By TRIP GABRIEL
The New York Times
October 19, 2011
Today, Republican candidates are competing over who can talk the toughest about illegal immigration — who will erect the most impenetrable border defense; who will turn off “magnets” like college tuition benefits.
But after such pointed proposals heated up yet another Republican debate, on Tuesday night, some party officials see a yellow light signaling danger in battleground states with large Hispanic populations in November 2012. Will Hispanic voters remember and punish the eventual Republican nominee?
“The discussion of creating electrified fences from sea to sea is neither prudent nor helpful,” said Ryan Call, chairman of the Republican Party of Colorado, where Hispanics cast 13 percent of votes in 2008 and helped President Obama flip the state to blue. “They’re throwing red meat around in an attempt to mollify a particular aspect of the Republican base.”
Besides Colorado, Mr. Obama cemented his victory in part by carrying three other swing states with large Hispanic voting populations: Florida, Nevada and New Mexico.
Republican strategists have hoped to win many of these voters back by appealing to their discontent over the economy and to their social conservatism, issues that helped George W. Bush win a historically high 44 percent of Hispanic voters in 2004.
Now, however, that pitch may be thwarted, according to some Republican strategists.
Both Herman Cain, the former business executive, and Representative Michele Bachmann are proposing a 1,200-mile border fence — electrified, in Mr. Cain’s case, double-walled in Mrs. Bachmann’s.
Mitt Romney has attacked Gov. Rick Perry of Texas as soft on illegal immigration. Mr. Perry punched back in the debate on Tuesday in Las Vegas, accusing Mr. Romney of “hypocrisy” because, Mr. Perry said, “you had illegals working on your property.”
Robert Ramirez, a Republican state representative from Colorado who attended the debate, said Hispanic voters in his state “are sick and tired of empty promises from the Democratic Party.”
Nevertheless, Mr. Ramirez was concerned about the nominees’ lack of sensitivity. “We can’t pretend the Latino vote doesn’t exist,” he said. “It’s time we became the party of inclusion.”
Even Mr. Romney, who has been more measured in his remarks, may have lost Hispanic support over his criticism of a Texas law that allows some children of illegal immigrants to attend state colleges on in-state tuition.
“He can make as many trips to Florida and New Mexico and Colorado and other swing states that have a large Latino population, but he can write off the Latino vote,” said Lionel Sosa, a strategist in Texas who advised Mr. Bush and Senator John McCain on appealing to Hispanics. “He’s not going to gain it again.”
In each of those states, plus Nevada, Hispanics are a growing share of eligible voters, according to the Pew Hispanic Center. Although these voters have traditionally favored Democrats, Mr. Obama’s 67 percent share of the Hispanic vote in 2008 dipped to 60 percent who voted Democratic during the 2010 Republican wave that swept the midterm elections, said Mark Hugo Lopez, associate director of the Pew center.
In a Pew survey that year, Hispanic voters ranked education and the economy as their top issues. But there was strong support for state-level “Dream” acts allowing children of illegal immigrants to attend colleges on in-state tuition, and 61 percent disapproved of more border fencing.
Many analysts credit the Democratic victories that year of Harry Reid of Nevada, the Senate majority leader, and Senator Michael Bennet of Colorado to get-out-the-vote efforts by Latinos.
“Sharron Angle got destroyed in the election because of her anti-immigration stand,” said Andres Ramirez, a Democratic strategist in Nevada, referring to Mr. Reid’s opponent, a Tea Party darling. Mr. Ramirez predicted that Hispanic participation in the 2012 election in Nevada would surpass the 15 percent from 2008, and he said that Republicans missed an opportunity in holding a debate in Las Vegas to showcase more moderate immigration views.
“Their rhetoric on illegal immigration was very over the top,” he said. “It will cost them in the future.”
Heidi Smith, the Republican national committeewoman from Nevada, said the focus on illegal immigration was a distraction. “It’s taking time off of the big issue, and that is we don’t have any jobs,” she said.
In Florida, where the Hispanic vote has traditionally leaned Republican because of large numbers of conservative Cuban-Americans, immigration issues may be especially divisive in 2012. The state’s favorite son Republican senator, Marco Rubio, seems only too happy to duck immigration issues, and the Republican-controlled State Senate refused to pass a bill this spring with a tough requirement on employers to check workers’ immigration status.
Joe Gruters, chairman of the Republican Party of Sarasota County in Florida, said that showing toughness against illegal immigration was an “electrifying” issue and could bump a Republican candidate many points in primary polls. He is disappointed by the moderation of candidates’ proposals so far. “Nobody said, ‘We have to repeal the 14th Amendment,’ ” he said, referring to the constitutional guarantee of citizenship to a child born in the United States. Critics of illegal immigrant mothers who supposedly enter the country to have “anchor babies” sometimes propose repealing the Reconstruction-era amendment.
Mr. Gruters was quick to concede that such positions would cost an eventual Republican nominee.
“In case they’re the nominee, it could be a deal-breaker where they take themselves out as a serious contender,” he said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/20/us/politics/immigration-talk-turns-off-some-hispanics.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y
