With the relatively breaking news that the Los Angeles City Council has voted to ban nearly all travel and future contracts with the entire state of Arizona, as well as the developing efforts in nine states to enact similar discriminatory legislation against Latinos and Hispanics, it is worth considering the sheer long-term electoral implications behind these racist shenanigans.
One person who is undoubtedly cringing is none other than Dick Armey, scion of the astro-turfed Tea Party "movement."
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Former House Majority Leader Dick Armey, a Texas Republican who now works closely with Tea Party activists, said today that Republicans are alienating Hispanic voters with their rhetoric on the immigration issue.
"These guys are trying to blow it," Armey said at a National Press Club luncheon.
Armey was not speaking directly to Arizona's efforts (the law was passed well after these statements), but he might as well have been. And if anyone is aware of the implications of pandering to a reactionary base, that would be Dick Armey. But he is not the only member of the GOP to recognize the electoral monster that this may have created. Indeed, Dr. Evil himself has weighed in:
"I think there is going to be some constitutional problems with the bill," top Bush strategist Karl Rove said during a stop on his book tour. "I wished they hadn't passed it, in a way."
"Wished they hadn't passed it" is a masterful piece of understatement. In fact, it's likely that top GOP strategists are burying their hands in their faces, muttering to themselves, "What the fuck have we done?"
Not to put too fine a point on it, but what you've done is alienate an enormous voting bloc at the time their political impressions are just being formed:
Ninety percent of Hispanics under 18 in Arizona are U.S. citizens, and the explosive growth of the Hispanic population this decade has been driven by U.S. births. That’s a switch from the 1990s, when most of the Hispanic population’s increase was due to non-citizen immigration.
"This law and potential copy cat laws have the ability to seal the fate of the Republican Party with Hispanics in the exact same way that the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act did with African Americans," said Matt Barreto, a pollster for Latino Decisions and an associate political science professor at the University of Washington.
Fox News has taken the tack lately of pointing out that Americans as a whole support the Arizona legislation. Indeed, many Americans will support anything that seems to provide a quick fix to a problem that doesn't directly affect them. But there is something deeper in these superfluous polls that should worry the GOP greatly.
Young people are less supportive of the Arizona immigration law than are older Americans. Fewer than half (45%) of those younger than 30 approve of the new law while 47% disapprove. Majorities of older age groups – including 74% of those 65 and older – approve of the law.
Although the analogy is imperfect, I'm reminded of the galvanizing effect the military Draft had upon young people in this country in the late 60's and early 70's. What these reactionaries apparently fail to appreciate is the degree to which young people congregate, talk, and commisserate about issues that directly affect them. These are the issues that connect them, the issues that stay with them for a lifetime because they are formative of their identities. A political assault on the identity of an entire population is going to carry with it massive repercussions for the future.
Here is an article from ABC detailing how Latino students are seeing what the mainstream media has blithely characterized as a "debate."
Gregorio Montes de Oca, 22, a political science and Chicano and Chicano studies senior at Arizona State University, is one of those who had protested the bill. On Tuesday he and eight other students went as far as to chain themselves to the doors of the capitol building, preventing anyone from entering or leaving the building. Montes de Oca was one of several ASU students participating, and all were arrested for disorderly conduct.
Another student, Alicia Contreras highlights the trouble that lies ahead for the GOP. If legislators of that Party don't understand the implications of this, they should:
Alicia Contreras, 26, a social work and sociology senior at ASU, shares that goal. She had slept outside the capitol for days in peaceful vigil and prayer.
"This is our time, this is our generation," she said. "We are going to be the ones having to deal with the outcomes of this law."
Contreras said that oftentimes young people don’t realize the influence they have, and should think about ways to spread their messages -- ways that activists didn’t have years ago
"Utilizing our social networks, Facebook, text messaging, and e-mails are ways to have circles of influence," she said..
These are the political leaders of the Hispanic/Latino Community in 5-10 years.
In this environment, probably the worst possible response would be to double-down with a measure that goes directly to the student population. But that's exactly what the Arizona governor has done, with the new law banning ethnic studies in the public schools.
Again, These are the political leaders of the Hispanic/Latino Community in 5-10 years.
As Matthew Dowd, former GOP strategist notes:
"It’s like a virus that you get and you don’t feel like you’re unhealthy for the first few days, but after that you have a fever and you’re really sick," says Matthew Dowd, former President George W. Bush’s chief strategist in 2004.
Dowd is right, but it's more than a fever. While the metastasis may take one or two election cycles, it could very well be a terminal illness for the GOP. And they have no one to blame but themselves.