A new poll has been released that claims to show that the top concern of "Hispanics" in this country is immigration. According to the poll it's not the economy; It's not unemployment; it's not the environment. This "poll" seems to suggest that it's not just simply immigration that they are concerned about, but illegal immigration and the legalizing of illegal aliens.
This poll has been flaunted around on major news sites without actually delving into who put forth the poll, their ideology, their base of constituents or their funding. So I guess it comes to me to point out such things. The poll was put forth by the pro-illegal alien lobby known as the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO) - and in particular their Educational Fund department. As you'll see in some of the results below this Educational Fund seems to be having very poor results in actually educating anyone.
NALEO
NALEO openly states on their website that they strongly oppose Arizona SB1070 in big, bold letters in a prominent position and their latest event is to honor the highly pro-illegal alien former Florida Senator Mel Martinez. Their stated mission "NALEO Educational Fund is the nation's leading 501 (c)(3) non-profit, non-partisan organization that facilitates the full participation of Latinos in the American political process, from citizenship to public service.". Not just any "Latinos" though I can assure you. If you don't fall in line with them, you'll be scorned.
Here are a few top headlines on their site as of the writing of this article:
- 07/06/10: NALEO Educational Fund Applauds Federal Action Against Arizona's Discriminatory SB 1070
- 07/01/10: NALEO Educational Fund Welcomes President Obama's Remarks on Comprehensive Immigration Reform
Obviously NALEO supports amnesty. They are for a "pathway to citizenship" and other entitlements like in-state tuition for illegal aliens (the DREAM act) and other benefits that would only go to those of "their race". It is an outright racist organization of not only elected officials but, as their name states, appointed individuals.
Poll Slanting
How any news organization could publish the results of this poll as legitimate is beyond me. After taking a look at the questions that were posed in the poll it becomes quite clear where they are leading respondents. It starts off innocuously and becomes more and more pro-illegal alien as it goes along. It goes from the generic "did you vote in 2008" to whether they like Obama and congress. Then it diverges into what candidates in the 2010 midterm elections are pandering (they call it "reaching out") to "Latino voters" the best. As we'll see below it quickly goes downhill from there.
The pollsters claim that they took their samplings from registered Latino voters from California, Colorado, Florida and Texas. I'm sure these four "key states", as they refer to them, are no oversight on their part. They didn't poll voters in Arizona, where voters from every race, ethnicity and background have overwhelmingly shown time and again that they oppose benefits to illegal aliens in any form. For instance on prop 200 in Arizona a few years ago to deny benefits to illegal aliens, the "Hispanic" population supported it at the ballot box. Asking for a sampling in states like Arizona would not fit the results NALEO wanted though and therefore states like Arizona were avoided.
Their results show that 65% somewhat or strongly approve of Obama. They show that more than 41% approve of Congress. They also show that nearly 65% say that the country is either remaining the same or headed in the right direction. These numbers are far from what the general public feels about this country and it calls into question their sampling of individuals. NALEO is trying to prop up its base and stir them up to receive votes, funding and donations. An easy way to do this is to put out false and skewed information in order to get people to jump on the bandwagon. "Oh! so many of my race want amnesty, I don't want to be looked at as an outcast!"
Only 61% say they will certainly vote in the 2010 midterm election, but only 45% say they are following the races very closely or at all. That leaves quite a gap of clueless voters, some of which may see this "news story" and vote accordingly. The poll also delves into what candidates "Hispanics" support, thus putting in these "undecided" voter's heads who they should be looking to vote for.
This poll was put together for one purpose though, and that purpose wasn't for a general feeling of the "Hispanic" community.
Questions
Question 17 focuses on what the most important issue is to Latino voters. Sounds innocuous, but what is missed by the press is that questions 18 to 22 focus on giving amnesty to illegal aliens - that and punishing elected officials (or political parties) who don't support it. A generic and legitimate poll on what the most important issue to "Latinos" is would not include 5 questions on amnesty in the poll directly following the top concern question. It is leading. Of course a legitimate poll would not focus on one race or ethnicity either, as this country lives or dies on the efforts and contributions of all.
So here is the question the media focused on.
