President Obama, the Latino vote and immigration policy

The Young Turks recently took a look at President Obama's problems with Latino voters (video uploaded 08/17/2011):



Obama has announced a supposedly less drastic deportation policy. But that's after his record to date of greatly increasing the rate of deporting undocumented Latino immigrants far above what it was during the Cheney-Bush Administration. And he has been much less than enthusiastic on immigration-reform measures - to put it generously.

And it's not surprising that the announcement didn't bring celebration from the Latino community: Mixed Reactions From Latinos On Obama's New Deportation Plan Huffington Post 08/20/2011.

Obama's willingness to let the Republicans slap him around endlessly in the name of Compromise has various consequences. One of them is that when Democrats hear an announcement from this White House that sounds good, the next question that pops into our minds is likely to be, what happens when the Republicans start criticizing him for it? This kind of announcement coming from Obama just isn't credible any more until we see what the Administration actually does. The anti-immigrant House Judiciary Committee is, in fact, planning to hold hearings to oppose Obama's announced new policy: Matt Gertz, Rep. Lamar Smith Wants Hearings To "Embarrass The President" Media Matters 08/22/2011.

Pilar Marrero reports in La Opinión on a recent Impremedia/Latino Decisions poll showing that on 39% of Latino voters are saying they are sure they will vote for Obama in 2012: Obama pierde brillo ante latinos 08/22/2011. The percentage has been declining from 49% in June, after the killing of Osama Bin Laden. As she notes, the Latino vote in 2008 went 68% for Obama. A bad turnout among them in 2012 could sink Obama's re-election chances.

Tags: barack obama, comprehensive immigration reform

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