Free Republic

Two eye-catching things were buried in the new Census Bureau projection that, by 2042, America will no longer be a white man's country. One is that the proportion of African Americans also will fade, or at least not get much bigger. The other is that the number of Hispanics will soar, to about 30 percent of the nation's population. Not only will America not be a white majority country, but it will almost certainly be a bilingual nation. In many cities, Spanish will be as likely to be heard on the streets, in schools and workplaces as English. This seismic...

In what has been a strongly Republican county for years, a dramatic increase in Democratic registrations should be credited for the rise of Latino voters in the county, according to political experts. Increasing numbers of Latino Democratic voters combined with the launch of an aggressive "Viva Obama" campaign in the county have contributed to the changing tide, they said. There were 301,765 registered Republicans and 300,435 registered Democrats in the county, a difference of only 1,330 voters, as of July 28. The numbers reflect a rapid increase in Democratic voters just over the past few months, according to the San...

Darned curious. The last time McCain was confronted about this, he professed not to know of any controversial statements made by Hernandez while cheerily pledging to “look into it.” Does this mean he’s looked into it and decided to keep him on, albeit gagged? Or is he still getting around to “looking into it”? Sure sounds like someone knows they have a Hernandez problem.

On the surface, political life in Cuban Miami seems unchanged. Little Havana is still partly a Disney version of a displaced Cuba and partly a genuine community hub, where families who have long since left for suburbia still come for nostalgic weekend lunches. At the Versailles Restaurant, the community newspapers preaching no compromise with Castro are all that are on offer. For almost four decades, the Versailles has been an obligatory stop for Washington politicians courting the Cuban-American community, visits that, as photographs in the restaurant attest, have often involved putting on a white guayabera, the four-pocket dress shirt that...

President Daniel Ortega, who led the 1979 revolution in Nicaragua, says Barack Obama’s presidential bid is a “revolutionary” phenomenon in the United States. “It’s not to say that there is already a revolution under way in the U.S. … but yes, they are laying the foundations for a revolutionary change,” the Sandinista leader said Wednesday night as he accepted an honorary doctorate from an engineering university. Ortega led a Soviet-backed government that battled U.S.-supported Contra rebels before he lost power in a 1990 election. He returned to office last year via the ballot box. In statements broadcast on Sandinista Radio...

Summoning a time of political upheaval in Miami, a great-uncle of Elián González plans Friday to publicly denounce two Barack Obama campaign advisors who helped send the boy back to his father in Cuba eight years ago. One day before the expected Democratic nominee addresses a conference of mayors in Miami, Delfín González will hold a 1 p.m. news conference outside the Little Havana home where Elián lived with relatives for several months in 2000. Earlier this week, CNN reported that Elián, now 14 years old, has joined Cuba's Young Communist Union. Obama was an Illinois lawmaker during the 2000...

Ken Vogel reports that the Clinton campaign is using the results to openly argue that Barack Obama has a problem with Hispanic voters — an idea Clinton backers have previously mentioned only behind the scenes. “It was a 100 percent Hispanic primary and it shows that he has a problem with the Latino community,” Terry McAuliffe, campaign chairman for Hillary Clinton, told a handful of reporters after polls closed Sunday. “He cannot close in this key core constituency,” McAuliffe added. Voters in Puerto Rico are in some ways different from Hispanics living stateside, both because there’s a long tradition of...

Sunday: Hillary Clinton waves to a supporter at the Kasalta Bakery in San Juan, as she campaigns on primary day in Puerto Rico. (AP Photo) SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Hillary Clinton won the Democratic presidential primary in Puerto Rico on Sunday, and is expected to return to the mainland with a purseful of delegates. But lower-than-expected turnout could hamper her camp’s efforts to argue she can attract enthusiastic general election voters and is the better candidate than Barack Obama in the fall race against presumptive Republican nominee John McCain. Puerto Rico’s role was enhanced in the Democratic primary election...

This is just on from CNN. CNN is projecting Hillary will win Puerto Rico by a wide margin of 40%. Geez, I guess Michelle will soon add those brown people and yellow people to her 'whitey' tape. More popcorn.

Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama has drawn criticism from some Cuban Americans who disagree with his policy on negotiating with U.S. enemies. The Washington Times reported Sunday that the Illinois senator will likely have to defend his policy this week when he meets with the Cuban American National Foundation, in his first campaign stop in Florida in nine months. Obama has said that if elected president he would hold direct talks with hostile governments, including Cuba's communist leaders. In addition to holding talks with Cuban leaders including President Raul Castro, Obama has said if elected he would relax restrictions on...

