The Battle over Immigration Has Unleashed a Tsunami of New Voters

[AlphaCentauri]

Source: La Prensa SD

A new report suggests that “2008 will be the year of the immigrant and Latino voter,” as “unprecedented numbers of immigrants are becoming citizens and registering to vote.” The stakes, according to the report by America’s Voice, an immigrants’ rights group, “could not be higher.”
Pro-immigrant groups are registering hundreds of thousands of new citizens to vote. They, along with earlier generations of immigrants, are being mobilized in large part by the passions surrounding the often heated debate over immigration.


The report calls members of these communities a “sleeping giant,” awoken by the rhetoric of the anti-immigration hardliners who have often dominated debate over the issue. The We Are America Alliance — with a $10 million field operation — is trying to reach the ambitious goal of registering a half-million new voters an getting a million members of immigrant communities to the polls. Many are located in the crucial battleground states that will ultimately decide the election. The alliance has registered over 83,000 new voters in Florida and 35,000 in Pennsylvania. In Colorado, nearly 35,000 new voters could have a decisive impact on the Presidential contest. In Nevada, the 52,000 new voters the alliance registered are almost 2.5 times the margin of victory in that state in the 2004 presidential election (George W. Bush won Nevada by 21,500 votes). And the nearly 40,000 new registrations in New Mexico could be a major factor in a state that supported George W. Bush by less than 6,000 votes in 2004 and has an open U.S. Senate seat in 2008.


If organizers can deliver on their promises, it may signal a sea-change in American politics. As the report’s authors predict, “Energized by their first leap into the political process, these new citizens will not rest after they cast their votes, and will continue to press their elected officials to enact laws that they support.”


In the wake of two failed attempts to pass a Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CIR) measure in recent years, immigrant rights advocates’ worst fears have materialized. As a recent New York Times editorial put it, “the Bush administration keeps raiding factories and farms, terrorizing immigrant families while exposing horrific accounts of workplace abuses. Children toil in slaughterhouses; detainees languish in federal lockups, dying without decent medical care. Day laborers are harassed and robbed of wages. An ineffective border fence is behind schedule and millions over budget. Local enforcers drag citizens and legal residents into their nets, to the cheers of the Minutemen.”




Read more: http://www.laprensa-sandiego.org/current/New.Voters.102408.htm

[EFerrari]

1. McBomb is going to try to suppress those votes in NM, CO.

Stay ready.

[Juche]

2. Kerry lost in 2004 by 120k votes

He lost by 120k votes in Ohio and everyone talks about how had he gotten an extra 120k votes there he would've won in 2004. However if he had won Nevada, Colorado & New Mexico (which he lost by a combined total of about 120k votes) he would've won 20 electoral votes and won the presidency with 272 EV. So he had 2 realistic paths to victory, Ohio or the southwest.

That is good because democratic candidates tend to be somewhat more fair to immigrants and latinos (stronger on labor rights, uniting families, healthcare & education access, etc) and have about a 40 pt gap over the GOP in this election cycle. However when you look at how the GOP has totally lost the black vote it didn't make them change policies. Even with blacks making up 13% of hte electorate and going democratic by 80 point margins the GOP is still race baiting. So I don't think registering latino voters will make the GOP change their policies or tactics. They may hide them more with dog whistle tactics, but they won't stop.

[Peace Patriot]

4. 80% of the votes in the 2004 election were counted using 'TRADE SECRET,' PROPRIETARY

programming code, owned and controlled by Bushwhack corporations, with virtually no audit/recount controls.

When you say that Kerry "lost by 120k votes," how do you know?

That's what the Corpo/Fascist electronic voting manufactures reported to us, and what the Corpo/Fascist 'news' monopolies echoed. Is it true? And if you believe it, what is the basis of your belief?

I don't think that ANY result of this 100% non-transparent voting system should be taken at face value, and quoted as if it had been verified and proven. It has not been--and cannot be--verified.

This corporate coup d'etat--their takeover of our election system--merits at least an asterisk, stating that the results are not verifiable.

[Bette Noir]

3. Here's a thought:

Enough Latinos register and vote, and we'll become a valued constituency. Politicians will compete to gain our votes, instead of whipping up racism against us every 4-5 years, like they have for as long as I can remember.

One can dream.

[ConcernedCanuk]

5. Dat wunnerful Boosh guy ! He just can't stop UNITING peoples! - wunnerful, wunnerful man der . .

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