MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Economy shadows immigration in US Hispanics' agenda

The economy, education and health care are the main issues that Hispanics feel must be attended to by the new US president, but they place immigration in sixth place, according to a study from The Pew Hispanic Centre.

The study was based on a survey of 1,007 Latinos in December to analyze the problems that, in their judgment, must be faced first by President-elect Barack Obama and to assess the implications for the Latino community of his November election victory. In the November election Obama received 67% of the Hispanic vote in the election, while his Republican rival Senator John McCain garnered 31%. The study revealed that immigration, one of the issues that the candidates used to try and attract the Hispanic vote, is not among the main themes the respondents believe the new president must attend to first. Only 31% of those surveyed said that immigration should head the list of the tasks that President Obama must deal with, but the majority said that the top matter of importance was the economy. Furthermore, 57% of those queried said that the US economic situation is "extremely important" and they expressed their concern about other issues such as education, the health care system, national security and the environment, all of which they rated higher than immigration. Hispanics are optimistic with the arrival of Obama in the White House and 72% of the respondents expect him to be successful in his term in office. That is a substantially more favourable assessment than George W. Bush received, with 54% of Hispanics saying that they had a negative opinion of the outgoing president and adding that his failures outweighed his successes during his eight years in office. The study also revealed that the 2008 elections, in which more than 10 million Latinos were eligible to vote, awakened more interest among the Hispanic community than previous elections, and 74% of them acknowledged that they got involved in the election process in some way. During the election campaign, Democrats and Republicans alike increased their efforts to attract the Hispanic vote and 38% of those surveyed admitted that at least one of the two main campaign organizations got in touch with them and urged them to register and vote in the elections. Of those, 59% were contacted by the Obama campaign and 47% were contacted by the Republican campaign of Senator McCain. Of Latinos who were able to vote in the election, 47% did so for the first time, according to the survey. But Latinos not only went to the polls in greater numbers than in earlier elections, they also actively participated during the campaign and prepared themselves more thoroughly to cast their votes. The survey respondents said that 36% of them used the Internet to look for information about the candidates, 51% said they had participated in at least one political activity and 26% tried to persuade a friend or relative to vote for a particular candidate. The vast majority of the Hispanics surveyed – 82%- turned to the television for information about the campaign, 18% used the Internet, the same percentage read the newspaper and 10% listened to the radio. One quarter of Latinos who got their information from the TV heard it there in Spanish, while a third got their news in English and 44% got it in both languages. There are an estimated 44.6 million Hispanics living in the United States, comprising 15% of the US population and constituting the country's largest minority.