Viva Los Democrats!
A new poll finds Barack Obama leading John McCain by wide margins among Hispanic voters. But what impact will Latinos have on Election Day?
There's no way to predict the real impact of Latinos in the 2008 race, but the campaigns are actively courting the voting bloc. In Thursday's poll by the Pew Hispanic Center, 66 percent of registered Hispanic voters say they support Democratic nominee Barack Obama while 23 percent stand behind Republican nominee John McCain. For Obama, the figures solidify the transition of Latino support from Hillary Clinton to his camp. For McCain, they suggest that making real inroads with this group may require a minor miracle. Obama not only has the support of traditionally Democratic Latinos, he also has the backing of 23 percent of Hispanics who identify themselves as Republicans and holds a significant edge among Latino independents. Those numbers have to worry the GOP in battleground states like Nevada, New Mexico, Colorado and Florida. NEWSWEEK's Jessica Ramirez spoke to Mark Lopez, associate director of the Pew Hispanic Center, about some of the other voter trends in their latest report. Excerpts:
NEWSWEEK: The 39 percent identification edge Democrats hold with Hispanics is larger than it has been at any time this decade. What do you attribute this to?
Mark Lopez: A part of it is the debate surrounding immigration policy. A part of it is that Latinos think the Democratic Party is more in tune with the issues they care most about. Then there's also a general movement among Latinos, and really all Americans who want some sort of a change, to lean toward the Democratic Party.
More than half of the Hispanics you polled say they voted during primary season. Of those, 72 percent cast a ballot in a Democratic contest and 21 percent in a GOP contest. Are these voting trends at all an indicator of how it might go come November?
Definitely, it's a possibility. There are a couple of things that speak to this. One, a significant number of Latinos are following the election very closely, and that's important. There was also a lot of participation in the primaries on the Democratic side, and I think that was because the race went to the end and it was close. Latinos were especially supportive of a particular candidate, Hillary Clinton. So I think all of this helped to lead to a real push in participation in the primaries. While what could happen in November is uncertain, everything is in place for a good level of turnout, a high level of turnout even.
I noticed 16 percent of primary voters said they had voted for the first time. How key will new Latino voters be?
They could be very key. There's some evidence that there's been a movement among those who are noncitizens to become citizens and register to vote. There are some organizations that have been pursuing that. So it looks like they could play a role. One of the things about Latinos is that they are very young. They will always have a larger share of first-time voters just because there are so many youth.
The movement to register goes back to the immigration debate, right?
Yes, the whole point of the marches in recent times was "march today and vote tomorrow." I think we are seeing at least some of that come to fruition, but it's hard to disentangle that from the other reasons that explain participation.
Among Hispanics, Obama is favored over McCain 3 to 1 on the issues of education, jobs, immigration, health care and cost of living. He is favored 2 to 1 in the areas of Iraq and crime. How did Latinos arrive at this opinion?
We don't have enough information to tell, but Hispanics do say Obama is more attuned to the issues and concerns of the Hispanic community than McCain. I think part of the explanation is that this group tends to lean heavily Democrat, so it's not too big of a surprise that they see a Democratic candidate better positioned to solve their issues than a Republican candidate.
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Member Comments
Posted By: Nowforthetruth @ 10/10/2008 4:33:21 PM
Comment: CNN Reports Acorn Faking Voter Registrations:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/09/acorn.fraud.claims/index.html?iref=newssearch
Posted By: Jose52 @ 10/10/2008 2:51:10 PM
Comment: Cani77. You have drunk the Bambi Koolaid! The Community Reinvestment Act from Jimmy Carter tenure started this mess. Fact.
Bill Clinton expanded the program during his 8 horrible years. Fact.
Acorn and their attorney barry obama sued and won court cases against lenders... Citicorp. Fact.
Acorn went to congress and spent money on liberal politicians to press Fannie Mae to ease up their credit standards. Fact.
Fannie and freddie bought sub prime mortgages from banks that knew it was bad paper! Fact.
This depression was bought by Acorn, bambi, and the dems like Cris Dodd and Barney Frank who wanted to help poor people. We're all poor now! bambi and Ayers succeded in destroying Capitalism and the USA.
Bush and McCain wanted to stop this mess and were stopped. by ignorant demon crats like yourself. Wake up. My source is the NYtimes.
Posted By: cani77 @ 10/10/2008 9:58:19 AM
Comment: In a few weeks we will make a choice that will decide our future.
I follow an economist named Bob Proctor. He has called the top and bottom of every market crash since the 70s correctly.
Also, he perfectly predicted the current real estate market meltdown and the picture he paints about what will happen in the next couple years
is terrifying.He thinks it will be worse then the great depression.
The banks in the U.S. are going under one after the other. Countrywide ,Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch , Fanny and Freddy Mae ,AIG
The government took them over because they are essentially bankrupt. Even with the goverment nationalizing hundreds of billions of dollars in debt the stock market is crashing
the credit markets are frozen and all of us may suffer beyond anything in the last 80 years.
McCain just like Bush " doesn't understand the economy".
That not just my opinion its his own words. Not only does he not understand how to fix it but he does not understand exactly what is broken.
It is no surprise that he doesn't. The people that make up these securities use complex mathematical models very few people understand.
Bush and McCain both can take the credit for this mess since they helped deregulate the laws that were protecting us.
Bush's economic advisor Phil Graham wrote the deregulation bill that allowed banks to take huge risks with all of our future.
Now, Phil Graham is the head of McCain's economic policy.He is also McCain's choice for the next secretary of the treasury.
No one in this country can afford for that to happen. The last time Bush met with his economic advisors was in March. He didnt realize that anything was wrong. Phil Graham had the guts to say that we are in a mental recession after he helped create the worst economy meltdown in our lifetime. Check out this link to the truth http://my.barackobama.com/keatingvideo
It will take the best and brightest minds in the world to get us out of this nightmare. As bad as Bush has done, McCain would be
even more destructive because things are in much worse shape. The next president will not inherit a surplus like Bush did but a crashing economy and a 11,600,000,000,000 (trillion) dollars deficit. Most of it Bush created and it will take decades to pay it back.
If you do what you have always done then you will get what you have always got.
When it comes to policy Bush and McCain are the same 90 percent of the time.
So why are the polls even close then ?
Mccains team just said they no longer want to talk about the economy.Instead they would like to spend time talking about obama
which means running the biggest smear campaign in history.
They think they can just tell you lies and you wont be smart enough to see through it
Let's teach him we are smarter than that .
Elect Obama Biden 2008
Check out this video of sarah palins interview and ask your self if she understands what she is talking about.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r36Xc0GG4iQ