The Latino vote
Ruben Navarrette Jr. has an interesting commentary, arguing that even though Ted Kennedy endorsed Obama, his more significant role was co-sponsoring the immigration reform bill with John McCain. Since McCain is moving to frontrunner status, Latinos may be inclined to vote for him.
On the other hand, Obama is being credited for his controversial stance on allowing undocumented immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses, which is not a popular position among the general population (h/t Immigration and Politics Blog). Hillary Clinton flipped and flopped, then ultimately decided to come down against the idea, denying she had ever been for it. As Navarrette points out, however, Obama did vote for the Secure Fence Act.
So where does this leave Latinos? First, as I’ve noted a number of times, the Latino population is not a bloc, does not necessarily vote based on immigration, and many Latinos are registering as independents, though generally leaning Democratic. Given current conditions Latinos, like everyone else, will be focused quite a lot on the economy. Nonetheless, all will at the very least be paying attention to the candidates’ views on the issue.
A Clinton-McCain match-up could prompt more of those independents to move rightward. Hillary Clinton has voted in favor of immigration reform, but has not been nearly as active as McCain.
An Obama-McCain match-up is much harder to call. Both have stuck their necks out politically on immigration and taken heat for it.
Of course, if a Republican other than McCain ultimately wins the nomination, it is likely that much of the Latino vote will go to either Clinton or Obama. The only other viable candidate is Romney who, despite his ads in Spanish, has played to his restrictionist base on immigration during the campaign.
1 comments:
Thank you for the post on the Latino vote.
I am at a lost with these candidates as of late. I am Latina, and tend to vote blue. However, I am disgusted by the candidates left standing stance on immigration.
You are right, immigration isn't likely to be the hold up on why one would or wouldn't vote for a candidate, however, its infuriating to run ads telling us how they are "nuestra amiga," yet, they vote to make English the national language (as if being a multi-lingual national will you less American).
And while they work to shake our hands one minute, the are voting to keep our loved ones out of the country by building a wall between us.
You know, Republicans aren't any better on immigration, but at least they don't seem so hypocritical in their stance on it.
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