Q17. Issue most important to you in deciding whom to vote for in 2010 General Election
| CA | CO | FL | TX | ALL |
| Budget deficits | 4.3 | 7.0 | 4.0 | 5.8 | 5.3 |
| Cost of living/underemployment | 5.5 | 7.8 | 7.8 | 10.5 | 7.9 |
| Unemployment | 19.8 | 13.5 | 15.8 | 12.3 | 15.3 |
| Regulating wall street | 0.8 | 0.0 | 2.0 | 0.3 | 0.8 |
| Housing Market | 0.0 | 0.3 | 0.5 | 0.0 | 0.2 |
| War [in Afghanistan OR Iraq] | 3.3 | 2.3 | 1.0 | 3.0 | 2.4 |
| Healthcare | 4.5 | 9.5 | 9.0 | 6.5 | 7.4 |
| Education | 6.5 | 5.0 | 8.0 | 5.0 | 6.1 |
| The Environment | 1.0 | 1.3 | 1.5 | 0.3 | 1.0 |
| Immigration | 33.3 | 22.0 | 23.5 | 27.5 | 26.6 |
| Taxes | 0.5 | 0.3 | 1.3 | 1.3 | 0.8 |
| Energy | 0.3 | 0.3 | 0.3 | 1.0 | 0.4 |
| Terrorism/Security | 0.0 | 1.0 | 1.8 | 1.8 | 1.1 |
| Crime | 1.0 | 0.3 | 0.3 | 2.3 | 0.9 |
| Other | 6.3 | 9.8 | 13.3 | 9.3 | 9.6 |
| DK/NA | 13.3 | 19.5 | 10.3 | 13.3 | 14.1 |
| Refused | 0.0 | 0.5 | 0.0 | 0.3 | 0.2 |
.. and here are the other questions immediately following it.
Q18. Greatest challenges facing the current immigration system
Q19. Most important element that an immigration reform law should include
This question shows that only .8% of registered California Latino voters support an immigration law that should include penalizing employers that hire illegal aliens and include more deportations of illegal aliens (It's 2% in Colorado, 3% in Florida and 2.2% in Texas). The question also shows that 35.1% of Californian Latino voters think that an immigration law should include an amnesty (33.4% in Colorado, 27.8% in Florida, 30.3% in Texas). The rest of the options, other than border security, are all regarding what benefits should be include in such a law (such as a DREAM act).
Q20. Immigration effect on likelihood of voting in November
Q21. If a political party or candidate took a position on immigration that you disagreed with, how likely would you be to vote against that political party or candidate even if you agreed with that party on most other issues?
This is the threatening question. "Vote for amnesty," according to NALEO, "or Latinos won't vote for you." Don't overlook the obvious in the question though. They are not just talking about individual candidates, they are talking political parties. This question seems to be double-edged. It is warning the Democrats to get stronger on amnesty and the Republicans that they will suffer if they don't get behind it.
Q22. Do you think that if more Latinos/Hispanics vote in this election it will increase the chances that the Congress and the President will pass comprehensive immigration reform?
This question is telling as to the slant of those who put the poll together. They already approached and engineered the poll in order for it to show that Latinos want amnesty for illegal aliens. Otherwise this question would be meaningless. If the previous questions had in any way shown that Latinos didn't favor lax immigration this follow up question would have destroyed NALEO and its goals. Another telling thing is that they aren't just addressing immigration here, it's not a choice for the respondent. They can't choose to have split bills - one on border security and another on interior enforcement, they must choose the code name for amnesty - Comprehensive Immigration Reform as their one lone choice.
As you can see the poll questions are to push the respondent towards giving illegal aliens rewards or to get those respondents to form an opinion of giving illegal aliens rewards if they haven't come to a conclusion, not to allow the respondent to actually give their opinion without influence.
Other interesting things of note in the poll.
51.8% of respondents claim to be naturalized citizens (70% in California, only 26% in Colorado).
29% of California respondents claim to have 4-6 adults living in their home (as opposed to 12.2% in Colorado, 10.6% in Florida and 11.5% in Texas)
Education Really?
Rather than pointing to immigration as being the top issue of "Hispanics" maybe the media should have actually reported on the results of the question below which is highly disturbing when it comes to the future of our country. It also points out the failures of the Education Fund wing of NALEO. Maybe they should put some of their money into helping people they say they care about rather than just trying to manipulate an undereducated portion of the population.
