Latinos Swing Hard for Obama and the Democrats

Let us now put to rest the nasty canard that Latinos will not vote for a black candidate. This election season, Democratic Presidential candidate, Barak Obama, stands to gain several Western states on the strength of the Latino vote. Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico and perhaps Arizona are all in play for Obama. Never mind that the Latino vote in the state of California forms a Democratic firewall guaranteeing a Blue status to this very large state. Despite some rank racist statements by various Hispanic Republican leaders, the Latino community is strongly behind the African-American Democratic candidate and come election day the overwhelming majority will be punching the Democratic ticket.

I do not want to discount the fact of racism in the Latino community anymore than I would in the Anglo community. But anti-black sentiment is no more pronounced in the Hispanic community than it is in the larger majoritarian community. Whatsmore, Latinos have come to see their interests as largely consistent with those of the African-American community. Like African-Americans, Latinos feel that their ethnicity and national origin are keeping them from getting jobs and that receive unfair treatment by the criminal justice system. As well, the heavy handed tactics of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) have cast a siege mentality amongst Latinos.

Polls have consistently demonstrated overwhelming support of Latinos for Barack Obama. The media narrative going into the presidential election posited that Latinos would split their vote for John McCain, who had sponsored legislation for comprehensive immigration reform. As McCain backed away from his prior stance, and embraced the pro-enforcement policies of the Bush administration, Latinos saw little reason to back a Republican candidate who towed the Bush Party line. This was all the more evident when one considers the demoralizing effect that the harsh ICE enforcement tactics of the Bush administration were and are having on the Latino community. As articulated by the Pew Hispanic Center:

Half (50%) of all Latinos say that the situation of Latinos in this country is worse now than it was a year ago, according to a new nationwide survey of 2,015 Hispanic adults conducted by the Pew Hispanic Center.

This pessimism is especially prevalent among immigrants, who account for 54% of all Hispanic adults in the United States. Fully 63% of these Latino immigrants say that the situation of Latinos has worsened over the past year. In 2007, just 42% of all adult Hispanic immigrants--and just 33% of all Hispanic adults--said the same thing.

Some Latinos are experiencing other difficulties because of their ethnicity. One-in-seven (15%) say that they have had trouble in the past year finding or keeping a job because they are Latino. One-in-ten (10%) report the same about finding or keeping housing.

Not surprisingly, worries about deportation and perceptions of discrimination in jobs or housing because of Hispanic ethnicity correlate with the view that Latinos' situation has worsened in the past year. Two-thirds (68%) of Latinos who worry a lot that they or someone close to them may be deported say that Latinos' situation in the country today is worse than it was a year ago, as do 63% of Latinos who have experienced job difficulties because of their ethnicity and 71% of Latinos who report housing difficulties because of their ethnicity.

Naturally, Latinos are very unhappy with the status quo, which translates to a toxic environment for Republican candidates (of any stripe). On a personal level, I live in an area with a heavy Latino population and the concerns set forth in the Pew survey are very real to this community. One Chilean friend who had a grocery store that catered to Latinos closed shop because he said fear of ICE and law enforcement in general was keeping many Latinos close to home. Fear of law enforcement is not confined to undocumented Latinos. There is now a pervasive fear of the police amongst Latinos, who are see the criminal justice system as discriminating against all Latinos.

I have heard many personal stories of people being accosted and treated rudely because they are Latino. The anger is palpable both as a community and on a personal level. And that anger is being translated into strong support for Barack Obama. Senator Obama, who is viewed as championing changes to the harsh immigration policies of the Bush administration, as well as shifting economic priorities, is clearly benefitting. Economic concerns play an important role in this allegiance. Although McCain’s inept campaign has not helped his cause amongst Latinos.

The choice of Alaska governor, Sarah Palin, as McCain’s running mate did nothing for the presidential candidates standing in the Latino community. Unlike Texas governor, George Bush, who hails from a border state, Alaska has virtually no cross-border issues of significance for the Hispanic community. (Although a substantial percentage of the Alaska fishing work-force is now Latino.) And although a significant portion of the Latino community identifies itself as evangelical Christians, this alone is not significant to undo the political realignment brought about by the Bush Administration’s policies.

Eristic ragemail has previously written how Republican designs on the Hispanic vote were being undermined by a misguided and inept enforcement-only immigration policy. What I see now, is a wholesale shift away from the Republican Party in all its manifestations. Whatever conservative cultural factors may have once aligned a segment of the Latino community to the Republicans has given way to more pragmatic concerns. As with the larger community, it appears that Latinos are more strongly shifting their allegiance to the Democratic Party. This shift by Latinos to the Democratic Party is, in my estimation, permanent.