This November McCain will win the election. I am certain McCain will be our next president. McCain will win because he will get about 54% of the Hispanic vote ( Bush got 44%). The Democrats can not overcome that large of a margin going to McCain. This will be fatal to their party. McCain will get such a large percentage of the Hispanic vote because of his support for immigration and because of the natural unreported tension that exist between the Black and Hispanic populations. At the same time, Hispanic will split their vote and vote Democratic for Congressional election....

Presumptive GOP presidential nominee John McCain - wildly popular in his home state of Arizona, on the Mexican border - has vowed to win a sizable chunk of the crucial Latino vote this fall. But history is against him. Typically, about two-thirds of Latinos vote Democratic in a presidential election. And a nationwide Gallup Poll, conducted between March 1 and March 16, confirms that trend.

Sen. Edward Kennedy delivered a passionate speech at East Los Angeles College with a Spanish accent that the heavily Latino crowd surely had never heard before. Proclaiming that a vote for Illinois Sen. Barack Obama is a vote for the people, he cried out, "Un voto para Obama es un voto para la gente." He went on for several more sentences in Spanish and then stopped himself. "There may be people here who don't understand my Spanish," he said.

Clinton beats Obama as candidates bicker over the final delegate count. Will the ethnic tensions inflamed by a rough caucus fight haunt the Democrats? Hillary Clinton won the Nevada popular vote, and Barack Obama's campaign is claiming he won more delegates, but it was hard not to worry that the Democratic Party could wind up the loser as I sat watching a nasty caucus battle at the Paris Hotel and Casino Saturday afternoon. At the end of the day, having called around to Democrats and reporters who were at other caucus sites, I'm pretty sure I witnessed one of the...

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama picked up the endorsement of several Latino community leaders and legislators on Sunday, including state senator Gil Cedillo. The Los Angeles democrat has been one of the state's leading supporters of driver's licenses for undocumented immigrants. Hillary Clinton has said she opposes such licenses. Clinton has so far won most of the endorsements from California's major Hispanic leaders, including L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez. This comes on the same day that Obama, while campaigning in Las Vegas, unveiled an economic stimulus package costing up to $120 billion that his campaign said...

Editor’s Note: By participating in the historic Spanish-language debate on Univision, Republican candidates finally realized that they need Latino votes. But is it “too little, too late?" NAM editor Elena Shore monitors Spanish language media. The first Spanish-language Republican presidential candidate debate couldn’t have come at a better time for the GOP. Latino support for the Republican Party has dropped substantially when the Latino vote is more important than ever. The candidates’ jostling over who is tougher on immigration has alienated Latinos even further. Seven of the eight Republican presidential candidates showed up at the University of Miami Sunday with...

This week, Pew Research introduced an interesting poll that shows Latino voters shifting away from gains the GOP made in 2006. Could it be because of the rhetoric about immigration reform? President George Bush benefited from gains in 2000 and 2004 and recognized it as a crucial voting bloc.

Fred Thompson's campaign named a handful of volunteer grassroots leaders in Miami-Dade to help boost its outreach to Latino voters -- a territory rival Rudy Giuliani is putting great effort in reaching. County leadership positions announced today include co-chairs: Homestead Mayor Lynda Bell and Miami-Dade Commissioners Joe Martinez and Natacha Seijas. The latter two previously endorsed Thompson when he appeared at Miami's Urbeita Oil in October. Other's involved Lois Jones, Chris Miles and Luis Rodriguez.

WASHINGTON -- Rudy Giuliani is the only 2008 Republican presidential candidate who has not accepted an invitation to a "values voters" conference of social conservatives in Washington, D.C., Oct. 19-21 sponsored by the Family Research Council. Giuliani's absence suggests that he will fare badly in the conference's straw vote though he leads the national Republican public opinion polls. Some 2,000 social conservatives from around the country are expected to attend the event. A footnote: Supporters from outside his staff are urging Giuliani to discontinue the stunt of interrupting a campaign speech by taking a cell phone call from his wife....

CAMPAIGN '08 | Dem candidates woo growing demographic In 1994, Maya Solis became a White House intern and got to see the inner workings of the West Wing. "The Clintons have been great to our family," said Solis, 32. "I see the human side of them." Maya Solis' father, Chicago Ald. Danny Solis (25th), is one of the few Illinois politicians who has, so far, come out in support of Clinton's bid for president. Maya Solis is volunteering for Clinton, mobilizing grass-roots support in the gritty Pilsen neighborhood. » Click to enlarge image Maya Solis (left) signs up Adriana Vera...