Obama Tries to Rebuild Hispanic Ties
President Barack Obama met last week at the White House with a group of Latino celebrities, the latest in a series of moves to rebuild his ties to a fast-growing segment of the electorate heading toward 2012.
Thursday's meeting, which included Miami Sound Machine co-founder Emilio Estefan, and actresses Rosario Dawson and Eva Longoria, followed a similar session a week earlier with administration officials and a delegation of business, labor and political figures. In that meeting, Mr. Obama said he'd intensify efforts in the coming months to push Congress to act on proposals to overhaul immigration laws.
It's not clear what Mr. Obama can do to advance far-reaching new immigration legislation following the collapse last year of efforts to pass measures such as the DREAM act. That bill would have granted permanent resident status to illegal immigrant students who completed some college or military service but failed to pass the Senate largely because of Republican opposition.
"I'm not going to lay out what our strategy is on how to move from here to there," White House Press Secretary jay Carney said last week.
But the administration has a clear interest in countering frustration among Latino voters over high unemployment and immigration issues.
Mr. Obama won 67% of Latino voters in 2008, compared with 31% for John McCain. Within the past year, however, Mr. Obama's approval ratings among Latinos have slumped. In March, 54% of voter-aged Latinos polled said they approved of Mr. Obama's job performance, down from 59% in February and far below the 82% peak in May 2009, according to a Gallup poll.
Leaders of some Hispanic groups have expressed dismay over the administration's failure to deliver a promised overhaul of immigration laws, while boosting deportations to record levels.
Hector Sanchez, executive director of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, said his organization has frequent meetings with White House officials, including the Latino outreach team. "But we need to see these conversations reflected in the national policies," he said.
The administration has ordered several moves by executive branch agencies aimed at placating disgruntled Hispanic groups.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and Environmental Protection Agency administrator Lisa Jackson teamed up in April for the first time to visit U.S. farm workers, many of whom are Hispanic. Many of them also are undocumented and subjected to low pay and poor working conditions, said Farm Workers of America President Arturo Rodriguez.
Labor Secretary Hilda Solis recently held a conference call with Hispanic leaders to promote her department's employment efforts, massaging a sore spot over the 11.3% March unemployment rate for Latinos that exceeded the national average of 8.8%.
In late March, Mr. Obama participated in an education town hall meeting moderated by Jorge Ramos of Spanish-language television network Univision. He called for continued funding for bilingual education programs, said the administration had refocused its immigration enforcement on deporting criminals, and said the failed DREAM Act still has a chance.
Hispanic community leaders and union officials warn Latino voters could stay home in 2012, or turn to Republican candidates who make a strong effort to win their votes.
Traditionally, Hispanic voters register Democrat by a ratio of two-to-one, but party affiliation isn't necessarily an indication of how they'll vote, according to research by the National Council of La Raza, a Hispanic civil rights and advocacy group. In 2004, for example, 56% of Arizona Latino voters voted for Democrat John Kerry for president, while 74% voted for Republican John McCain for Senate, the NCLR found.
In 2004, George Bush won 56% of the Hispanic vote in Florida, where Latinos have historically supported Republican presidential candidates, according to a Pew Research report. Mr. Obama turned that around in 2008, winning with help from 57% of Florida's Hispanic vote, according to exit polls.
In 2012, however, Florida Republicans will have on their side the state's newly elected U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, who won office in 2010 with a campaign that stressed his conservative economic ideas and his Cuban-American roots.