By Arturo R. García
Tuesday night’s midterm elections brought with them the worst-case scenario for the Democratic Party: Not only did they lose control of the Senate to the Republicans, but the GOP added to its control of the House of Representatives. But while many observers blamed Democrats’ decision to distance themselves from President Barack Obama, immigrant activists also want the party to consider the cost of Obama’s move to delay immigration reform.
“Prioritizing Senate seats over keeping families together was bad politics,” Dream Action Coalition (DRM) co-directors Erika Andiola and Cesar Vargas said in a statement late Tuesday night. “Tonight, when the Democrats were hoping to keep the Senate despite the President’s delay on immigration, we saw Latino voters rebuke Democrats at the polls, either opting to stay home or voting for another party.”
The schism has been building since September, when Obama held off on implementing an executive order ameliorating the deportation of undocumented immigrants from the country. As the International Business Times reported last week, the effects were already there: an ABC News/Washington Post poll found that only half of Latino respondents said it would not matter which of the country’s two dominant parties left the election controlling the Senate.
Considering that Obama amassed the support of 71 percent of the Latino electorate during his successful re-election bid in 2012, many of those voters had come to believe they were being asked to choose between a GOP openly running on anti-immigrant positions and a Democratic Party that was putting them off. And some groups, like Presente Action, opted to punish Democrats for their inaction.
“This was not an easy step for us,” Presente executive director Arturo Carmona told The Atlantic. “But we believe it is necessary if we are ever going to see politicians of any party approach the Latino constituency as one to be catered to, not spat on.”
The coalition sent a more blunt message following incumbent Sen. Mark Udall’s (D-CO) loss:
And Senator Udall from Colorado lost. Obama's failed strategy screwed him up big time. Horrible consequences. #BrokenPromise #Not1More
— DRM Action Coalition (@DRMAction) November 5, 2014
These reactions suggest that Democrats did not just ignore the warning from civic groups, but those from within their own party ranks, like Rep. Luis Gutiérrez (D-IL), who told The Guardian about the lack of enthusiasm Obama’s inaction had generated.
“This problem that you see, politically, is nothing in comparison to the civil war that will be created politically in the Democratic party should the president not be broad and generous in his use of prosecutorial discretion,” Gutiérrez said. “Because Latinos will not be deciding whether or not they vote, but whether or not they are in the Democratic party.”
[Top image: Immigration march in Washington, D.C. in March 2010. Photo by SEIU via Flickr Creative Commons]
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