Tancredo Endorses McCain

CNN/TIME are reporting that Tom Tancredo is endorsing John McCain's presidential bid.

Back on the campaign trail late last year, amid snow drifts and ice storms, candidate Tom Tancredo spoke often about the possibility of defecting from the Republican Party if its eventual nominee failed to meet his benchmarks of conservatism, most importantly a zero-tolerance policy for undocumented immigrants.

"I am absolutely tired and sick and tired of being forced to go to the polls and say I'm going to make this choice between the lesser of two evils," the Colorado congressman said at an October debate in Michigan, standing across the stage from his ideological opponent, John McCain, who supports a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants. "I really don't intend to do that again."

But just months later, with Washington sweltering in humidity, the hawkish immigration reformer, who wants to deport the nation's 12 million illegal immigrants, has declared his support for McCain. "I expect to be supporting him in November," Tancredo told TIME last week. "But certainly it is not set in stone."

So Tancredo endorses McCain after a weekend appearance at the convention of National Assn. of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, where McCain reaffirmed his support for comprehensive immigration reform. This says less about McCain and more about Tancredo. With both presidential candidates in favor of CIR, Tancredo has no place to go except to support his Party's nominee. Tancredo is retiring after this session. Look for him for crawl under some nativist safehouse such as FAIR or NumbersUSA.

McCain: A Chip off of the Bush Republican Block

John McCain likes to tout his independence from the nutwings that make up the Republican Party base. However, neither his voting record nor his recent statements indicate that he will be anything other than a third term Bush administration. McCain has virtually always voted in lock-step with his Republican colleagues. As well, his advisors are almost all industry hacks and lobbyists. The one issue that could have put McCain in good stead with Hispanic voters was his support of a comprehensive immigration reform bill that he co-sponsored with Democratic Senator Edward Kennedy. He has now repudiated that position and is in lock-step with the Bush administration’s radical immigration enforcement tactics.

The conventional wisdom put forth by the mainstream media is that McCain is a “maverick” amongst Republicans. But McCain’s right wing position was recently highlighted in a report by the media watchdog, Media Matters. The Media Matters report notes that the media continues to push this maverick narrative against all facts to the contrary. Of special significance is his repudiation of comprehensive immigration reform.

In a March 31 article, the Los Angeles Times claimed that Sen. John McCain's "biography tour" may "soften conservative discomfort with the maverick senator, who has strayed from Republican orthodoxy on immigration and campaign reform." In fact, as Media Matters for America has repeatedly documented, McCain has abandoned his previous support for comprehensive immigration legislation to more closely align himself with the base of the Republican Party. McCain asserted on January 30 that he "would not" support his original comprehensive immigration proposal if it came to a vote on the Senate floor, now saying that "we've got to secure the borders first" -- a position at odds with his prior assertion that border security could not be disaggregated from other aspects of comprehensive immigration reform without being rendered ineffective.

Media Matters also notes another L.A. Times article which hues to the maverick narrative.

In a June 5 Los Angeles Times article, staff writer Michael Finnegan wrote that in the Southwest, where there is an "influx of Latinos," Sen. John McCain "hopes that his support for legalizing many undocumented immigrants, and the political price he paid for it within his party, will keep him competitive with Latinos." Yet Finnegan did not note that during the race for the Republican nomination, McCain reversed himself on the issue of border security, saying that "we've got to secure the borders first" -- a position at odds with his prior assertion that border security could not be disaggregated from other aspects of comprehensive immigration reform without being rendered ineffective. Indeed, McCain said in January that he "would not" support the comprehensive immigration reform legislation he once sponsored with Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA).

Latinos never had much reason to support the Senator from Arizona. Arizona has put in place some of the harshest anti-immigrant measures in the country. Neo-Nazi Sheriff, Joe Arpaio has used these measures to harass Latinos. McCain has not uttered a peep of protest against these highly punitive and discriminatory measures. Whatever hopes the Republicans had of splitting the Latino vote in key swing states are quickly dissipating.

