Clinton gets warm welcome from Latinos
Robyn Beck /AFP/Getty Images
Members of the United Farm Workers, which endorsed Hillary Rodham Clinton, fill a town hall meeting at Hartnell College in the Salinas Valley that featured the Democratic presidential hopeful.
The United Farm Workers union endorses her. One expert says Obama remains a relatively unknown entity.
SALINAS, CALIF. -- The next showdown in the Democratic presidential contest may be in South Carolina on Saturday, but Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton showed her determination to look further down the campaign calendar Tuesday with a whirlwind visit to California's Salinas Valley and to a high school in Phoenix.
With polls showing Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, her chief rival, benefiting from the support of African American voters in South Carolina, Clinton's coast-to-coast excursion played to a different audience with whom she has held the upper hand -- Latinos.
The New York senator won Saturday's Nevada caucuses, besting Obama by 2 to 1 among Latinos. And a Field Poll released Tuesday showed her with an even bigger advantage -- 59% to 19% -- among Latinos likely to vote in the Feb. 5 California primary.
Clinton greeted an overflow crowd of more than 2,000 at the gymnasium of Hartnell College in this agricultural city, where she received the endorsement of the United Farm Workers of America.
Arturo Rodriguez, president of the union, told an audience that included a contingent of red-shirted farm workers from across California that the UFW's leadership had reached a "unanimous" decision to endorse Clinton.
"We know that Sen. Clinton . . . will ensure that Americans get health insurance throughout the United States," Rodriguez told the crowd. "She will ensure that the economic issues that face working families in America will be dealt with in her administration. She will repair the relationships with countries throughout the world."
When Clinton took the gymnasium stage, the crowd shouted greetings and chanted her name. During her speech and a brief question-and-answer session, Clinton hewed mainly to economic themes that have dominated the campaign in recent days.
The crowd greeted her most warmly when she talked about reforming education -- making preschool available to all children and scrapping President Bush's No Child Left Behind program to put more decision-making in the hands of teachers.
"I want education to be available to every single child in America in a way that gives you a chance to live up to your God-given potential," Clinton said.
That launched the crowd into the traditional farm workers union chant, "Si, se puede!" The candidate smiled broadly and basked in the moment before slightly botching her own "Si, se puede." ("Si, se pue-dah," she offered.) She added the translation, "That's right: 'Yes, we can!' "
Clinton repeated her call for comprehensive immigration reform and belittled the suggestion "that you lock up and deport 12 [million] to 14 million people" who have entered the U.S. illegally. She said such an effort would cost more than $200 billion, require some 100,000 federal law-enforcement officials and force intrusive searches of homes and businesses.
"I don't think most Americans would welcome that," she said.
Field Poll Director Mark DiCamillo said Clinton has consistently been well received in the Latino community. "Obama has not been able to dent her advantage," he said.
Harry Pachon, president of the Tomas Rivera Policy Institute at USC, said Obama remains an unknown quantity to many Latinos.
A Spanish-language news report from the Nevada caucuses described some voters as unclear even as to the name of Clinton's prime challenger. "They were looking for an Omega, not an Obama," Pachon said. "So his name is just not recognized yet."
Clinton has been served well by her multiple endorsements from Latino elected officials, including Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Pachon said. Social worker Nora Lopez took her 9-year-old daughter, Kylee, out of school Tuesday and drove from Santa Cruz to see Clinton.
"Women are having an opportunity to be educated and to have a voice," Lopez said. "Having a chance to have a woman in the White House, that's monumental. It's history in the making. And we wanted to be here to see it."
The effect of the UFW endorsement is hard to assess. The union and particularly its founders, Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, maintain a storied place in the Latino community for strikes and boycotts of the 1960s and 1970s that helped form a political consciousness. Rodriguez said union members are prepared to travel to key precincts to rally for Clinton.
But the union has struggled to bolster its membership in recent years. Although a Clinton news release claimed the union has 27,000 members, a union leader conceded that was a cumulative enrollment over a year's time. A report to the federal government last year showed the UFW with fewer than 6,000 members.
With polls showing Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, her chief rival, benefiting from the support of African American voters in South Carolina, Clinton's coast-to-coast excursion played to a different audience with whom she has held the upper hand -- Latinos.
The New York senator won Saturday's Nevada caucuses, besting Obama by 2 to 1 among Latinos. And a Field Poll released Tuesday showed her with an even bigger advantage -- 59% to 19% -- among Latinos likely to vote in the Feb. 5 California primary.
Clinton greeted an overflow crowd of more than 2,000 at the gymnasium of Hartnell College in this agricultural city, where she received the endorsement of the United Farm Workers of America.
Arturo Rodriguez, president of the union, told an audience that included a contingent of red-shirted farm workers from across California that the UFW's leadership had reached a "unanimous" decision to endorse Clinton.
"We know that Sen. Clinton . . . will ensure that Americans get health insurance throughout the United States," Rodriguez told the crowd. "She will ensure that the economic issues that face working families in America will be dealt with in her administration. She will repair the relationships with countries throughout the world."
