by James E. García
U.S. Navy Chief Petty Officer Bill Mesta replaces an official picture of outgoing President George W. Bush with that of newly-sworn-in U.S. President Barack Hussein Obama, in the lobby of the headquarters of the U.S. Naval Base January 20, 2009 in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.(photo by Brennan Linsley-Pool)
PHOENIX — A local bilingual publication recently featured a cover illustration of Barack Obama with a headline that posed a provocative if indelicate question: “Could he be a Santa Claus for us?”
The “us” referred to the U.S. Latino community.
The short answer to that question is “no.” Latinos will not wake up this year and find a pile of shimmering, gift-wrapped public policy initiatives that will suddenly make everything alright. Politics, like life, doesn’t work that way.
The question that we should ask ourselves is whether Mr. Obama will routinely take into account the needs and interests of Latinos as he pursues his administration’s already crowded agenda?
To that question, I offer an enthusiastic if indelicate “probably.”
I don’t mean to sound cynical. These times demand a certain guarded optimism. For one thing — and I hope you’re sitting down — politicians don’t always keep their promises. Also, running for president is very different than being president. Simply put, you don’t always get what you want.
For the record, here’s some of what Obama pledged to Latino voters during the campaign: more jobs; economic stability; middle class tax cuts; worker protections; a quick end to the Iraq War; greater access to affordable health care; more investment in public education; broader access to higher education; and an immigration reform plan that penalizes employers who hire illegal immigrants and provides millions of undocumented immigrants with a path to citizenship.
If a lot of that sounds like the pledges he made to most of the nation’s voters, there’s a good reason for that: most Latinos are not unlike everyone else. We tend to care about the same basic issues. We just happen to care about some of those issues in slightly different ways.
Consider the following: Latinos are among the least likely to have health insurance.
Our young people quit high school at alarmingly high rates. During economic downturns, Latinos are often the first to lose their jobs and the last to be rehired. The rate of foreclosures among Latino homeowners since 2006 was 6.7 per 1,000 homes as compared to the national average of 4.5 per 1,000, according to a recent report published in the Wall Street Journal. And many of us have relatives who are recent immigrants.
The key to ensuring that the so-called Latino agenda is part of Obama’s White House agenda will depend on our ability to gain and maintain access to the new president.
Obama’s announced nominations to his Cabinet were a good start. U.S. Sen. Ken Salazar, U.S. Rep. Hilda Solis and Gov. Bill Richardson were picked to lead the Interior, Labor and Commerce departments respectively, though Richardson has withdrawn his name in the wake of a potential scandal in New Mexico.
Other key Obama moves include the selection of Cecilia Muñoz, one of the smartest policy wonks in Washington, as White House Director of Intergovernmental Affairs.
Our access to the president also is secured by the fact that Obama’s team will not soon forget the important role Latinos played in electing the new president.
In Nevada, Colorado and New Mexico, states that all went for Bush in 2004, Latino voters helped decide the win for Obama. Nationwide, two-thirds of Latino voters picked Obama over Republican John McCain. Latino voters will account for a growing percentage of overall turnout in years to come.
Latinos have earned a role in White House decisions that will determine our nation’s future. In 2010, will Latino voters look back and say that Obama kept his promises?
To that question, I offer an enthusiastic if indelicate “I hope so.” Hispanic Link.
(James E. García is a journalist and senior research fellow at the ASU Center for Community Development and Civil Rights. Email: james.garcia@asu.edu). ©2009
