The American Spectator

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McCain and the Hispanic Vote

By W. James Antle, III on 7.9.08 @ 11:04AM

Matthew Continetti reports that John McCain bombed at the League of United Latino Citizens (LULAC) convention and predicts McCain will lose the Hispanic vote to Barack Obama. Dana Milbank zings both McCain and Obama for pandering to the LULAC crowd, but Continetti says McCain gave a speech that frequently sounded like it was aimed at a national audience rather than a special interest group. McCain has, shall we say, seemed to go off message on his revised enforcement-first position recently and probably wasn't eager to generate more headlines on that front. McCain was always fairly unlikely to make inroads among Hispanic voters in this political climate, despite his immigration legislation and relative popularity with Arizona Hispanics. He is much more likely, in my view, to flip back to his original immigration position if elected.

topics:
John McCain, Barack Obama, Immigration