When Clinton took the gymnasium stage, the crowd shouted greetings and chanted her name. During her speech and a brief question-and-answer session, Clinton hewed mainly to economic themes that have dominated the campaign in recent days.
The crowd greeted her most warmly when she talked about reforming education -- making preschool available to all children and scrapping President Bush's No Child Left Behind program to put more decision-making in the hands of teachers.
"I want education to be available to every single child in America in a way that gives you a chance to live up to your God-given potential," Clinton said.
That launched the crowd into the traditional farm workers union chant, "Si, se puede!" The candidate smiled broadly and basked in the moment before slightly botching her own "Si, se puede." ("Si, se pue-dah," she offered.) She added the translation, "That's right: 'Yes, we can!' "
Clinton repeated her call for comprehensive immigration reform and belittled the suggestion "that you lock up and deport 12 [million] to 14 million people" who have entered the U.S. illegally. She said such an effort would cost more than $200 billion, require some 100,000 federal law-enforcement officials and force intrusive searches of homes and businesses.
"I don't think most Americans would welcome that," she said.
Field Poll Director Mark DiCamillo said Clinton has consistently been well received in the Latino community. "Obama has not been able to dent her advantage," he said.
Harry Pachon, president of the Tomas Rivera Policy Institute at USC, said Obama remains an unknown quantity to many Latinos.
A Spanish-language news report from the Nevada caucuses described some voters as unclear even as to the name of Clinton's prime challenger. "They were looking for an Omega, not an Obama," Pachon said. "So his name is just not recognized yet."
Clinton has been served well by her multiple endorsements from Latino elected officials, including Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Pachon said. Social worker Nora Lopez took her 9-year-old daughter, Kylee, out of school Tuesday and drove from Santa Cruz to see Clinton.
"Women are having an opportunity to be educated and to have a voice," Lopez said. "Having a chance to have a woman in the White House, that's monumental. It's history in the making. And we wanted to be here to see it."
The effect of the UFW endorsement is hard to assess. The union and particularly its founders, Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, maintain a storied place in the Latino community for strikes and boycotts of the 1960s and 1970s that helped form a political consciousness. Rodriguez said union members are prepared to travel to key precincts to rally for Clinton.
But the union has struggled to bolster its membership in recent years. Although a Clinton news release claimed the union has 27,000 members, a union leader conceded that was a cumulative enrollment over a year's time. A report to the federal government last year showed the UFW with fewer than 6,000 members.
7 comments:
Now after watching the presidential debates between Barrack Obama and Hillary Clinton I have noticed that Clinton does seem to have more of an advantage with the Latino people than Obama does. She does have alot to offer the Latino community. The only problem that I have is that in this article there is talk of a unanimous decision to support Clinton in California. Also it says in the article that the Latino bloc just doesnt really know who Obama is. The problem with all this is that maybe Obama is better for the latino people. The Latinos only support Clinton because they remembered a Clinton from before and knew that life was better then than with Bush, but the question is do you think she is better? Or do you think these people need to take a further look into Obamas stance?
With the planks of Hillary Clinton's campaign on immigration, do you think that she is helping endorse the idea of a wall? Is she advocating for the advancement of Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants or neither? And furthermore do you think that Gutierrez would be supporting Clinton or Obama or niether?
Good question on whether Clinton or Obama are seeing walls or mirrors in this immigration debate.
I think both are seing both. They are both are strong border security first and then comprehensive immigration reform. The one difference that I saw was that unlike Clinto, Obama supports granting drivers licenses to undocumented immigrants claiming a public safety issue.
-Profe
Discussion about hillary pulling the hispanic vote. Could be because her husband sponsered the Gear Up program that helped youths, including hispanics.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-OU9PRb_jqA
This is from an earlier debate but it did seem relevant to me. This article talks about the republican debate pulling more mexican-american's than the democratic debate. It is hard to say if the people that watched the debates are republicans, democrats or on the fence. The viewers may have been looking to see what would happen if the republican party took the presidency again, or there could be a shift to the right in voters. Either way this article has some interesting information.
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6511229.html
Truthfully I dont see how any of these candidates have anything for a plan to deal with the problems of immigration. Both of their ideas seem to be fragmented and in favor of both sides. Im not saying that it isnt a complicated issue, but it is something that needs to be dealt with. How are they going to crack down on illegal immigrants but favor those who are still illegal and have been working here and help them get citizenship? Basically What I mean is how do you seperate those who must be deported from those that should be given the opportunity to stay? If there is no system set in place, than it will remain an issue for a while.
Now so far in these debates between Obama and Clinton I see that it seems as though Obama is a little bit more sympathetic to the immigrants. I mean being the president of America is very hard on this issue because you want what is best for your American people, but thats why this is such a huge issue because the immigrants want to be American and some of them deserve it more than white people who were born here because they work so hard. Now going back to Obama, I was just trying to point out that Obama wants to work on helping Mexico's economic condition so that illegal immigration will decline. He also wants to give immigrants the rights to driver's licenses which Hillary is opposed to. What do you guys think about that since it seems as though Clinton has the Latino Vote in her pocket?
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