Best Way To Attract More Latinos to the Republican Party . . .

and not lose more than gained from the conservative base:

Appealing to immigrants should not mean adopting the donkey and calling it an elephant

Stay true to conservative principles . . .  articulate them well and essentially the same to everyone. Outreach to Latinos, Blacks, Catholics, Women is outreach to the country as a whole.  Do not be afraid to point out the negative impact of Democrat policies.

Consider these selected excerpts from a recent article in the publication OXY.com by Geraldo L. Cadava:   Rise of the Conservative Latinos.  They resonate well with our instincts, and experience with Americans with Hispanic ancestry.

 

 

But most up-and-coming Latino Republicans walk in step with new-wave conservatism. They advocate policies indistinguishable from the mainstream or far right elements of their party: pro-growth business measures, lower taxes, smaller government, curtailed entitlements, pro-life, school choice, anti-Affordable Care Act. The list goes on, begging the question: What’s Latino about them at all?

Many seem to want to pull the GOP more toward the center on comprehensive immigration reform, a goal supported by some 80 percent of Latinos. But legislators such as Rep. Raúl Labrador of Idaho, who bailed on bipartisan deliberations this summer, cast doubt on even this mildly moderating influence. Others, including Governor Martinez of New Mexico and Gabriel Gomez of Massachusetts, who lost his bid for a U.S. Senate seat earlier this year, emphasized that their bootstrapping work ethic and traditional religious beliefs somehow stemmed from their Latino upbringing. On her website, Marilinda Garcia mentions her mixed Italian-American and Spanish-American heritage. But more often, conservative Latinos eschew their ethnicity — note the absence of accents over their names — and any discernable connections with something that might be called Latino politics.

The Party will never “get” all Latinos, anymore than it will get everyone else, and it should not try if it means giving up principles the Party should stand for — the rule of law, fairness to all aspiring immigrants, economic freedoms and limited government (as a practical identity immigrants are leaving governments claiming socialist operating principles.)

The Republican Party should not presume aspiring citizens are predisposed to being wards of the state, or low wage chattel for businesses. The Party should appeal to the true immigrants best instincts, those that appreciate America’s rule of law and the opportunities it is able to provide because of less government, a free market system, individual rights and responsibilities and an American cultural identity that encompasses that ethos.

The instincts that told individuals and parents with children to leave their birth country for better, but honest, opportunity here are understood, indeed honored.  But that does not justify the position that people in such circumstances can ethically expect to burden our welfare system or demand citizenship  by virtue of being in the country illegally, however long, when others including desperate parents elsewhere abide by our immigration rules.  Our country’s borders must be sacred, and orderly rules for immigration respected, or frankly we should not be interested in attracting anyone intent on undermining those principles.

R Mall

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