Thread: Obama says Latino vote key to victory, vows immigration reform in 2013

Obama ‘confident’ of immigration reform if reelected

By Dave Boyer

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The Washington Times

Wednesday, October 24, 2012


DAVENPORT, Iowa — In an interview that the White House originally insisted be kept off-the-record, President Obama told an Iowa newspaper that he’s “confident” he will achieve immigration reform next year if he’s reelected.

“Since this is off the record, I will just be very blunt,” Mr. Obama told the editor and publisher of the Des Moines Register in a 30-minute phone call. “Should I win a second term, a big reason I will win a second term is because the Republican nominee and the Republican Party have so alienated the fastest-growing demographic group in the country, the Latino community.”
The president held a campaign rally in Iowa Wednesday morning, his 10th visit to the battleground state this year. “This is where the movement for change began,” he told about 3,500 cheering supporters at the Mississippi Valley fairgrounds, referring to his victory four years ago.
It was his first stop on a 48-hour blitz of six battleground states as the campaign enters its final two weeks.
The president gave the interview to Iowa’s most influential newspaper Tuesday as he lobbied for its endorsement, which will be announced Saturday. Mr. Obama holds a slight lead in Iowa polls over Republican nominee Mitt Romney, who has closed the gap here since the presidential debates.
The president also told the newspaper’s officials that his economic stimulus actions have produced a rebound that is quicker than some other economic recoveries in U.S. history.
“In many ways, because of the actions we took early on, we’re actually ahead of pace in the typical recovery out of a recession like this,” Mr. Obama said.
Mr. Obama joked with the newspaper’s managers that “you’ll feel better” if they endorse him.
The White House originally insisted the president’s interview be kept from the public, although Mr. Obama’s comments on immigration and other topics didn’t diverge much from his public remarks on those issues. White House officials reversed course Wednesday morning and released a transcript of the interview after editor Rick Green publicly complained to readers about the secretive nature of the interview. Mr. Green openly speculated that the White House had been worried that the president might commit a gaffe that could hurt him in the election.
The president told the newspaper that Republicans’ alienation of Hispanics “is a relatively new phenomenon.”
“George Bush and Karl Rove were smart enough to understand the changing nature of America,” Mr. Obama said. “And so I am fairly confident that they’re going to have a deep interest in getting that done. And I want to get it done because it’s the right thing to do and I’ve cared about this ever since I ran back in 2008.”
Mr. Obama pledged in the 2008 campaign to make immigration reform a priority but failed to follow through on the promise. Leaders of the Hispanic community and others have been especially critical of his broken promise, although Mr. Obama holds a wide lead over Mr. Romney in polling of Latino voters.
The president also told the newspaper that he expects to get “the equivalent of the grand bargain” with Republicans after the election on the looming “fiscal cliff” of spending cuts and deficit reduction.
“We can easily meet — ‘easily’ is the wrong word — we can credibly meet the target that the Bowles-Simpson Commission established of $4 trillion in deficit reduction, and even more in the out-years, and we can stabilize our deficit-to-GDP ratio in a way that is really going to be a good foundation for long-term growth,” Mr. Obama said. “Now, once we get that done, that takes a huge piece of business off the table.”
Early voting in Iowa began on Sept. 27; nearly 520,000 people have requested early ballots. In 2008, Mr. Obama won the state over Republican John McCain by about 9.5 percentage points.
The president’s campaign stop in Iowa launched two days of virtually round-the-clock campaigning in battleground states. Mr. Obama will hold rallies later Wednesday in Denver and Las Vegas. In between, he will tape a segment of “The Tonight Show” with Jay Leno in Los Angeles.
Mr. Obama will fly overnight on Air Force One to Florida, where he will hold a campaign rally in Tampa before traveling to Richmond, Va., and Cleveland, Ohio, for more campaign events.

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A more honest title for this article would be...

Obama says illegal alien vote key to victory, vows AMNESTY for 2013

Barack Obama To Des Moines Register: If I Win, It May Be Thanks To GOP Alienating Latinos

huffingtonpost.com
Elise Foley
Sam Stein
Posted: 10/24/2012 11:24 am EDT Updated: 10/24/2012 11:39 am EDT


President Barack Obama told The Des Moines Register Tuesday that Latinos -- and the GOP's alienation of the Latino community -- will help him win the election.

WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama told The Des Moines Register on Tuesday that there was a strong possibility that he'd win a second term because of the extent to which Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney had alienated Hispanic voters.

"Since this is off the record, I will just be very blunt," Obama said on a call Tuesday with the Register's publisher and editor, which was originally meant to be off the record. "Should I win a second term, a big reason I will win a second term is because the Republican nominee and the Republican Party have so alienated the fastest-growing demographic group in the country, the Latino community."

The statement was part of an interview that the White House never intended to go public. The president talked to the editors at the Register on condition that the conversation be kept off the record. The paper complained, asking for some explanation for why they couldn't print what the president had said (the campaign said it was the White House's call). The paper ended up taking their complaints public in a blistering blog post on Tuesday night. By Wednesday morning, the Obama campaign relented.

Jen Psaki, a spokeswoman for the Obama campaign, told reporters Wednesday morning that the Register had asked to make the interview public. "We have said that is fine," she said, according to a pool report.

Ironically, nothing in the transcript appears all too exciting. In fact, much of it is banal. But the hoopla around the process of conducting the interview gave it more buzz. The caution initially exhibited by the Obama campaign, after all, was surprising. The Register is the most important paper in Iowa, itself a critical battleground state. And while the impact of endorsements on elections tends to be overstated, it wouldn't be in any candidate's interest to alienate the paper's editorial page.

Obama's observations, even when offered under the supposition of an off-the-record conversation, weren't all that uncommon for him or his campaign. The president has a huge lead with Latino voters -- a polling firm predicted on Wednesday that he will win their vote by a three-to-one margin -- and Romney has not been able to significantly cut into it, despite outreach efforts.

Previous Republicans have done better with Latino voters, as Obama pointed out to the paper.

"George Bush and Karl Rove were smart enough to understand the changing nature of America," he said.

Latinos by and large oppose the Republican Party's views on immigration reform, and support adding pathways to citizenship for those undocumented immigrants already in the country. Obama's plan would include methods for undocumented immigrants to become citizens, while Romney opposes "amnesty" and paths to citizenship. Despite Romney's attempt to shift back to the center, the Obama campaign has done what it can to remind Latinos of the hardline statements that Romney made during the Republican primary. During the Register interview, Obama pledged once more to pass immigration reform in his second term.

"I want get it done because it’s the right thing to do and I've cared about this ever since I ran back in 2008," he said.

In addition to immigration reform, President Obama also laid out other agenda items for his next four years in office, should he win them. He discussed implementing the Wall Street and health care reform laws that he passed during his first term, and investing in new energy technologies and infrastructure as well as home retrofitting. As for tax reform he noted, "a serious corporate tax reform agenda that's revenue-neutral but lowers rates and broadens the base."

And, perhaps to the chagrin of some in his party, he said he would revisit the deal that he and House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) nearly pulled off during the debt-ceiling showdown in the summer of 2011.

"It will probably be messy," Obama told the Register. "It won't be pleasant. But I am absolutely confident that we can get what is the equivalent of the grand bargain that essentially I’ve been offering to the Republicans for a very long time, which is $2.50 worth of cuts for every dollar in spending, and work to reduce the costs of our health care programs."

Barack Obama To Des Moines Register: If I Win, It May Be Thanks To GOP Alienating Latinos

If Obama wins it will be because he made up lost ground among white voters that comprise around 75% of all voters in America.

W

Originally Posted by ALIPAC

If Obama wins it will be because he made up lost ground among white voters that comprise around 75% of all voters in America.

W

Mr W
I don't think he going to win I have watch Fox & all the other News
Im for Mitt . I like what he told Obama about the pip line . Obama did not know what to say . it true Our American Guy 's & Girls would have a job by now if Obama
put the pip line in but he did not do this .
from what I have seen mitt has obama worry . obama don't know his Left hand from his right hand In my book .
No amnesty Or dream act