Soooooooooo the Republicans have been trying Hispanic outreach to close what can only be described as a comically large gap between Romney and Obama among Hispanic voters. How's that going?
Welp, according to a June 8 poll by Latino Decisions (I'm guessing they tilt to the left, but whatevs) Obama has...a comically large lead over Romney, 66-23. I'd say there's no way Obama can go any higher, but 11% of respondents were undecided, so I guess can he still hit 77%.
Why isn't Romney packing up his Cadillacs and going back to the white part of town? Largely because he needs the states of Colorado and Nevada, both of which have burgeoning Latino populations, to make it to 270. Polls show Romney close in both states, so a high Latino turnout could hurt him. This is probably why Romney's Hispanic-targeted ads have been less about voting for Romney and more about staying home out of hopeless despair.
Most interesting takeaway from the poll: Hispanics aren't buying Marco Rubio's alternate DREAM Act, which he proposed as a cute, rookie attempt at triangulation between the hardcore conservative wing of his party that don't like no foreigners and the irrefutable reality that the GOP is losing the largest growing demographic in the country.
Rubio's DREAM Act, commonly referred to as DREAM Lite, creates a cumbersome third level of citizenship between illegal immigrant and citizen, so that undocumented immigrants have the ability to become temporary residents if they attend college or serve in the military, but not full citizens. So it's not amnesty, but it's not deportation either.
Survey says: no dice. Hispanics preferred Dick Durbin's original DREAM Act by a whopping 82% to 13% preferring Rubio's. The poll also found resounding support for Durbin's plan among non-Hispanic respondents. Disclaimer: Rubio hasn't actually proposed his Act yet, so the poll was forced to rely on his public statements about what he might propose. Get on it, Rubio!
When considered in isolation, Rubio's proposal breaks even at 49-46, suggesting that Hispanic voters consider it better than nothing, nothing being what we have thanks to stalwart GOP opposition.
Long story short: Romney's ads aimed at the Hispanic demographic and Rubio's well-intentioned (in my opinion) but substantively stupid attempt to woo Hispanic voters through a conservative-ish legislation have gotten nowhere. Romney better hope his more-in-sorrow-than-anger ads keep the Hispanic vote at home in November, or he could lose swing states over this.
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