California Latinos Turn Their Back On The GOP
Bad news for the GOP as the fastest growing ethnic group in the most populous state continues to reject the party:
A new poll out of California found little hope for Republicans among the nation’s fastest-growing electoral demographic.
Latino voters across the state hold widely negative views of the Republican Party, according to the survey, which was conducted by a GOP pollster and consultant and conceived as a tool to help the party make inroads with Hispanic voters. Many respondents said they see the GOP as too conservative and don’t trust it on the issue of immigration reform.
And while California won’t likely be in play in the 2012 presidential election, the poll has implications for more competitive Western states where Hispanics’ political voice is growing: Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Arizona.
Republican consultant Marty Wilson, who worked with pollster Bob Moore on the poll, tried hard to find reasons for GOP optimism in the numbers, but acknowledged: “The short answer is, it ain’t going to be easy.”
Indeed, it won’t be easy at all, because the numbers are grim:
Just 26 percent of those polled had a favorable opinion of the Republican Party, compared with 62 percent who viewed Democrats favorably.
Asked how the GOP could win them over, 32 percent said they would never vote for a Republican, while 30 percent suggested moving to the center and nominating less conservative candidates. Just 22 percent said sticking with conservative values was the way to go.
As the pollster put it in his own presentation of the findings, “The GOP candidate is not going to win many Latino voters by emphasizing Conservatism.”
Immigration, the poll found, is “the elephant in the GOP living room”: 67 percent of Latinos favored a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants, including 51 percent of Latino Republicans.
Asked which party they trusted to reform immigration, 57 percent of those polled said Democrats, versus just 21 percent who trusted Republicans.
The GOP stands on the verge of losing the fastest growing ethnic group in the country for at least a generation, all because the conservative base continues to cling to a restrictionist, anti-immigrant policy on immigration and refuses to even discuss the possibility of compromise on issues like amnesty for people already in the country illegally. To these conservatives, the answer to the immigration problem is an easy one but the truth it that it isn’t easy, and they’re leading the GOP down the road to electoral disaster.
Given the GOP’s propensity for alienating even moderate Hispanic voters with their over-the-top rhetoric and Arizona-style legislation in other Western states, it’s just a matter of time before even Texas turns Blue due to demographics.
New Mexico, Colorado, and Nevada were once solidly Red. Now, they’re purple, and trending blue. When Texas turns, the GOP will be shut out of the White House for a long time. The GOP cannot win ANY national election without Texas.
As a Californian and a Republican all I can say is that I’m surprised the party hasn’t already lost Latinos. The response to this from conservatives here will be split between “they’re not citizens so they shouldn’t be able to vote anyway” and “It doesn’t matter because they’ll all go to the Democrats because they’ll pay for the anchor babies.”
Personally, I think electoral disaster is the only thing that’ll bring sanity back to the party.
Latinos not blind and deaf at a rate higher than other demographics!
And now sports!
In other words, the conservatives insist on the rule of law. And you see this as a bad thing? And it’s not “anti-immigrant”, it anti-illegal immigrant. There is a difference.
(Man, I totally forgot about this one.) So, you’re all for the government controlling the labor supply as a way to prop up wages Pat?
Isn’t that kinda, I dunno, socialist?
(Spoilers: The claim will be made that immigration restrictions are either about “defending the nation from an invasion” or “immigrants these days not wanting to assimilate.”)
Nothing says “rule of law” like shooting brown people from a helicopter, huh?
This is like saying Mayor Daley isn’t anti-gun, just anti-illegal-gun. When all legal forms of X are banned, there’s no difference between the two.
Oh, gee, the party of hate is discovering that those they hate don’t like them back?
Shocking!!!
The idea that there are moderate or conservatives Hispanics is laughable. Even the Republicans who are Hispanics are much more liberal that the rest of the Party.
Blame the situation on the La Raza Repulbicans who supported open borders and unlimited immigration while also supporting quotas, set asides, and preferences for Hispanics. Why would any Hispanics vote for lower taxes ans smaller government when the Hispanics can vote for government handouts and higher taxes on whites.