The Latino Vote

The concern of the Republican camp is justified. George W. Bush was able to capture the White House in great part thanks to the Latino voters who supported him in record numbers.

Today, however, Hispanics have abandoned the Republicans. The primary reason has been the fury of ultra-conservatives with everything related to immigration reform.

“Amnesty, amnesty, amnesty!” This has been the continuous call from the Republicans, even those who recognize that the immigration system is broken and something must be done to repair it, like Sen. John McCain.

The Pew Hispanic Center just released an opinion poll where this desertion is clear. If the ex-governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney, faced Obama, the president would win by a wide margin among Hispanics, with 68 percent. Romney would only win 23 percent of registered Latino voters.

These results are very similar to those in the 2008 election, where Obama won these voters 67 percent to McCain’s 31 percent.

The incredible fact is that this trend is taking place even while Hispanics are not happy with Obama. Not only has the president not pushed any initiative related to immigration, he has also increased the total number of deportations to numbers never seen before, almost double that of Bush, his predecessor.

The same poll from the Pew Hispanic Center shows that more than half of Hispanics, 59 percent, disagree with his deportation policy. And even though in 2010, 58 percent agreed with Obama’s policies in general, today that has dropped to 49 percent.

But, even so, listening to Republican speeches and debates convinces most Latinos that the best scenario would be for Obama to be re-elected; 57 percent of polled Hispanics today prefer four years more of Obama, while 34 percent prefer to give that opportunity to Romney.

One can bet on continued progress of the DREAM Act, which would allow those who came to the U.S. illegally, brought as infants or young children by their parents, to come out of the shadows and gain legal status to obtain an education.

This is an issue Obama touched on in his speech to the nation, one of the few issues where he made his convictions and preferences clear. The reason is obvious. Today there are 15 so-called “swing states,” where votes could go to either the Republicans or the Democrats in November. In these states, including Florida with its juicy number of delegates, there are important numbers of Latino voters.

Hence, both Obama and the Republicans must get to work to attract these voters.

Obama already launched this effort with his State of the Union address. The Republicans are being left behind. Aside from the Washington Post article written by Jeb Bush, George W. Bush’s brother and ex-governor of Florida, where he outlines ways in which Republicans could win over Hispanics, the GOP’s discourse has been one of rejection of the Latino community.