Latinos can’t afford to sit out election

Yet President Barack Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress are setting adrift any kind of comprehensive immigration reform this year. The president dedicated one sentence to the issue in his State of the Union address. Immigration reform is difficult and does not command the priority of economic stimulus or health care reform legislation.

But with midterm elections approaching, Latinos have nowhere to turn. The GOP — whose business wing historically led the party in support of immigration — are now in the thrall of xenophobic populists and tea-partiers. The GOP revolted against its own pro-immigrant president, George W. Bush, and is pursuing an attrition strategy to force out the nation’s nearly 11 million unauthorized immigrants.

The Republicans are on a suicide march against immutable demographic trends. Hispanics make up more than 15 percent of the population today and will be nearly 30 percent by 2050, when they and their Asian- and African-American political allies will outnumber whites, according to the Pew Research Center.

As Richard Nadler, the late conservative commentator, wrote last year: “Opponents of comprehensive immigration reform are sitting on a demographic time bomb. ... If immigration reform is the evil that ‘enforcement only’ partisans claim it to be, they will need not one fence bordering Mexico, but multiple barriers to partition California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Nevada, Colorado, Florida, New York and New Jersey from the rest of the nation.”

But reason doesn’t do much for Latinos today. After years of moving toward Bush-like Republicans who lauded both family and immigrant values, they voted overwhelmingly for Obama, only to be left feeling frustrated.

Instead of voting Republican come November, many may just stay home.

Rep. Luis Gutierrez, an Illinois Democrat whose comprehensive immigration reform bill is backed by most Hispanic and pro-immigrant groups, even drew a line in the sand. He told the Mexican news service Notimex that if the administration doesn’t move on immigration by March 21, Latinos “will have to reflect on the idea of a punishment with a vote of absence” in November.

The threat isn’t idle. The Latino vote, which grew 64 percent from 2000 to 2008, helped push Obama over the top in several swing states. The pro-immigrant group America’s Voice has just released a report showing that Latinos make up more than a quarter of the population in 79 congressional districts and more than a quarter of the voters in 40 of them.

The report detailed how if some dispirited Latino voters stay home in November, it could change the results in 40 tight elections, including eight for the Senate, 29 for the House and three governorships.

Among them are Senate seats currently or recently held by Democrats Harry Reid in Nevada, Barbara Boxer in California, Ken Salazar in Colorado and Obama in Illinois. Two of the Senate seats are held by moderate Republicans, John McCain of Arizona and Mel Martinez of Florida.

The disappointment among Latinos is understandable. But just as it would be self-defeating for Hispanics not to participate in the April census, as some radio commentators advocate in a protest against suspected undercounting of Latinos, they also would be shooting themselves in the foot by not voting.

The other issues Hispanics care about — the economy, health care, the country’s two wars — are at play, too. Latinos need to make their voices heard at the polls.

Legalization of the unauthorized and a guest worker program would bring economic benefits for all Americans and help re-establish immigration order. But Gutierrez and others should consider this: A wise leader waits patiently for the right political time to stage an all-out strike. That time is not now.

Edward Schumacher-Matos writes for the Washington Post Writers Group.