Democrats go deep to court Latino vote
The Latino vote will be particularly crucial on Feb. 5, when more than 20 states vote coast to coast in the closest thing yet to a national presidential primary.
"You've got states like California, New Jersey, New York, Illinois, Arizona, Colorado,"
They're reaching into the communities in key Western states and avoiding old-style ethnic politicking.
By Mark Z. Barabak and Robin Abcarian, Los Angeles Times Staff Writers
Robyn Beck / AFP / Getty Images
Senator Hillary Clinton greets waitresses at Lindo Michoacan restaurant in Las Vegas last week.
January 17, 2008
LAS VEGAS -- Hillary Rodham Clinton was sympathetic as, one after another, members of the audience discussed their unhappy dealings with shady home lenders.
"This is a problem we're going to talk a lot about in this campaign," the Democratic hopeful promised, suggesting that presidential candidates too often isolate issues like the sub-prime mortgage meltdown from the bigger economic picture.
"All of our problems are interconnected, but we treat them as though one is guacamole and one is chips," the New York senator said, drawing laughter and applause from the mostly Latino crowd gathered at the Lindo Michoacan restaurant off the Las Vegas Strip.
As the presidential campaign moves south and west from the mostly white, heavily rural states of Iowa and New Hampshire, Democrats are reaching out to Latino voters as never before -- and not just through strained similes, or rallies set to mariachi music.
In California, Nevada, Arizona and elsewhere across the country, the candidates are advertising extensively in Spanish, running bilingual phone banks and dispatching door-knockers fluent in English and Spanish.
They have ardently wooed and won the support of Latino political luminaries -- among them Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa for Clinton and former Transportation and Energy Secretary Federico Pena for Barack Obama -- and dispatched them to key states to campaign on their behalf.
Read More
Source LA Times
"You've got states like California, New Jersey, New York, Illinois, Arizona, Colorado,"
They're reaching into the communities in key Western states and avoiding old-style ethnic politicking.
By Mark Z. Barabak and Robin Abcarian, Los Angeles Times Staff Writers
Robyn Beck / AFP / Getty Images
Senator Hillary Clinton greets waitresses at Lindo Michoacan restaurant in Las Vegas last week.
January 17, 2008
LAS VEGAS -- Hillary Rodham Clinton was sympathetic as, one after another, members of the audience discussed their unhappy dealings with shady home lenders.
"This is a problem we're going to talk a lot about in this campaign," the Democratic hopeful promised, suggesting that presidential candidates too often isolate issues like the sub-prime mortgage meltdown from the bigger economic picture.
"All of our problems are interconnected, but we treat them as though one is guacamole and one is chips," the New York senator said, drawing laughter and applause from the mostly Latino crowd gathered at the Lindo Michoacan restaurant off the Las Vegas Strip.
As the presidential campaign moves south and west from the mostly white, heavily rural states of Iowa and New Hampshire, Democrats are reaching out to Latino voters as never before -- and not just through strained similes, or rallies set to mariachi music.
In California, Nevada, Arizona and elsewhere across the country, the candidates are advertising extensively in Spanish, running bilingual phone banks and dispatching door-knockers fluent in English and Spanish.
They have ardently wooed and won the support of Latino political luminaries -- among them Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa for Clinton and former Transportation and Energy Secretary Federico Pena for Barack Obama -- and dispatched them to key states to campaign on their behalf.
Read More
Source LA Times
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