{"id":13379,"date":"2023-08-08T15:49:30","date_gmt":"2023-08-08T15:49:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/?p=13379"},"modified":"2023-08-10T19:20:31","modified_gmt":"2023-08-10T19:20:31","slug":"as-trump-seeks-reelection-a-growing-army-of-immigrant-voters-stands-in-his-path","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/?p=13379","title":{"rendered":"As Trump seeks reelection, a growing army of immigrant voters stands in his path"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

by <\/em>Matt Pearce<\/em><\/a>, LA Times<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

This\nis where a nation changes: a public school auditorium that moonlights as a\nveritable citizenship factory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At\nthe M.O. Campbell Educational Center, where murals honoring the arts and\nsciences adorn the walls, U.S. immigration officials routinely hold packed\nnaturalization ceremonies. Immigrants approved for citizenship walk in, take\nthe oath of allegiance, and walk out as Americans \u2014 and as a small army of new\nvoters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\nwill never, ever be easier to register than it is this morning,\u201d U.S. District\nJudge Keith P. Ellison, who presided over a ceremony last month, told the 2,155\nimmigrants from more than 100 countries who had just taken their citizenship\noaths.\u201cThe record for registrations is 89% of those who are sworn\nin…. Let\u2019s see if we can break that record today.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Amish\nSoni, a 34-year-old radiologist from India holding a small American flag, was\none of the 85% who registered to vote that morning, aided by a volunteer from\nthe League of Women Voters. He \u201cdefinitely\u201d plans to vote in 2020, partly\nbecause he thinks the healthcare system should be fixed, but also: \u201cI\u2019m not a\nbig fan of Donald Trump.\u201d And he\u2019s far from the only one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At\nceremonies like these across the country, hundreds of thousands of immigrants\nare expected to receive their U.S. citizenship and become eligible to vote\nbefore November 2020, gently reshaping\u2014and threatening \u2014 the\nelectoral path that President Trump must thread to win reelection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over\nthe last two decades, naturalized immigrants have grown into a force at the\nballot box, with the United States recently swearing in more than 700,000\nforeign-born U.S. citizens each year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Naturalized\ncitizens \u2014 who share the full legal rights of natural-born citizens, except for\nthe ability to become president \u2014cast more than 8% of the ballots in\nthe 2018 midterm elections, almost double their share in the 1996 presidential\ncontest, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Surveys\nshow that many of the new citizens are liberal-leaning, which is one of several\ndemographic trends helping put some historically red states such as Texas,\nArizona and Georgia closer to Democrats\u2019 reach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\ngains in immigrants\u2019 electoral strength have been gradual. But Trump\u2019s anti-immigration\npolicies may be accelerating the trend by spurring even more people to\nnaturalize and to vote, worrying some moderate Republican experts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s\nnot \u2018bad-ish\u2019 news. It\u2019s extremely bad,\u201d said Mike Madrid, a Sacramento-based\nGOP consultant who studies Latino voters. He thinks the party\u2019s use of\nanti-immigrant rhetoric to mobilize non-college-educated white voters will come\nat a steep electoral price. \u201cThis is a five-alarm fire.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some\nexperts said the national climate reminded them of California in the mid-1990s,\nwhen heightened rhetoric against immigrants and the Proposition 187 ballot\nmeasure to prohibit services for some immigrants inspired a wave of eligible\nLatino immigrants to naturalize and register to vote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\nhelped transform the home of Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon into a nearly\nimpenetrable Democratic stronghold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cRepublicans\ndid not learn their lesson, and they have revived some of that anti-Latino\nsentiment,\u201d said U.S. Rep. Norma Torres (D-Pomona), who was born in Guatemala\nand naturalized in 1996 so she could get more involved in politics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nTrump campaign disagrees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDemocrats\nmake a mistake when they assume that all immigrants think the same way,\u201d said\ncampaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh. \u201cOur own data shows that a great many legal\nimmigrants agree with President Trump\u2019s position on enforcing immigration laws,\nbecause they feel that if their families played by the rules, then other people\nought to as well.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Murtaugh\ndeclined to share the data, but he said the numbers are whyTrump made a\nrecent visit to New Mexico \u2014 a state he lost to Hillary Clinton by more than 8percentage points\u2014 to court Latino voters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Citizenship\napplications spiked in the two years before the 2016 election, which is common\nbefore a presidential contest. But instead of dropping as usual afterward, the\nnumber of filings grew in 2017 in the wake of Trump\u2019s victory. The more than\n800,000 citizenship requests in 2018 were also the most filed in a midterm\nelection year in two decades.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere\nare these surges in applications when immigrants perceive that it\u2019s a time of\ncrisis,\u201d said Arturo Vargas, chief executive of NALEO Educational Fund, a\nnonprofit that promotes greater Latino participation in civic life. \u201cWe are\ngoing through a similar period right now at the national level, where\nimmigrants are feeling a bit in the cross-hairs by the Trump administration.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According\nto data collected by the New Americans Campaign, a coalition of nonprofits,\nalmost a third of U.S. immigrants hoping to naturalize this year were most\ninterested in gaining the power to vote \u2014 the \u201ctop reason by far,\u201d said Melissa\nRodgers\u200b, the director of programs at the Immigrant Legal Resource Center,\nwhich runs the coalition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Filing\nan application does not necessarily lead to naturalization; the denial rate is\nusually about 1 in 10.Immigrant advocacy groups have complained that\nthe Trump administration has allowed a backlog to pile up, putting some\napplicants at risk of missing the 2020 election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Latino\nand Asian immigrants are particularly potent additions to the electorate, with\nturnout rates that are often 5 to 8 percentage points higher than their\nnatural-born counterparts, according to census estimates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A September survey by Univision<\/a>, conducted by the\nresearch firm