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 News from Around the Americas | January 2008 
Obama Struggling to Woo Hispanics
 Agence France-Presse
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| | Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama walks through the cabin on his chartered aircraft past photographers en route to Phoenix from Denver January 30, 2008. (Reuters/Jason Reed) | | |
Los Angeles - “Obama? We just don’t know him,” says Hortensia, a Mexican arts and crafts seller at a bustling market in East Los Angeles, the heart of this city’s Hispanic community.
With just days to go until California holds its crucial February 5 primary, Hortensia’s sentiments are a common refrain among Democrat-leaning Hispanics as they weigh the merits of front-runners Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
Both Obama and Clinton have aggressively courted Hispanics, who account for roughly one third of California’s population, launching Spanish-language advertising campaigns and mixing with Latino communities.
Clinton munched tacos on the campaign trail in East Los Angeles while Obama broke into Spanish during a recent rally in Nevada, adopting the catchphrase “Si Se Puede! (Yes we can!).”
But Obama’s attempts to wrest Latino support away from Clinton appear to have had little effect in California, where a recent Field poll gave the former first lady a 59 percent to 19 percent lead over Obama among Latinos.
In East Los Angeles’ busy market, many Hispanics said they were backing Clinton largely because they had fond memories of her husband’s presidency.
“Bill Clinton was a good leader, and the economy worked much better under him than with (President George) Bush,” said Jose Balboa, the manager of a camera and photographic shop.
Hillary Clinton has also benefited from enthusiastic support by prominent Latino leaders, most notably Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and the influential veteran union activist Dolores Huerta.
According to Huerta, 77, Clinton has been championing the cause of Hispanics for years, while “Hispanics don’t know who Obama is.”
Obama has gained support among some Latino leaders however, including the Mexican American Political Association’s president Nativo Lopez.
Lopez told AFP that his organization supported Obama because of the Illinois senator’s record as an advocate of social projects, opposition to the construction of a US-Mexico border wall and support for undocumented workers to be allowed to apply for driving licenses.
Rights activist Angelica Salas has also expressed support for Obama, telling the Spanish-language newspaper La Opinion that he had ”always been on the side of immigrants.”
While the Latino support for Clinton suggests a racial divide in California only one out of around 20 people AFP talked with said Obama’s ethnicity was an issue. Analysts say most Hispanic voters were unconcerned by the race question.
“The tensions between Hispanic and African-American communities in parts of Los Angeles do not reflect the overall picture,” said Miguel Tinker-Salas, a professor of history at Pomona College, California. |
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