The day following the Nov. 4 election, there will be an obituary written by many pundits for the "Hispanic Vote Catastrophe" that never happened. It turns out that Hispanic voters are behaving like most other voters.
That's good news for everyone but those who invested all their political capital in the specter of a "Republican demographic catastrophe" if Republicans did not endorse the Senate's 2013 Gang of Eight amnesty bill.
The only people surprised by the November obituary will be the campaign consultants and Republican National Committee operatives who created that lifeless Frankenstein following the 2012 election.
It's a safe bet this good news will be interpreted as bad news by the political consultant class, who are heavily invested in "identity politics."
- When black voters get upset that the Obama economy has left them with 12 percent unemployment, when women don't vote overwhelmingly as radical feminists, when under-30 voters no longer think being an Obamatron is cool, and when Hispanic voters start paying attention to education reform and taxes, pollsters and pundits see their favorite clichés upended.
- It means Democrats have to get a new playbook, and so do the many Republican Party leaders who have for too long ignored the issues of most concern to Hispanic voters.
The evidence was there all along for anyone willing to look at it instead of being buffaloed and manipulated by the liberal media. Hispanic voters are not sheep to be herded into conformity with the LA Raza agenda.
- As far back as May of this year, polls were reporting that Hispanic voters were deserting Obama. According to the Pew center, Obama's approval rating among Hispanic voters fell to 52 percent in May from a high of 74 percent a year earlier.
- Other polls like Gallup throughout the year consistently showed that Hispanic voters place immigration reform way below job, health care and education on their the list of priorities.
Now, less than two weeks before the November election, with the handwriting on the wall as big as an expressway billboard, amnesty lobbyists are taking notice of this reality and finding excuses for the failure to stampede the public into a phony consensus about "winning the Hispanic vote."
- Even the media's favorite Republican gurus have stopped talking about "comprehensive immigration reform" as a silver bullet for "solving the Republicans Hispanic problem." Karl Rove has thrown out his old scripts and now talks only about jobs, energy and Obamacare as the keys to Republican victory.
- In Texas, where even Gov. George Bush never got more than 44 percent of the Hispanic vote, the Republican candidate for governor will likely win close to 50 percent of the Hispanic vote in an election that turns on many issues besides immigration. Clearly, his failure to endorse the 2013 Senate amnesty bill has not hurt him among Hispanic voters in Texas.
- In Colorado, where the Republican Senate candidate leads the Democratic incumbent by 2 to 6 points depending on what poll you believe, immigration is a top concern for only 5 percent of the likely voters in a state where Hispanics make up 14 percent of registered voters. In a recent interview, a Democrat-leaning polling firm in Colorado praised the Democratic candidate for his emphasis on "reproductive health issues" and downplayed the importance of immigration.
Such headlines must be causing nightmares for Rep. Luis Gutierrez, head of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and ardent propagandist for amnesty. Many Democratic congressional candidates are running away from amnesty, not embracing it, and Gutierrez is not a happy camper.
In Louisiana and Kentucky, the Democratic candidates for US Senate are running to the right of Obama on immigration. Democrat Sen. Mary Landrieu is touting her support for more border fencing, while in Kentucky, the Democratic challenger to incumbent Republican Mitch McConnell is criticizing him for voting FOR the Gang of Eight amnesty bill!
Why should any of this be a surprise? Every two years, politicians get a cold shower called a reality check. Elections allow citizens to register their true concerns and policy priorities, not what the mainstream media tell them they ought to believe. In 2014, when a typical voter is asked about "immigration reform," they say border security is the most important part of any reform. Even 42 percent of Hispanic voters agree with that, according to recent Pew Center polls.
It ought not to come as a surprise that, like other citizens, Hispanic voters want to know where candidates stand on jobs, education reform, the Keystone Pipeline, Ebola containment and fighting Islamist terrorism. The idea that Hispanic voters are a monolithic block marching to the drum of universal amnesty was always a myth and always an insult to a diverse and dynamic population who happen to have a Hispanic ancestry.
In most places and most races, candidates who reflect the sensible priority for border security and immigration law enforcement will get elected, and candidates who peddle the amnesty snake oil will not. Let's hope that this time, pundits, consultants and aspiring political party leaders are paying attention.
Media wishing to interview Tom Tancredo, please contact [email protected].
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