Latino Decisions, said 81% of naturalized Latino respondents\ndisapproved of the job Trump was doing as president; 12% said they were\ncommitted to voting for Trump in the 2020 election; and 64% said they planned\nto vote for the eventual Democratic nominee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA\nlot of folks are responding to the climate of fear and division and general\nintimidation against immigrant and refugee communities,\u201d said Diego\nI\u00f1iguez-Lopez, the policy and campaigns manager at National Partnership for New\nAmericans, a coalition of immigrant advocacy groups. This year, the coalition\nlaunched a campaign to try to naturalize 1 million new citizens in time for the\n2020 election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump\nhas been less unpopular with naturalized Asian immigrants, with a 38% approval\nand 52% disapproval rating, according to a 2018 survey <\/a>by <\/a>Asian and Pacific Islander American <\/a>and AAPI Data<\/a>. These voters reported supporting\nHillary Clinton over Trump by 48% to 28%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\nrecent decades, Asian Americans as a whole \u2014 the fastest-growing ethnicity in\nthe country \u2014 had been generally more open to supporting Republicans<\/a>.\nBut the diverse group is increasingly becoming a reliably Democratic\ndemographic, according to Karthick Ramakrishnan, a professor of public policy\nat UC Riverside who studies Asian American voting trends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat\nwe\u2019ve seen in the last two election cycles is either a crystallization or\nsolidification in voting preferences and increasingly party preferences as\nwell,\u201d Ramakrishnan said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Liking\na party is one thing. Mobilizing to vote is another. Roughly three-fifths of\nforeign-born Asian American voters surveyed by APIAVote and AAPI Data said they\nwere not contacted by the Democratic Party or the GOP before the 2018 election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Language\ncan be a barrier, and \u201ca lot of folks don\u2019t watch the same channels,\u201d making\npeople harder to reach through the media, said Harris County, Texas, Judge Lina\nHidalgo, who immigrated to the U.S. in 2005 after fleeing Colombia and who\nbecame a U.S. citizen in 2013. Last year, the 28-year-old was among the\nDemocrats who swept Republicans out of power in the county, where immigrants\nmake up more than a quarter of the population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Politicians\nneed \u201cto reach people where they are,\u201d said Hidalgo, who appeared at last\nmonth\u2019s ceremony to urge the new citizens to get involved in their communities\nand vote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At\nthe presidential level, naturalized immigrants\u2019 voting power is largely diluted\nby the electoral college. New citizens most commonly settle in Democratic\nbastions such as California and New York, where their votes are not expected to\naffect the next presidential election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Along\nwith Texas, Florida is a key exception. The battleground state adds between\n70,000 and 100,000 naturalized citizens each year, with more than 20,000 born\nin communist Cuba, amore conservative voter bloc that has helped\nRepublicans maintain razor-thin majorities in the state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Immigration\nis only one of several forces reshaping the electoral map, such as rural areas\u2019\nswing toward the GOP and the suburbs\u2019 moves toward the Democratic Party.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Paul\nBentz, a senior vice president of research and strategy at HighGround Inc., atraditionally Republican public affairs firm, said that younger voters,\ncollege-educated suburbanites and new residents from California are also\nhelping push Arizona from red to purple.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe\npresident\u2019s got big problems in multiple segments, not just naturalized\nvoters,\u201d Bentz said. He added that new voters are not monolithic, either, and\nthat \u201cborder enforcement is not every Latino in Arizona\u2019s No. 1 issue.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At\nthe Houston ceremony, new citizen Raul Borjas, 32, who was born in Venezuela,\nsaid he generally shares Republicans\u2019 policy views.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe\nU.S. has given me the freedom to express myself, which is particularly\nimportant to us as Venezuelans, who are losing that freedom in our country,\u201d\nBorjas said, alluding to the political strife in his home country, as he waited\nto get his picture taken with the judge who administered his citizenship oath.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But\nhe said he thought the party had fallen out of step on gun control policies,\nand he\u2019s not sure whether he will vote for Trump.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hans\nGottwald, 74, an Alvin, Texas, retiree, said he was born in Germany and has\nlived in the U.S. since 1963 after he served three years in the U.S. Army. He\nsaid he decided to become a citizen so he could vote in the next national\nelection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\nmiss that I couldn\u2019t vote for many years, but I think 2020 is very important to\nme,\u201d Gottwald said. He\u2019s not sure whether he\u2019s going to support Trump or a\nDemocratic challenger. He likes Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, but\nsaid, \u201cI will not vote for a socialist,\u201d apparently referring to Vermont Sen.\nBernie Sanders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Walter\nMartinez, 22, who was born in El Salvador and has lived in the U.S. since he\nwas a young child, said he long felt like an American, and he wanted to\nnaturalize as a citizen before it potentially became more difficult to do so.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He\ndoesn\u2019t see himself as very politically engaged, but he plans to vote in 2020 \u2014\nand definitely not for Trump.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNo\ndoubt,\u201d Martinez said with a laugh, adding he doesn\u2019t like the way the\nadministration has treated Latinos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMaybe he knows money,\u201d Martinez said of the president, \u201cbut I don\u2019t agree how he is toward other people.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Matt Pearce, LA Times This is where a nation changes: a public school auditorium that moonlights as a veritable citizenship factory. At the M.O. Campbell Educational Center, where murals honoring the arts and sciences […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13380,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[70],"tags":[80,81],"class_list":{"0":"post-13379","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-latino-vote","8":"tag-immigration","9":"tag-latino-vote"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13379"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13379\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13860,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13379\/revisions\/13860"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}