As Republican presidential candidates seek to establish their tough, anti-illegal immigration bona fides with the GOP's conservative base, a new Pew Research Center survey of Latino voters suggests a looming land mine in the general election.
The survey confirms that former White House strategist Karl Rove was correct: the Republicans' long-term prospects in presidential campaigns could be hurt by taking a hard line against allowing a path to citizenship to illegal immigrants who are already working in this country.
The survey shows that Democrats, who just a year ago enjoyed only a 21 percentage point advantage in the partisan leanings of Latino voters, have now widened their advantage to 34 percentage points. The Pew report notes that in 2008 Latino voters will have an advantage beyond their numbers because they will play a key role in determining the outcomes in four swing states: Florida, New Mexico, Colorado and Nevada.
Being married to a South American immigrant, and working with Hispanics every day, I believe that there is indeed a natural averse reaction to the hate speak being spewed by some of the candidates.
I believe most Hispanics want the issue resolved in a fair manner, by creating reasonable laws that allow immigrant workers some sort of legal status while they work here. The guaranteed path to citizenship is not at the top of the list of priorities for the foreign workers. They just want the right to work without fear of retribution, and without the hatred that exists in the current situation.
The current situation is horrible, and it is a result of our legislators not trying hard enough to solve the problem. It is because they have not separated the immigration problem into two separate issues. One is the lack of enforcement of the border. This is the source of the anger. Unfortunately the anger is channeled at the workers who keep coming here to work. If the government tried harder to secure the borders, much of the anger would disappear.
The other is to come up with a reasonable guest worker program. If the border is secure, Americans will allow workers to come do the work they don't do.
The anger created by this issue will indeed hurt the Republican candidates that need the Hispanic vote to win.
Hispanic voters (citizens) are just like any voter. They want safe and efficient cities, good schools and the chance to provide a good living for their families. But if they believe they are hated because of their heritage, they will gravitate to the party that reaches out to them. I apologize for writing a book on this....
I know every election cycle, Elton reminds his constituency about how tough he is on immigration. Perhaps this turns out the vote - like gay marraige. Lately, at the local level we are seeing immigration be made an issue when there is little locally that can be done about it. I have to think it is an issue that is perceived as driving people to the voting booth. Why else would it be used by some County Supervisor candidates or City Council candidates.
I also know that the Ag community isn't haooy with Elton because of his immigration stance. The Ag community knows it needs workers and is becoming more vocal about it. I suspect the restaurant and hotel businesses will soon chime in. Not sure about construction these days because of the downtown in real estate. I would think the allure of cheap labor would be even more appealing.
I personally think we need a comprehensive guest worker program and we need our legistators to work on it now. Unfortunately, they don't want to take any real action because it is a political time bomb. Let's start in Sacramento and work on having our DC representatives and senators get us the Federal money that is due to our state.
Timm, are you going to weigh in? What do YOU think?
I know every election cycle, Elton reminds his constituency about how tough he is on immigration. Perhaps this turns out the vote - like gay marraige. Lately, at the local level we are seeing immigration be made an issue when there is little locally that can be done about it. I have to think it is an issue that is perceived as driving people to the voting booth. Why else would it be used by some County Supervisor candidates or City Council candidates.
I also know that the Ag community isn't haooy with Elton because of his immigration stance. The Ag community knows it needs workers and is becoming more vocal about it. I suspect the restaurant and hotel businesses will soon chime in. Not sure about construction these days because of the downtown in real estate. I would think the allure of cheap labor would be even more appealing.
I personally think we need a comprehensive guest worker program and we need our legistators to work on it now. Unfortunately, they don't want to take any real action because it is a political time bomb. Let's start in Sacramento and work on having our DC representatives and senators get us the Federal money that is due to our state.
Timm, are you going to weigh in? What do YOU think?