Last fall, we correctly predicted that the raging anti-immigrant rhetoric coming from portions of the Republican party would not fly during the election. (*Please note, I am not conflating Republican with anti-immigrant. Not all Republicans are anti-immigrant and they are plenty of anti’s among the Democratic party. However, the most extreme of the anti’s do seem to come from the Right). During November’s election, Latino and New American voters proved to be this past year’s “soccer moms”, swinging Democratic in huge numbers and effectively sealing the Democratic party’s decisive victory.
Driven by some Republicans’ sharp attacks on illegal immigration and — as many Hispanics perceived it, immigrants in general — Latino voters fled the GOP en masse in the midterm elections, then turned on John McCain, as well.
He got 31 percent of the Latino vote to the 44 percent that George W. Bush took in 2004, according to exit polls. And it was enough to put much of the West and Southwest out of reach for the Republican Party, to give Florida to the Democrats and to hand Barack Obama the presidency.
Now, as Obama moves to solidify his advantage, Republican leaders are sounding the alarm on what could be the party’s most pressing national challenge.
While the article continues in detail about the political ramifications of this, I just want to note that, as I’ve said before, using immigration as a wedge issue and pushing anti-immigrant policies is political suicide.
Today, Politico has a full-length article about the Obama administration’s courting of their most vital demographic – Latino voters. This is something that I’ve been blogging about since well before the election. Last November, Latinos turned out in record numbers to support the now-President Obama. Much of that support was based on his promise to push for immigration reform, a priority issue on the Latino community’s agenda.
In February, President Obama went on the El Piolin show (an outrageously popular Latino radio show hosted by El Piolin, Eduardo Sotelo) And last week, the administration invited Sotelo to the White House to have a sit-down conversation with the President.
“We need to be able to communicate through radio and obviously you’ve got the biggest listenership so we’ve got to make sure you’re involved,” Obama said in the interview.
The blossoming friendship between the administration and El Piolin is just the tip of the iceberg of the new inclusion of the Latino community. Latinos have been included in all major policy discussion since Obama took office. And many already feel the doors of opportunity being opened. The President has also visited Arizona (a border state with a high Latino population) twice in his time in office, including giving the commencement speech at Arizona State University last night.
However, as Luis Gutierrez, the Congressional leader on immigration reform puts it:
“He will ultimately be judged by the Hispanic community on what he does for the weakest and most vulnerable,” said Rep. Luis Gutierrez, the veteran Chicago Democrat, referring to the issue on which he’s become a national leader, comprehensive immigration reform.
Obama has committed to immigraiton reform publicly – the story broke in April, with a HUGE response from advocates to support the gesture. He noted he would be making a public statement about reform sometime this May, though we are still waiting for this cue.
Even Rahm Emanuel, who has been an opponent of previous reform bills, has acknowledged his support for reform. Rep. Gutierrez notes that Rahm, who is well-known for his shrewd and calculating politics, has to make good on reform if the administration wants to stay in good favor with Latino voters.
“If Rahm thinks he can get away with not doing anything on immigration and still have the support of Latino voters, it won’t get done,” said Gutierrez, who has had a long and at times contentious relationship with his fellow Chicago pol.
While there are certainly other issues on the docket for the Latino community, it seems that immigration reform is the most pressing and the most widely supported. The administration acknowledges it will be a tough battle to pass a reform bill, but as I’ve said before, it seems that the momentum for such a bill continues to grow by the day.
From Politico:
When Piolin asked Obama if he had the votes in Congress on immigration reform, the president was candid.
“Probably not yet,” he said
But when it comes time to rally support for the bill, Obama said he would need the talk show host’s help.
“You can count on me,” Piolin assured.
Yesterday there was a great post up on Daily Kos laying out the reasons why immigration reform should be on the White House agenda for this year. Touching on Luis Gutierrez’s Family Unity tour, the post argues why it is not only morally right to push through reform, but also politically salient.
People who live in some of the states most affected by immigration are fully supportive of comprehensive immigration reform, and not just Latinos and Asians, but across the board including whites. There is little appetite overall for the Minuteman agenda. Remember, even Republicans nominated John McCain — author of the last immigration reform bill — as their nominee, despite facing primary opponents trying to one-up each other on their anti-immigrant rhetoric. The issue simply doesn’t have electoral bite.
