Pew surveyed Latino voters on illegal immigration issues: the report isn’t available yet at the site, but this article reports that Latino attitudes towards illegal immigration has taken a seriously negative turn. The most important finding? 31% consider illegal immigration a net negative for the Latino community, with 29% considering it positive, and 20% considering it neither. In 2007, 50% considered illegal immigration to be a net positive.
Oddly, I sort of agree with both sets of spin from the article on why this would be so: the right’s argument that this reflects heightened public awareness on the issue makes a good deal of sense. After all, people are more than a set of survey questions: having a last name like Herrera or Sandoval or Martinez does not automatically require you to take a hardcore liberal line on immigration policy. But this means that I also sort of take the left’s argument that much of this new attitude comes from our miserable economy. Indeed, it does: the economy’s bad, thanks largely to the inability of the Democratic party to focus on job creation. Instead, they do things like waste valuable legislative time pandering to the ultra-far left splinter of the Latino community…
Via Mickey Kaus (who is watching in horror as his Democratic party acts like, well, the Democratic party on the DREAM Act*), via Instapundit.
Moe Lane
*:shrug: Elections have consequences.