Opportunity Knocks & GOP Locks The Door

As I have discussed before, the Republican Party did very poorly among Hispanic voters in the last presidential election. Romney was only able to corral around 23% of the Hispanic vote (and about the same with all other minority groups). And it is no secret that this is a major factor in costing the GOP any chance of regaining the White House. Even the party's national leaders admit that.

Those leaders know that Hispanics are the fastest growing portion of the American electorate. The percentage of the national vote by Hispanics grows with each election -- and the percentage of the White vote decreases (by about 2% in each presidential election year). That is why those leaders have urged the congressional members of their party to support immigration reform. They know that issue is important to most in the Hispanic community, and anyone opposing that reform will have a very difficult time getting Hispanic votes.

But the GOP is currently being controlled by the fringe of the right-wing in this country -- racists and fundamentalists who still delude themselves into believing that they can return to power with only the White vote (and re-institute a whites-only power structure). That's not going to happen. U.S. Census calculations tell us that by 2015 the number of Hispanics under 25 will grow by 14%, while the number of Whites in that age group will decrease by 0.5%. This kind of rapid growth simply cannot be ignored.

But GOP right-wingers are trying to fool their supporters (who seem to want to be deluded) by telling them that tide of new Hispanic voters can be stemmed by killing immigration reform and denying undocumented immigrants a path to citizenship. Their rhetoric says that Hispanics are going to vote Democratic regardless of what happens, and that giving undocumented immigrant citizenship will just give more votes to Democrats. They ignore the fact that 800,000 Hispanic youth turn 18 each year (and by 2030 that will probably reach 1,000,000 each year) -- and the vast majority are already American citizens.

They also ignore the fact that the Hispanic vote has not always been as solidly Democratic as it was in the 2008 and 2012 elections. George Bush got just above 40% of the Hispanic vote, and it was enough to enable him to squeak out a victory in 2004. National GOP candidates don't even need to get a majority of Hispanic votes to have a chance of victory -- they just need to get a credible share of that vote. And a recent poll shows that is within the realm of possibility.

It is the recent Gallup Poll (conducted of a nationwide sample of 7,901 Hispanic adults between January 3rd and June 27th -- with a margin of error of only 2 points). It shows that while the Democrats do have a majority of Hispanic voters, there are plenty of Hispanics who would be willing to vote Republican if only given a reason to do so. And this is particularly true of young Hispanic voters (the fastest growing portion of that vote), where 24% are Republicans and another 21% are true Independents. That adds up to 45% -- a number that could make GOP candidates credible again in a national election.

And remember, most voters set their voting pattern for life in the first couple of elections they vote in. The Republicans need to be appealing to young Hispanic voters -- not trying to alienate them, as the congressional right-wing Republicans are currently doing. The truth is that the Republican Party has a real opportunity to win back many Hispanic voters (especially among the young), but they cannot do that by killing immigration reform, or by talking about Hispanic Americans as though they were not good citizens.

Opportunity is knocking on the door -- and knocking loudly. Why are Republicans locking that door? Are they really stupid enough to believe they can bring back an America ruled by White privilege?