Posted on 11/27/2012 7:59:09 AM PST by CedarDave
As national Republican leaders fret about their party’s showing among Hispanics in the Nov. 6 elections and consider the GOP’s future, they might want to check in with a couple of prominent New Mexico Republicans.
Rep. Steve Pearce, who represents New Mexico’s border with Mexico, and Gov. Susana Martinez, who hails from the border-area town of Las Cruces, both have plenty to say about their party and Hispanic politics.
In a telephone interview Monday, Martinez said Romney’s weak result among Hispanics, who chose Obama by a more than 3-1 ratio nationally, isn’t necessarily a harbinger of things to come for the GOP. But she advised Republicans to craft “positive” instead of punitive ideas for immigration reform and drop the harsh anti-immigrant rhetoric.
~~snip~~
Pearce is a hard-line conservative on most issues, but on immigration reform his stance softens a bit. Pearce has long favored implementing a guest worker program that would allow immigrants to come to the U.S., work and make money and then return home. He reasons that not every immigrant wants citizenship and that those who do can earn it through the normal process.
Pearce, who had about 40 percent support among Hispanics in his district in a late October Journal poll, told me Republicans don’t have to cave on key immigration debates, such as offering a “path to citizenship” for those already in the U.S. illegally. But the GOP does need to establish relationships with the Hispanic community.
“You broaden your appeal by showing up,” Pearce said. “You begin to know people, and they begin to know you. If you’re not willing to do that hard work … it’s hard to get that support. It’s not about patronizing or giving ground; it’s about relationships.”
(Excerpt) Read more at abqjournal.com ...
You are probably referring to the numbers in this article from a pro-amnesty website:
In New Mexico, Latino GOPer Martinez Lost Latino Vote 61% to 38%
Assuming the numbers are correct, what would you have us do?? Join the open-borders crowd or just become a prepper with a survival kit and a stash of guns? I certainly don't have answers except to say that Steve Pearce's victory (hard work by him, no pandering, and an explanation of the rewards of private enterprise) showed there is a way.
El grande barile de puerco?
Pretty much everybody agrees with that. We already have a guest worker program, but nobody uses it, because there is no reason to.
What ‘anti-immigrant rhetoric’ is Martinez talking about? We always hear this nonsense, but where are the examples? Of course people who utter this garbage (like Martinez) know that they won’t get asked to provide examples and to prove their accusations. They say this crap confident that no one in the media will call them on it.
The truth is something quite different. Republicans usually go out of their way to offer up nauseating praise of immigrants and immigration before stating opposition to amnesty. Just think of how dolt Sean Hannity talks about how much he loves legal immigration. This is likely a futile attempt to head off the inevitable and bogus charges of racism, xenophobia, and of being anti-immigrant.
The frightening thing is that the Left is so thoroughly winning the language war and the the ability to set the parameters of debate. We are now to the point where even allegedly conservative Republicans parrot baseless, mindless leftwing talking points. I mean, Romney is taking all sorts of flack for being a hardliner on immigration; it’s maddening because he wasn’t even close to being that. He backed away from his primary talk, refused to say he’d reverse Obama’s executive amnesty for young illegal aliens, and repeatedly said he’d like to increase legal immigration. That is a hardliner?
Imagine the demagoguery that would greet a Republican who actually championed conservative immigration reform (i.e. no path to citizenship for illegals and large reductions in legal immigration). What would Governor Martinez say about that?
As I recall, all the Networks used the same exit polling in 2010, and I believe that was the CIS source.
What would I do?
Exactly what I've been doing since Bush 2 tried to ram Amnesty down our throats...
I would aggressively pursue a higher percentage of the white vote.
I would aggressively resist any form of Amnesty.
I would aggressively try to stop our current level of immigration and chain migration.
I would link ALL immigration and work visas to a contractual job offer and the amount of pay.
How much pay?
Minimum - $125,000 per year.
Below that?
Adios, dude!
I don’t necessarily disagree, but of all the options out there, it is probably the least bad.
It actually worked for years. Until 1986 it was illegal for them to be here but it wasn’t illegal to hire them. It was schizophrenic but it worked. They worked just past the border and then they went home. Most of them just worked here when they were young and had enough money to buy a car and a home in Mexico and then they went home to stay.
I grew up on the border but I never saw Mexicans in any numbers past mid-Texas or south Colorado. After amnesty they enforced the border so the Mexicans just went further into the interior where there were no border patrols and it was no longer easy to go home so they moved their whole families here too.
After Clinton decimated the BP and their ability to do their job and 9/11 pulled half of the too few agents to the northern border it was open doors for illegals until Bush rebuilt the BP and put the National Guard on the border.
No, why do you think we had such an illegal problem that Reagan agreed to amnesty to start with?
We’ve got more than enough low-skill workers in the country already.
Again, I think the Democrats have sold people on the idea that the Republicans would renege on treaty obligations and cut programs many in tribal hierarchies depend on to employ their relatives. Of course, seniors (elders) and children hit hardest.
The Democrats have been extraordinarily effective in selling the "Conservatives/Republicans don't CARE" bit, and that, first and foremost is hurting the GOP.
Sarah Palin tried to bring home the idea that Republicans/Conservatives are caring people, family people, (family is very important to Hispanic and American Indian voters) and the GOP threw her under the bus with the rest of Conservative America instead of capitalizing on the theme.
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