Univision News

The top-ranking Latino Democrat in the House of Representatives shrugged aside Mitt Romney’s suggestion that he could appeal to Latinos. (Flickr)

By JORDAN FABIAN
Channel: Politics

MANCHESTER, N.H. — A top Latino Democrat on Tuesday threw cold water on GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s appeal to Latino voters.

In an interview with Univision News, Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-Calif.) said that the former Massachusetts governor’s economic ideas and tough stance on illegal immigration would make him unpalatable to Latino voters. 

“He’s right that he has to attract Latino voters at the polls. He’s wrong in that every time he says something, he does anything but attract Latinos to his candidacy,” Becerra said. “If Romney was serious about trying to recruit Latinos to vote for him, he wouldn’t be saying the things that, actually, a lot of Americans don’t care for.”

At a campaign stop on Monday, Romney said: “If I can convince more Latino-Americans to vote Republican, I’ll be doing pretty well pretty broadly.”

Democrats noted the irony of that statement Wednesday, pointing out that Mitt Romney accepted the endorsement of Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, one of the architects of the Arizona and Alabama immigration laws that are extremely unpopular with Latinos.

But when asked about his party’s efforts to address the high 11 percent unemployment rate among Latinos, something the GOP says could hurt Democrats with Latinos, Becerra shifted blame to the Republicans.

“One of the reasons you’re going to see it be tough for Latinos looking for work to really see the full breadth of the recovery is that a lot of these industries [housing, construction] are being held up with the Republican obstruction of a lot of the legislation that would help our infrastructure,” he said. “One thing I can tell you from experience with my own family is that Americans of Latino descent are hard workers and they’re going to persevere. We just got to see someone who wants to work with them, not fire them.”