(http://www.politico.com/)
Poll: Hispanics give mixed marks
By: Carrie Budoff Brown
November 3, 2010 10:01 PM EDT
Hispanic voters gave mixed marks to President Barack Obama in an
election-eve poll released Wednesday — an early sign that he has ground to
make up
with this constituency ahead of his 2012 reelection campaign.
Forty-nine percent of Hispanic voters said they approved of Obama’s
handling of immigration, and 40 percent disapproved, according to the polling
by
Latino Decisions, which surveyed 3,200 voters in eight key states.
Thirty-nine percent said they would definitely support Obama in 2012,
while 20 percent said they might and 29 percent said they wouldn’t back him
for
reelection.
“This is not a resounding endorsement and reflects frustration in the
Latino community,” said Gary Segura, a senior researcher with Latino Decisions
and Stanford University professor. “The president’s path to reelection
with Latinos requires some work and investment of time.”
The findings provide a benchmark for Obama's support within the Hispanic
community after months of contentious debate over the Arizona enforcement
law and the collapse of immigration reform in Congress.
His overall job rating was 68 percent approve, 25 percent disapprove.
Latinos turned out heavily for Democratic senators in the West, erecting a
firewall that helped prevent Republicans from seizing control of the upper
chamber, Segura said.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.)
and Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Ca.) ran the most sophisticated operations this
year aimed at Hispanics, stuck by their support of immigration reform – and
the Latinos rewarded them.
“We think there’s a message in there for other Democrats, including the
president,” said Frank Sharry, executive director of America’s Voice, an
immigration reform advocacy group that sponsored the survey with National
Council of La Raza and Service Employees International Union, among others.
“Our view is that if you sit on your hands on immigration, you lose. If
lean into it, you win,” Sharry added.
Reid beat Republican Sharron Angle among Hispanics, 90 percent to 8
percent – the widest spread of any statewide campaign in the eight states
surveyed. Angle ran several harsh ads that were called anti-immigrant and
anti-Hispanic.
Boxer topped Republican Carly Fiorina, 86 percent to 14 percent. And
Bennet beat Republican Ken Buck, 81 percent to 19 percent.
The Latino Decisions polling showed larger margins than exit polling
conducted by the TV networks. For example, the support from Latinos for Reid
and
Boxer was 68 percent and 65 percent, respectively, in the network polls.
The sample size wasn’t large enough to report figures for Colorado.
Segura said the network exit polling often fail to capture enough data
from an ethnic or racial subgroup to draw accurate conclusions.
Latino Decisions surveyed 400 voters in each of the eight states who said
they were certain to vote or had already voted. The margin of error for
each state is plus or minus 5 percentage points, and for the total 3,200-voter
sample, it is plus or minus 1.7 points.
The eight states are Florida, Illinois, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada,
California, Texas and Colorado.
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