Jack Kemp was considered a “radical with hair on fire” by the GOP-e of the time and they all disavowed him. However, GOP presidential candidates got much more of the Hispanic vote during his time. Read all of the article beyond the first few words and you will understand this.
It didn’t carry forward because the GOP abandoned (a) the ideals and (b) the outreach. The fact that Ryan was not allowed to go and speak to “urban” (read: poor black) areas and nobody at all went to speak in Hispanic areas, except for Rubio, who was allowed to occasionally preach to the choir, tells you why we lost these areas spectacularly.
I was speaking to a Hispanic friend this weekend who said she despised everything Obama stood for - but she voted for him anyway, because she thought the GOP hated Hispanics and Romney made it very clear that he “didn’t want” their votes.
She loves Rubio and Mia Love, btw, but she said she couldn’t get past Romney. Also, she and a lot of Hispanics did not like the fact that he was a Mormon.
Rubio’s (Catholic) family was sucked in by the Mormons for social services after they arrived in the US, but then he married a Catholic and is Catholic himself.
Mia Love is also a Mormon, but she wasn’t brought up as a Mormon and probably still has a less-Mormon oriented agenda (and I wouldn’t be surprised if she finds another religion one of these days).
But Romney was very much a part of their strange world vision, which involves making huge profits for themselves and their church. They were originally enemies of the US, and Romney’s great-grandfather fled to Mexico with his wives. Romney’s grandfather brought his son (Romney’s father) back to the US as a child when the Mexicans began objecting to this polygamist colony and its proseletysing.
The only reason Utah is part of the US is because the Mormons didn’t have enough firepower to resist the US cavalry, and the Mormons finally had to back off after killing a whole wagon train (Mountain Meadows Massacre) and various other groups and individuals that were on their way to settle the West. The condition for statehood was that they give up polygamy and any practice that was contrary to the US Constitution.
Romney, like Obama, apparently thought he was the fulfilment of some Mormon “prophecy” where they would take over the United States.
Could we have found a worse candidate?