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Thirty eight percent favor Trump, followed by Cuban American Ted Cruz (15 percent), Jeb Bush (14 percent) and Cuban American Marco Rubio (8 percent), according to the national poll conducted by the Beck Research for the American Federation for Children. (Excerpted: rest at link)

U.S. citizens and voters as possible before Election Day. Leading the charge is Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., who said Thursday that he believes the "stand up to hate" push can get 1 million of those Latinos naturalized by May, which would see them become citizens in time to register for the presidential election. The campaign's mantra is "Naturalize. Register. Vote." Gutierrez advised Latinos to "get angry" over the anti-immigrant rhetoric emanating from Republican presidential candidates "then naturalize, register and vote." "Can you believe calling all Mexicans rapists?" he asked during a conference call announcing the New American Democracy Campaign, referring...

Republican presidential candidate says some people will be surprised who really thinks abortion is a losing campaign issue: Democrats. Cruz recently pointed out how abortion was a horrendous political issue for Democrats in Texas - the second largest state in the country - because the Democrats' position of supporting late-term abortions turned off a large portion of Hispanics voters who are pro-life. As the liberal Texas Tribune reports: Asked during a question-and-answer session with voters about how Republicans could run effectively on social issues in states beyond Iowa, home to the first nominating contest, Cruz insisted the GOP has nothing...

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is embarking on a partnership with universities across the country in hopes of infusing its ranks with more diversity as it faces civil rights complaints from Latino farmers and ranchers. But some members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus are voicing frustration, saying the agency has been dragging its feet and has yet to adequately address their concerns. The caucus had asked for a meeting with Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack in October, saying members received reports from constituents indicating significant civil rights violations and discrimination by the agency. Caucus members also pointed to a 2013 review...

The sample is 264 Latino registered voters, which is on the small side for a major poll but still noteworthy since Latinos are a key bloc and not often surveyed on their own.Lots of interesting tidbits here. Glass half full: Various GOPers are positioned to improve on Romney’s dismal numbers with Latinos in 2012, maybe dramatically. Glass half empty: All of them still trail Clinton overall, which is a nice reminder that doing better with Latinos in 2016 and no one else won’t be enough. Clinton’s biggest lead is against current GOP frontrunner Donald Trump: She’s ahead of him...

And by “other candidates,” I think we know which particular candidate they have in mind.Here’s the key bit from yesterday’s presser in Boulder, held just a mile away from tonight’s debate. Step one: Pronounce Trump persona non grata among Hispanic Republicans. That may or may not actually be true among rank-and-file voters, but the threat here doesn’t bite without that assumption, does it? “We want candidates to know: We’re monitoring your language. We are monitoring what you propose. And we’re going to hold you accountable,” said Alfonso Aguilar, head of the American Principles Project’s Latino Partnership…Although she did not...

Many of the findings in this report contradict trends that appear in publicly reported data. For instance, publicly reported statistics indicate that CPS has made tremendous progress in elementary math and reading tests, while this analysis demonstrates only incremental gains in math and almost no growth in reading. The discrepancies are due to myriad issues with publicly reported data—including changes in test content and scoring—that make year-over-year comparisons nearly impossible without complex statistical analyses, such as those undertaken for this report. This leads to another key message in this report: • The publicly reported statistics used to hold schools and...

In his ongoing quest to prove that Latinos do, in fact, “love” him, Donald Trump brought a Hispanic woman named Myriam Witcher up on stage at his Las Vegas rally Thursday night who could not love him more. “Yes, Mr. Trump! We love you! We love you, all the way to the White House!” she exclaimed, her hands held high in the air. On Friday, CNN’s Brooke Baldwin tried to get to the bottom of how this woman could possibly feel the way she does about Trump. “Oh my God, he is coming — he is our man sent from...

California Sen. Holly Mitchell (D) connects the lack of racial diversity in Silicon Valley with racially motivated “math misplacement.”She claims middle-school algebra teachers are holding back black and Latino kids from advancing to ninth-grade geometry, even though they are doing just as well as white kids who are getting a grade of “B” or better, and are meeting or exceeding state standard assessments.However, the study that Mitchell and others supporting her effort cite as proof of their position also shows the real problem is actually with middle-school algebra teachers. Many of them just aren’t very good at their jobs.The...

As far back as Ronald Reagan, politicians have been urging Latinos — who historically have voted overwhelmingly for Democrats — to move over to the Republican Party. The idea has been that, putting questions of immigration aside, Latinos as a whole are conservative about hard work, family values, and religious dedication, which Republicans generally consider to be “their” values. But do they stay that way once they are in the U.S.? If the Republicans continue being the party of strict borders, English-only, and deportation, they’re unlikely to get the first generation to become Republican voters. And like other immigrant groups,...