Links:

http://mediamatters.org/items/200804010006?f=s_search

http://mediamatters.org/items/200806040010?f=h_latest

http://mediamatters.org/items/200805220003?f=s_search

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McCain: Republicans Need to Abandon Anti-Immigrant Rhetoric

In a prior posting, “Immigration: The Myth of the Third Rail of Politics,” I noted that the conventional wisdom which holds “that any serious political candidate dare not articulate a pro-immigrant platform lest they get burned by the charged rail of American politics,” no longer holds true. (posting on March 3, 2008). A March 17, 2008 interview with Republican presidential candidate, John McCain, on NPR’s Morning Edition firmly underlines this point. (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=88382489) Senator McCain, along with Senator Edward Kennedy introduced, The Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2007, or, in its full name, the Secure Borders, Economic Opportunity and Immigration Reform Act of 2007 (S. 1348) (http://www.aila.org/content/default.aspx?docid=16719). The legislation went down in flames but the fact that McCain was and is so closely identified with comprehensive immigration reform did not stop him from gaining the Republican Presidential nomination and recent polls give no indication that this issue will hurt him in the general election.

In the NPR interview McCain makes the observation that the Republican Party lost Dennis Hastert’s congressional seat to Democratic rival, Bill Foster. Hastert's district was considered a safe Republican seat and should have been an easy win for the Republican candidate, Jim Oberweis. McCain notes that Oberweis ran on an aggressive anti-immigrant platform and that this likely contributed to his loss. While the loss of this seat to Democrats has shocked the Republican establishment, it is once again worth noting that candidates for office need not be afraid from articulating a pro-immigrant position. Polls consistently show that most Americans are not in league with nativist activists like Michelle Malkin or Lou Dobbs.

The Wall Street Journal (no friend of Democrats or immigrants) noted as follows:

Republicans such as Mr. Oberweis remain convinced that illegal immigration is a winning issue. And if the electorate were comprised mostly of Internet screechers and cable news anchors, they might be right. But the fact that Mr. McCain, the Presidential candidate most closely associated with immigration tolerance, has outlasted Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani, Mike Huckabee and other immigration hardliners, should be an indication that other issues are foremost in the minds of even GOP voters.

Saturday’s result showed once again that a hard line on illegal immigration doesn’t win elections. The longer Republicans pretend that it does the more elections they will lose.

Speaking of screeching web hate-mongers, Michelle Malkin tried bravely to spin this as anything but a loss for the nativist crowd. But the reality is that, despite so-much nativist chatter on the web and the cable networks, anti-immigrant hate-mongering will not carry the day as a wedge issue. As I have previously noted, this does not mean that anti-immigrant talk does not resonate with a portion of the electorate but that politicians who spew extreme positions will get burned. Conversely, pro-immigrant candidates need not fear that this issue will bring them down.

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Immigration: The Myth of the Third Rail of Politics

Now that the last three presidential candidates still standing are all in favor of comprehensive immigration reform it is becoming clear to most astute observers that immigration is not the third rail of politics. The conventional wisdom is that any serious political candidate dare not articulate a pro-immigrant platform lest they get burned by the charged rail of American politics. In fact, the most likely Democratic nominee, Barack Obama, marched with the thousands who protested in the summer of 2006 supporting immigrant rights. As New York Times reporter, David Leonhart notes in the March 2, 2008 issue of the New York Times:

Mr. McCain will all but clinch the Republican nomination on Tuesday with victories in the Ohio and Texas primaries. In the Texas campaign, except for a couple of obligatory questions about a border fence during a Democratic debate, immigration has been the dog that didn’t bark. The candidates who would have made an issue of it exited the race long ago.

The Border and the Ballot Box by David Leonhart, (New York Times, Mar 2, 2008)

(http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/02/weekinreview/02leonhardt.html?ref=politics)

Leonhart gives some historical perspective and notes that although the issue has always attracted a wave of xenophobia it has rarely impacted national elections. Given the Nativist laws that have been passed in prior eras, it is still a stretch to say that the immigration issue has little currency. The truth is that in economically challenging times, American workers will often focus their anger on the jobs allegedly lost to immigrants. Combine this with a pernicious racism and you still have a combustible political mixture.

Nonetheless, those of us who favor a humanist policy towards immigrants, especially those immigrants who live underground lives, can take comfort in seeing the likes of Tom Tancredo and his ilk go down in flames. The Nativist appeal clearly resonates with a portion of the American electorate but it does not carry the day as a wedge issue. Nativists do their cause ill by aligning themselves with the racists, like Michelle Malkin and the VDare folks who spew irrational hatred. We, at least, have reason on our side.

The task for progressives, as stated by Abe Lincoln, is to appeal to the better angels of our nature.

We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.

I harbor no illusions that we will easily overcome cultural resistance to the immigrant population and more broadly to the Latino community within our midst. But having been raised in Texas, with its Hispanic roots going back five centuries, I have seen some amazing melding of cultures. Surely, an appeal to simple humanity and perhaps a modicum of self-interest, we can find a way to move the issue of comprehensive immigration reform in a direction that finds some resonance in the humanity that is the American people.

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