Thread: MD Poll: Immigration high on voters' minds

OrlandoSentinel.com

Poll shows immigration high on voters' minds
By Aaron Deslatte and Victor Manuel Ramos, Orlando Sentinel

JACKSONVILLE BEACH — As he fought to keep his outgunned bid for governor from falling apart this summer, Attorney General Bill McCollum has been able to lean on one rock-ribbed base of Republican support: Hispanic voters.

But now that polls suggest McCollum's campaign has pulled into a statistical dead heat with Naples millionaire Rick Scott, he is taking a big risk by launching a hard-edged Arizona-style immigration policy that is ostracizing some of his top Latino backers.

A poll commissioned by the Orlando Sentinel and other media released Friday shows the issue is potent within Republican ranks.

The Mason-Dixon poll found 81 percent of GOP voters likely to cast ballots in the Aug. 24 primary support the Arizona immigration law, which Scott was first to pounce on last spring. McCollum vacillated at the time, saying first the law was "far out there" but then supporting an amended version -- even filing court briefs defending the law in the Obama Administration's federal court challenge.

But among Hispanic Republicans, support for an Arizona-style immigration law drops.

Only 54 percent of Hispanic GOP voters – who are overwhelmingly Cuban – support the Arizona law and 36 percent oppose it, although because the Hispanic sample size is relatively small, support for the law could be 10 percentage points higher or lower.

As McCollum spans the North half of the state in a four-day bus tour, he is straddling both ends of that ethnic divide.

"I support Arizona's immigration law. A lot of people have questioned that in this campaign, but I do support the law," McCollum told patrons Friday morning at the Bright Mornings Café in Fernandina Beach.

McCollum told the crowd he wanted Florida police to have directives to check the immigration status of people when they have a "reasonable suspicion" they are illegal during stops or arrests.

"The brouhaha that surrounds this law is far greater and exceeds the fundamentals that are in it."

Meanwhile, his campaign was trying to hastily arrange a private conference call with Hispanic campaign backers who were put off that McCollum announced the plan this week without enough consultation with them – a mistake McCollum acknowledged Thursday.

Osceola County Commissioner John Quiñones, who is on McCollum's Hispanic leadership team, said he has some misgivings about a Florida version of the law becoming an unfunded mandate that would empower untrained police officers to enforce federal law.

"If you give blanket authority to local police you could run afoul on issues like racial profiling," Quiñones said, "but I think primarily that McCollum's focus has been on jobs, on incentivizing businesses and I hope that would continue to be the primary discussion."

McCollum clearly has more to risk than Scott by plunging into the issue in the primary's fading days.

The same Mason-Dixon survey that found McCollum with a slight 34 percent to 30 percent edge over Scott, found he had 57 percent support from Hispanic Republicans compared with 21 percent for Scott.

"McCollum's got this one little segment of the base that is keeping him in the race, so he can't afford to alienate them too much," said Mason-Dixon managing director Brad Coker.

But at once, the issue is rippling through the electorate as the fears over jobs and government spending abound.

Among all voters, 55 percent favor the Arizona law, including 61 percent of independents. Among Democrats, 62 percent oppose it. Hispanic voters are divided, with 47 percent in favor and 46 percent in opposition.

Mary Lee French, 67, a retired teacher wearing a McCollum T-shirt at the Fernandina Beach café, asked McCollum about immigration "because of crime and because of workers."

"It's an economic thing," she said. "We need these people to come in and help us, but it's a mess."

Brian Downey, 68, a retired businessman echoed the mood.

"We're all immigrants. This country wouldn't be what it is without immigration .But we all did it legally," he said. "It's an undue financial burden without a corresponding return."

Nancy Acevedo, a Republican activist in Seminole County, said McCollum has more support from Hispanic Republicans in the state because many in the community have known him for years. He has been supportive of welcoming asylum immigration policies for Cuban immigrants and of efforts to decide on Puerto Rico's status through plebiscites.

His harsher take on illegal immigration is a new side of the candidate that doesn't scare her away, Acevedo said.

"People from the community who know McCollum understand that he is a very compassionate person who is sensitive to diversity issues," said Acevedo, of Winter Springs.

"I don't believe that at the end of the day he is going to support any law that would go to the extreme and would hurt the community."

But Violeta Burgos, a former Republican who turned independent, said she had supported McCollum when he was her congressman and would have voted for him in the general election if he had not taken a harsh immigration stance.

"I have voted for McCollum several times before, but I'm not going to give him my vote this time so that he could use that support to mistreat our immigrants," said Burgos, who is Puerto Rican and lives in east Orange County. "He could have all the political pressure in the world but that doesn't mean that he has to let the extreme right take the party hostage."

Copyright © 2010, Orlando Sentinel

The Mason-Dixon poll found 81 percent of GOP voters likely to cast ballots in the Aug. 24 primary support the Arizona immigration law, which Scott was first to pounce on last spring

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Toss McCollum...


Another McCain...flip flop to get votes.

Originally Posted by Rai7965

Toss McCollum...


Another McCain...flip flop to get votes.

We have the same problem here in California. We are screwed this coming November 2.