Simi Valley, CA -- “Welcome GOP Candidates,” reads the sign on Presidential Drive, at the entrance to the Ronald Reagan Library where CNN held the second Republican debate on Wednesday, Sept. 16. But that welcome is partially obscured by the faces, T-shirts, and Donald Trump piñatas being paraded by pro-immigrant protesters hours before the debate. Anti-immigration protesters are there as well, holding signs in support of Republican candidate Donald Trump and in opposition to jus solis, or birthright citizenship. Trump supporters rally across the street, mostly keeping to their own side Madera Road, the four-lane road at the end of...

Only 20 percent say they support The Donald for president. We talked to a few, who even say they agree with him on immigration. Trump will be lucky to win 20 percent of the Latino vote if he makes it to the general election, according to today’s polls. He called Mexicans “rapists,” threw the most prominent Latino reporter out of a press conference, and wants to put his name on a wall running the length of the border with Mexico. Piñatas are literally being made out of him and selling like hotcakes in Mexico. So who the hell are the...

Sunday on “This Week With George Stephanopoulos,” while discussing his confrontation with Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump last week at a press conference, Univision anchor Jorge Ramos said next year at the polls Latino voters “won’t forget,” Trump “promoting in his speeches bigotry and hatred.”

There is no greater political miscalculation, or fraud, than the notion that Republicans have to “moderate” their positions on immigration reform in order to appeal to Hispanic voters. This fiction began with President George W. Bush’s aborted attempt at comprehensive immigration reform in early 2007.

LYNWOOD, Calif. — MANY monsters and ghosts haunt the dreams of Latino children. There is “La Llorona,” who is said to moan for her dead children. And more recently, the Chupacabra, which sucks the blood from farm animals and maybe a boy or a girl if he or she doesn’t behave. Now we can add a new boogeyman to the repertoire of scary Latino bedtime stories. His name is The Donald. Ever since he began his campaign for the Republican presidential nomination with a vicious screed against Mexican immigrants, Donald J. Trump has become a figure of dread and comic-book...

Those of you who listen to my show, and regularly read my columns know that I am one of the biggest Ted Cruz fans that exists. He is an outspoken, proven conservative and a devout Christian. Last month, I watched a Fox and Friends interview with Ted Cruz, and he refused to attack Donald Trump. Not only did he refuse to attack Trump, but he defended him. “I don’t think you should apologize for speaking out against…illegal immigration,” Cruz said. That same month, Cruz and Trump privately met together in New York City, and this caught my attention. Why would...

Donald Trump may have started off on the wrong foot with Hispanic voters following some controversial comments during his presidential candidacy announcement, but that hasn’t stopped him from trying to reconnect with the valuable voting bloc. So when New York state Senator Ruben Diaz (D) sent invitations to a handful of Republican presidential candidates to tour his district, a heavily Hispanic area of the Bronx, Trump gladly accepted. In fact, Trump was the only candidate to respond to Diaz’s invitation. Invitations were also extended to candidates Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL). In his invitation to Trump,...

I think I speak for all of us when I say, “Who’s Kelly Osbourne?”The best part of this is an offended Rosie Perez apologizing to Osbourne after being reminded that they should focus on the Common Enemy. Perez clarified the point Collins was trying to make, saying, “There are a lot of Latinos here in this country that do agree that the immigration problem is a problem and it does need to be addressed and it does need to be fixed. But [Trump] making those comments [about rapists]—those racist comments—does not help.”“If you kick every Latino out of this...

Kelly Osbourne stuck her foot firmly in her mouth on Tuesday’s episode of “The View” when she made an unfortunate remark during a discussion on Donald Trump’s favorability among Latino voters. “If you kick every Latino out of this country, who is going to be cleaning your toilet Donald Trump?” Osbourne said. Her statement was met with an awkward groan from Raven-Symone before co-host Rosie Perez said, “Latinos are not the only people doing that.” Osbourne quickly back-pedaled, saying “I would never mean it like that. I’m not part of this argument.”

Liberal celebrity Kelly Osbourne inserted foot in mouth on The View today. Her attack on Donald Trump sort of backfired when she exposed herself as a heartless racist. TMZ reported: Kelly Osbourne stepped into it on “The View” Tuesday, challenging Donald Trump’s statement about Mexicans and asking if he has his way … who will clean his toilet. Osbourne quipped, “If you kick every Latino out of this country, then who is going to be cleaning your toilet, Donald Trump?”