The first signs of a major U.S. Latino voter mobilization are forming, and it’s Republicans turbocharging an effort likely to help Hillary Clinton.
Latinos in major U.S. cities hope to organize events similar to one last week that drew a mostly Hispanic crowd of 2,200 outside the third Republican debate in Boulder, Colo., said Federico Peña, the lead organizer who's fielded calls from activists around the country since the rally that doubled as both a protest and voter registration drive.
The primary force behind the efforts is rhetoric by some leading Republicans, especially real estate billionaire Donald Trump, who’s called undocumented immigrants rapists and wants to build a border wall. " 'Don’t get mad, register,’ that’s the rallying cry," said Peña, a former Energy secretary under President Bill Clinton and Denver mayor.
"Who benefits from that? A natural benefactor is Hillary Clinton,'' he said.
Without President Obama on the ballot in 2016, Clinton will turn to Latinos to compensate for a potential downtick in African-American participation next November, should she win the nomination. Her strength with Hispanic voters — she carried them overwhelmingly in her 2008 primary fight against Obama — figures to help her in the primaries, something her campaign and its supporters are trying to capitalize on.
Talks are underway with a major Spanish-language television network to sponsor a voter-registration drive, said Peña, who supports Clinton's bid but is not a part of her official campaign.
The Clinton team is investing heavily in a Latino outreach effort that began in recent weeks. Teams are forming in at least seven battlegrounds, including Ohio and Virginia.
Hispanic women in Nevada are getting calls from an all-Latina phone bank likely to be replicated in other states. Hollywood stars Marc Anthony and Salma Hayek pitch Clinton to fans on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. A digital and mobile campaign that mixes English and Spanish collects users with questions about their home countries and other data points.
Hispanic Republicans have long warned that their party's recent rhetoric would be Clinton's greatest mobilization tool. Now the evidence is coming in, said Mario Lopez, a Republican and president of the Hispanic Leadership Fund. An ad sponsored by an outside group, People for the American Way, airs on Spanish-language radio programs in Virginia, urging Hispanics to vote to "shut Trump's big mouth.''
Democrats, and Republicans such as Lopez, compare Trump to Pete Wilson, the former California governor whose 1994 ballot initiative to prohibit undocumented immigrants from using public services helped turn a purple state into a reliably blue one.
"This is what we’ve been warning Republicans about, that rhetoric, tone and policy positions matter on these issues,'' Lopez said.
Clinton aims for a more muscular approach than Obama’s 2012 effort, said Lorella Praeli, Clinton’s Latino outreach director.
Latinos want to know "who’s gonna have my back,’’ Praeli said. The campaign theme, "I am with you'' in Spanish, draws an implicit comparison with Trump.
Clinton isn't guaranteed a massive Latino turnout. Latinos historically have much lower voting rates than blacks and whites. In 2012, they had a 48% turnout rate, according to the Pew Research Center, compared with 64% for whites and nearly 67% for African Americans.
Her outreach could be complicated if Republicans choose Marco Rubio, a young Cuban American as their nominee. Rubio has backtracked on his advocacy for a comprehensive immigration overhaul but hasn't engaged in potentially polarizing rhetoric. "Trump hasn’t quite stained the entire party just yet,'' Lopez said.
The challenge for Democrats is drawing enthusiasm among Latinos for their policies, particularly given a record level of deportations under Obama, said Frank Sharry, director of America's Voice, a pro-immigration group. "Do Democrats have a positive message, or is it all anti-Republican fervor?’’ he said. Clinton has called Obama’s policies "harsh’’ and pledged to go beyond his 2014 executive orders to protect certain undocumented workers from deportation.
Republicans remain her most effective mobilization tool, said Rep. Xavier Becerra, D-Calif., the House's highest-ranking Latino and chair of the House Democratic Caucus. "It’s coming from that other part of the brain that makes you have the adrenaline rush when you know you have to run from someone,’’ said Becerra, a Clinton supporter, of how Latino voters are likely to respond to GOP rhetoric. "It’s the fight-or-flight thing."
The necessity of appealing to Latinos has become more pronounced since the last presidential election when Mitt Romney won 27% of the Latino vote. According to the Center for American Progress, a left-leaning think-tank, Republicans would need to attract even more Latino support than they did in 2004, when George W. Bush carried 44% of Hispanics nationally, to win key swing states such as Ohio, given demographic changes.
That could be difficult, particularly if the nominee is Trump, whose favorability rating among Latinos is 11%, according to a recent AP/GFK poll.
Though Latinos organized large rallies around the 2013 immigration policy debate in Congress, there hasn’t been much grass-roots activity since then. That’s changing.
"We're not a sleeping giant anymore,'' Praeli said.