Which was the last school you had the opportunity to finish?
| CA | CO | FL | TX | ALL |
| Grades 1 - 8 | 35.0 | 19.5 | 20.5 | 36.5 | 27.9 |
| Some High School | 7.5 | 7.0 | 6.8 | 8.3 | 7.4 |
| High School graduate | 25.0 | 26.3 | 12.3 | 16.8 | 20.1 |
| Some College/Technical School | 10.3 | 17.8 | 18.3 | 15.3 | 15.4 |
| College graduate | 11.3 | 19.8 | 20.5 | 13.3 | 16.2 |
| Post-graduate education | 7.5 | 6.8 | 20.3 | 7.3 | 10.4 |
| Don't know | 1.3 | 0.3 | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.6 |
| Refused | 2.3 | 2.8 | 1.0 | 2.3 | 2.1 |
The question above shows that 1 in 3 registered voting Latinos in California and Texas have less than an 8th grade education. Even more disturbing is that 1.3% of California respondents chose "Don't Know" for last school level completed. How can you not know what level of school you finished when the answers are so broad?
Below is just one sample of how the media portrayed the poll results. They seem to blame it on the Arizona law, yet no Arizona voters were included in the poll sampling. If only the reporter actually looked into NALEO and mentioned even once that the group "strongly opposes SB1070" and applauds the president's Justice Department in suing Arizona. Instead we get the following lead sentence to the story written by Paul Connor of Daily Caller.
Immigration has surpassed jobs to become the number one issue concerning Latino voters, according to a poll by leading non-profit Latino organization.
So that is all NALEO is? They are just a "non-profit Latino organization". They have no bias, they have no goal. Anyone reading this drivel of an article may assume that they have no leanings. It's all for the good of America!
... the mood among Latino voters has shifted markedly since [a 2009 Pew Hispanic Poll], largely due to the Arizona immigration law, which goes into effect next week.
The Pew poll showed the economy the main concern by a large margin. That should lead the reporter, Paul Connor, to question the claimed results of this new poll, but he does not do so.
I'm not sure who comes to the conclusion that the Arizona law has changed the mood of Latinos. Is this the finding of the reporter or is that straight from a press release from NALEO? The source of this conclusion isn't noted in the story.
The most telling thing as to why the poll was even put together is this quote below from the article.
“What is so striking to me in my many years of looking at polling, is that this is the first time that immigration is the number one issue among Latino voters,” said María Cardona, a Democratic strategist. “That, to me, was just stunning."
Maria Cardona claims the results are stunning, but I find that hard to believe. The poll was put together by people like Cardona to work to her advantage as a Democratic strategist. It gives her a platform to come out and say "this is "stunning!"
As for Cardona, she served on Hillary Clinton's "Hispanic Outreach" team during the 2008 presidential election. She often appears on Spanish language channels and is part of the Obama for America campaign. There's a long history of her pushing bilingual communication and advertising and working with polling companies. She's a regular Latino politics profiteer.
Cardona was indeed a nice unbiased choice for the "reporter" to make in getting an opinion of the "poll results". Don't you agree?
Sham
Its all a sham to fool "Latino" voters and to also fool candidates and political parties into thinking that they somehow have to get behind an amnesty to attract Latinos to vote for them. The fact is though that "Hispanic" or "Latino" voters do not vote as a block. They are individual people. Even this skewed poll shows that there is a majority of "Latino voters" who do not support an amnesty for illegal aliens. In California barely over 35% want an amnesty for illegal aliens in an immigration law. That leaves nearly 65% who either are opposed to amnesty or aren't sure.
One other disturbing thing as I close out - on the question of whether an amnesty should be given, the choices were split into two. One choice was to give amnesty to illegal aliens if they have otherwise obeyed the laws of the United States. Another choice was to give a general amnesty even if the illegal alien had broken other laws in this country. 12.3% of California respondents chose the latter - to give an amnesty to illegal aliens even if they have criminal records and have broken other non immigration related laws in this country. Think on that for a bit.
Sources:
http://www.naleo.org/downloads/NALEO%202010_Toplines_final.pdf
