Thread: Juan Hernandez laments not being used more by McCain.

TRANSLATED FROM:
http://www.aldiatx.com/sharedcontent/dw ... 1219a.html

Juan Hernández, the former director of Hispanic matters for the presidential campaign of senator John McCain, said that he tried to bring together the Republican Party to the Hispanic voters, but that it was not possible because there was a lack of interest.

In his first interview since last year's presidential campaign, Hernández said that because of the inaction, he offered to resign two times to his post, but that he continued in the campaign by insistence of McCain, who assured him that he was vital to obtaining the support of hispanics.


Hernández occupied for 14 months the highest position occupied by a Hispanic in the campaign of the republican candidate, but in an interview with Al Dia he summarized the experience as one of the most frustrating of his political career.

"It was one of the most difficult experiences for me", said Hernández, former educator of the University of Texas in Dallas (UTD) and former official of the administration of the former president of Mexico Vicente Fox. Hernández said that his ideas were ignored "not so much because there was discrimination inside the campaign, but (as a latin American advisor) you do not exist. You don't even exist. There never was any interest".

Hernández said that he participated in all the morning meetings of the campaign and saw as McCain, and campaign director Rick Davis, share many of his ideas and messages to conquer the Hispanic vote.

Nevertheless, Hernández said that those messages never came to see the light due to what he described as an ambiguous force inside the party that didn't let them be broadcasted.

"McCain wanted it. Rick Davis wanted it. But when you arrived at the medium level of the campaign, the ones that operated the campaign, froze (the message) ", he said.

For example, Hernández responsible for assuring that Hispanic faces would be seen behind McCain during all the press conferences and events.

"I gave hundreds of names", he said. "You never saw Hispanics. Why? Therefore because the schedule changed, or because we couldn't find him. Always excuses, and excuses and excuses and behind the senator there was never a Hispanic".

Intercepted messages.

Hernández said that attending to his recommendations, videos were filmed, or 'commercials', in Spanish directed specifically toward the Hispanic, said Hernández.

"Thousands of dollars in commercials for television and radio were spent that were never utilized. They weren't even permitted to show them on the internet", he said. "Never were they (videos) permited to be shown on the internet. There is a group in the middle. They don't have names. It is like a force, a resistance of a mass of people that says, 'No. To speaking to hispanics, to speaking to immigrants, No, No, No'".

In another instance, Hernández was sent to New Mexico to carry out interviews on the part of the campaign about immigration reform with the television chain Univision. For two consecutive days, the interviews were canceled by people inside the campaign.

"You would arrive at the medium level of the party and there was a fear about immigration reform", he said. "The republican base is going to get mad".

The post of Hernández inside the campaign was historic and unprecedented, since the Hispanic matters director position inside the Republican Party never had existed.

"I thank John McCain for being able to see how a campaign is handled in the great world campaign, the great campaign in the U.S.", he said. "It was incredibly interesting and also one of the largest frustrations of my life. For fourteen months I wanted to move a message and to see it frozen, frozen, frozen. And to feel that the candidate wanted me there, but the majority of the campaign did not want me there".

During the campaign, Hernández tried to put in the air four messages that undertook the themes of the contribution of hispanics to the economy, on how immigrants "are God's children", on the tried free commerce between the U.S. and countries of Latin America and on the participation of the Latin Americans in the armed forces.

But, he said, none of these messages could leave the extensive way and the true McCain was hidden from the American public.

"One of the times that I went to (McCain), I told him, 'Hey, many thanks, but here we are not doing what is necesary to win over hispanics. To the contrary, we are hiding your marvelous history, your marvelous relationship with hispanics in favor of the undocumented. We are hiding it in this campaign instead of promoting it'", said Hernández.

Hernández is current member of the Initiative for the Integral Migratory Reform of the Reform Institute and author of The New American Pioneers: Why Are We Afraid of Mexican Immigrants, and will reside in Washington during the next months trying to lobby for immigration reform during the administration of Barack Obama.

"Obama has been very quiet regarding reform. When he is asked which are his priorities, he forgets to say immigration reform. And we are not going to let him forget", he said.

Can you say "token" in Spanish?

Wow!

Headlines should read

"Juan Hernandez BACK Stabs McCain!"

You see there McCain. You bent over for La Raza, installed Juan, promised them everything they wanted, worked foolishly for them, pissed off many Americans doing it and now.... boom you get stabbed in the back by your man Juan.

Et Tu Juan?

W

Maybe headlines should read "Hernandez cost McCain the election".

I can't help but snicker about this.

Notice Juan did this interview with the Spanish Language media and these smear comments are going to his target audience.

You would have thought Juan signed a confidnetiality and gag agreement when he entered the McCain campaign.

Dixie

Hernández said that his ideas were ignored "not so much because there was discrimination inside the campaign, but (as a latin American advisor) you do not exist. You don't even exist. There never was any interest".

Cant Hispanics who are selected for these positions ever be satisfied without always being the center of attention? How about just plain "advisor" and not "Latin American advisor"? Anyway, Hernandez and McCain were losers from the get-go because of their idiotic stance on immigration reform.