Well, at least it doesn’t hurt us. Republicans have much more to fear: If it were to pass, 11-15 million undocumented immigrants (no one knows for sure the exact number) would eventually be able to vote. For reference, an estimated 12 million Latinos voted in 2008. Republicans won’t want to flood the electorate with new voters from a demographic that voted for Obama 67-32 percent, not when their current efforts are doing nothing but further alienate Latinos.
But that’s a crass electoral calculus, and it cuts both ways. Democrats can do the right thing and also help themselves politically. It’s a no-brainer.
I have said mulitple times that Immigration will be a priority issue for the incoming administration, and now I have Democratic Majority Leader, Senator Harry Reid, backing me up! (Hat-tip to America’s Voice for covering the story.) In an interview last week, Reid spoke about priorities for the next Congress, one of which will be immigration reform:
Q: With more Democrats in the Senate and the House and a Democrat in the White House, how do you see congressional efforts playing out on such issues as health care and immigration?
Q: Will there be as much of a fight on immigration as last time?
A: On immigration, there’s been an agreement between (President-elect Barack) Obama and (Arizona Republican Sen. John) McCain to move forward on that. … We’ll do that.
A: We’ve got McCain and we’ve got a few others. I don’t expect much of a fight at all.
So, it looks like odds are good that Comprehensive Immigration Reform will be an issue taken up by the next Congress. It also doesn’t hurt that the GOP will be attempting to mend their relationship with Latinos, or that Latino and Immigrant voters are the political power behind the election of the incoming President, Barack Obama.
In recent years, political advice on immigration in both parties has gone something like this: “It’s the third rail of politics.” “The less said, the better.” “If you say anything, talk tough.”
But with President-elect Barack Obama’s solid win — and his overwhelming support from Latinos — some think that advice may change.
“What the election showed is that the conventional wisdom on why immigration reform is too hot to handle is wrong,” says Frank Sharry of America’s Voice, a pro-immigration lobbying group. (click here to listen to the full story)
Sharry’s comment is backed up by the numbers. Immigrants and Latinos voted in record numbers during this past election, especially in key states like Nevada, New Mexico, Colorado and Florida. They are the electorate that helped put Obama in power and guess what – one of their top priorities is immigration. For more on this, check out the America’s Voice blog.
[Sunday} on Meet the Press, Tom Brokaw cited NDN in asking Senator Mel Martinez (R-FL) whether the weak showing of the Republicans these last few years with Hispanics was endangering their Party's ability to be a majority in the 21st century.
Regardless of your party affiliation, it is clear that Latinos were the decisive vote in this past election. It is also clear that they swung towards the Democrats. An excerpt from the full transcript of the interview (which is posted at NDN):
Senator Martinez: The fact of the matter is that Hispanics are going to be a more and more vibrant part of the electorate, and the Republican Party had better figure out how to talk to them. We had a very dramatic shift between what President Bush was able to do with Hispanic voters, where he won 44 percent of them, and what happened to Senator McCain. Senator McCain did not deserve what he got. He was one of those that valiantly fought, fought for immigration reform, but there were voices within our party, frankly, which if they continue with that kind of rhetoric, anti-Hispanic rhetoric, that so much of it was heard, we’re going to be relegated to minority status. (bold added).
The nativists and anti’s can no longer get away with their language of hate and their scapegoating of Latinos. Politically speaking, it is suicide. And realistically speaking: it is aiding and abetting in the murder of innocent immigrants. Stop the hate.
Latinos are responsible for Obama’s victory in New Mexico and contributed strongly to his margins in Nevada and Colorado. In New Mexico, Latinos constituted 41 percent of the electorate and voted for Obama by a 69 percent to 30 percent margin; white voters in New Mexico supported McCain 56 percent to 42 percent.
Angela Kelley has a great piece up at the Huffington Post about the New American voters and their power to overcome divisive anti-immigrant rhetoric during the upcoming election.
FBI reports don’t get a lot of attention, especially in the final days of a Presidential election season, but this week’s release reporting on a 40% increase in anti-Latino hate crimes should at least give us pause. The report’s findings are consistent with the swelling nativist movement that has become larger and more vitriolic in recent years and its impact undeniable as anti-Latino hate crime incidents reach unprecedented levels.
