac tribe of North America has a legend to explain a peculiar rock embankment resting peacefully on the hills just north of New Haven, Conn. There you will find a traprock mountain range now known as the Sleeping Giant, because of its likeness to a human form resting on the horizon.

The legend is based on the story of an angry spirit named Hobbomock who became displeased because the local tribes were abandoning the ancient customs of their ancestors. In his ire, he threatened to destroy the tribes. A countervailing spirit, seeing the potential for harm, cast a spell on Hobbomock and set him to sleep forever in the form of a rock formation. To this day, the Quinnipiac restlessly await the moment when the giant will rustle from his sleep and his voice will be heard.

Just as the stolid mountains of Connecticut have remained silent for generations, so too has the electoral voice of Texas Latinos.

Even though Hispanics in Texas represent nearly 40% of the eligible voting population, until the 2018 midterm elections, Texas Latinos had never comprised more than 20% of actual voting electorate. As a result, Latinos were often characterized as the sleeping giant — a potentially powerful voting bloc that never seemed to reach its demographic potential.

But something peculiar happened in November 2018. The giant began to rustle from his slumber. The ripple in Texas politics was immediately noticeable. In Dallas County, Texas Latinos comprised approximately 9% of the total voter participation in the 2010 and 2014 election cycles. In November of 2018, this percentage grew to 16%. That growth is simply unprecedented.

As a result, Beto O’Rourke, an unknown congressman from El Paso, came within 2 percentage points of defeating one of the most well-known and highly regarded tea party senators in the United States: Ted Cruz.

At the state level, because of a nearly 15% increase in Hispanic voter participation statewide, Texas Democrats flipped nine Texas House seats around the state, putting the Texas House in play for the first time in a generation. With just nine additional seats, Democrats would control the Texas House and be in the driver’s seat for census, redistricting and map drawing, which will shape Texas politics for the next decade.

As Texas Latinos become increasingly aware of their voting power and as they are better organized by political parties and candidates, they will have a greater impact on every political race in Texas: from school board trustees, to county commissioners, to state house representatives, to United States senator.

What we witnessed on Super Tuesday 2020 makes clear that the days when Texas voters can ignore Hobbomock are gone. Democratic socialist Bernie Sanders, who was able to coalesce the mindshare of nearly 40% of Texas Latinos on Super Tuesday, was within 5 percentage points of winning Texas. Without Latino voters, Sanders would have been crushed by Joe Biden. But because Biden was able to cobble together a coalition of African American, Anglo and boomer-generation college-educated voters, he prevailed.

Sanders’ message appealed to Texas Hispanics, hence, he was able to actually compete in Texas. Think about that. Sanders was nearly able to prevail in Texas. That was the direct result of Hispanic participation in the electoral process.

As the Quinnipiac people have learned, it is easy to ignore the dangers posed by a mythological bogeyman. It is much more difficult, however, to dismiss data, facts, statistics, trends and analysis.

Texas Latinos are here. We are wide awake, knowledgeable, informed, and ready to have our voice heard. Ignore Hobbomock at your peril.

Jason Villalba is chairman of the Texas Hispanic Policy Foundation. He wrote this column for The Dallas Morning News.