The nativists, ranging from skinhead extremists to your everyday politician or cable news anchor, and fueled by an administration myopic in its pursuit of deportation only proposals, are taking its toll on the immigrant and Latino community. A September survey by the Pew Hispanic Center shows half of all Latinos, immigrant and non-immigrant, say that their situation in this country is deteriorating and is worse now than it was a year ago. One-in-ten Hispanic adults–native-born U.S. citizens and immigrants alike–report that, in the past year, the police or other authorities have stopped them and asked them about their immigration status.
Last Friday, a New York Times editorial sharply criticized both candidates for their recent Spanish-language ads that hurled untrue accusations from all sides.
Mr. McCain lied first, in a Spanish-language ad that accused Mr. Obama of helping to kill immigration reform last year, by voting for amendments that supposedly doomed a bipartisan bill. The ad lamented the result: “No guest worker program. No path to citizenship. No secure borders. No reform. Is that being on our side?”
That is a jaw-dropping distortion. The bill wasn’t killed by any amendments. It was killed by a firestorm of talk-radio rage and a Republican-led filibuster. The very bill that Mr. McCain now mourns is the one he sidled away from as his own party weakened and killed it. It’s the one he says he would now vote against.
For Mr. McCain to suggest that Mr. Obama opposes the “path to citizenship” and “guest worker program” compounds his dishonesty. Mr. Obama supports the three pillars of comprehensive reform — tougher enforcement, expanded legal immigration and a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants already here.
Mr. McCain was an architect of just such a comprehensive bill. But he is also leading a party whose members rabidly oppose the path to citizenship. So, in deference to them, Mr. McCain now emphasizes border security as the utmost priority. Except when he’s pandering in Spanish.
Mr. Obama’s retaliatory ad, also in Spanish, was just as fraudulent. It slimed Mr. McCain as a friend and full-bore ally of restrictionists like Rush Limbaugh, even though Mr. Limbaugh has long attacked Mr. McCain’s immigration moderation. It quotes Mr. Limbaugh as calling all Mexicans stupid and ordering them to “shut your mouth or get out,” which he never did.
Meanwhile, the Bush administration keeps raiding factories and farms, terrorizing immigrant families while exposing horrific accounts of workplace abuses. Children toil in slaughterhouses; detainees languish in federal lockups, dying without decent medical care. Day laborers are harassed and robbed of wages. An ineffective border fence is behind schedule and millions over budget. Local enforcers drag citizens and legal residents into their nets, to the cheers of the Minutemen.
Both candidates once espoused smart, thoughtful positions for fixing the problem. But Mr. McCain is shuffling in step with his restrictionist party. Mr. Obama gave immigration one brief mention at the Democratic convention, in a litany of big-trouble issues, like abortion, guns and same-sex marriage, on which he seemed to say that the best Americans could hope for are small compromises and to agree to disagree.
It is time that we demanded a real debate on all of the issues, not just immigration. America is tired of the lies and tired of the smear ads. We want to hear about the issues.
As Frank Sherry from America’s Voice said:
[We] offer this challenge to both candidates: Be honest with us. Use the time remaining in your campaigns and the upcoming Presidential debates to tell us your plan for immigration reform. How will you design it, how will you pass it into law, and how will you implement it, so that we can once again be both a nation of immigrants and a nation of laws?
As I posted on Tuesday, the Sanctuary has yet to hear back from John McCain regarding the survey they sent his camp last month. Obama’s campaign officially responded to the questions that are at the center of Latino issues for the upcoming election. McCain’s, however, has yet to directly respond to the questions.
This morning, Kety Esquivel, founder of Crossleft.org, appeared on CNN for the second time to discuss the survey. CNN featured Leslie Sanchez as an unofficial mouthpiece for the McCain camp. Watch their discussion below:
There you have it. It’s not directly from the mouth of John McCain but it’s clear that the McCain campaign officially responded through Leslie Sanchez. Some of the strongest voices in the Latino blogosphere have been tossed aside because they’re like the Huffington Post.
Sanchez suggests McCain has been paying attention to Latinos by pointing to the four Latino events he attended in the last month, but it was during those events that the idea for the questionnnaire came about. The candidates were speaking in soundbites, not with substance. I was in San Diego, too, and the audience didn’t look very left-of-center, to me.
It’s good to know McCain doesn’t think we’re worth his time. It certainly tells me something about who the most pro-migrant candidate is.
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