Naturalization and Mexican
American Empowerment
Mexican Americans and Politics
Lecture 15
February 28, 2006
Exam – Thursday
Two essays of which you will need to answer
one
You may bring one 3x5 card with notes – no
more
You will have the entire period, so use a few
minutes to outline your answer
Strong answers will find evidence from both
the readings and class
No need to bring a blue book
We prefer answers in pen
From Last Time
Mexican American Influence
in State and Local Politics
Recall and Mexican
American Influence
Review – Mexican American/Latino influence
occurs when
Mexican Americans/Latinos are unified
Other electorates are divided
2003 California recall election
Latinos divided (on recall)
Electorate as a whole more unified (on recall
and replacement)
Recall, By Race/Ethnicity
Latinos Whites Blacks Asian
Americans
Recall 46% 60% 27% No data
No Recall 54% 40% 73% No data
Source: Los Angeles Times, exit poll
Governor, by
Race/Ethnicity
Latinos Whites Blacks
Schwarzenegger 31% 52% 17%
Bustamante 52% 28% 64%
McClintock 9% 13% 6%
Source: Los Angeles Times, exit poll
Urban Politics:
Los Angeles Case Study
Minority exclusion (1961-1973)
White-led coalition denied political opportunities to Blacks
and other minorities
The Bradley Coalition (1973-1993)
Blacks, Latinos, liberal whites (particularly Jews)
Coalition declined as each group sought leadership
Riordan and Hahn (1993-2005)
Business-led coalitions
Minority communities divided, internally and from each
other
The 2005 Mayoral Race(s)
Primary – Group/region/ideology all
represented to varying degrees
Race/Ethnicity
Valley vs. Non-Valley
Moderate vs. Liberal Democrats
With so many candidates (5), little incentive to
build coalitions at first
In runoff, winner had to reach beyond his
own race/ethnic group
Race/Ethnic Voting Los
Angeles Mayoral Primary
Alarcon Hahn Hertzberg Parks Villa-
raigosa
Whites 3% 23% 36% 5% 27%
Blacks 2% 23% 5% 54% 15%
Latinos 9% 17% 7% 3% 64%
Asians - 59% 12% 8% 19%
Source: Los Angeles Times, Exit Poll
Race/Ethnic Voting Los
Angeles Mayoral Runoff
Hahn Villaraigosa
Whites 50% 50%
Blacks 52% 48%
Latinos 16% 84%
Asian 56% 44%
American
Source: Los Angeles Times, exit poll
Was This an Example of
Raw Latino Power?
Not really – Latinos had supported
Villaraigosa strongly in 2001
What changed was division in non-Latino
electorates
Whites split their votes evenly
Young Blacks and Black leaders supported
Villaraigosa (and, so, the Black vote split)
Asian American electorate is the outlier
Will the Los Angeles Experience
Reappear in Other U.S. Cities?
No, at least in the short term
Multiracial political coalitions are hard to form
And, harder to sustain
When multiracial coalitions have formed, blacks
have generally led
Latino and Asian Americans most underrepresented in
electorate
2001, 2003, 2005—New York and Houston
Latino candidates defeated despite Latino
majorities/pluralities in city population
Latino candidates defeated by undermining their White
support
Today’s Lecture
Naturalization and Mexican
American Political
Empowerment
Trends in Mexican
American Naturalization
Historically, few Mexican immigrants naturalized
Today, many more do
But, they still naturalize at lower rates than most other
immigrants
Why
SES
Proximity
Lack of obvious benefits
Complexity of application process
Absence of community-based assistance
Naturalizations
1981-2004
1,200,000
1,000,000
Total
800,000 Naturalizations
600,000
Mexican
400,000 Immigrant
Naturalizations
200,000
0
1981 1986 1991 1996 2001 2004
Do Mexican Immigrants
Want to Naturalize?
Best evidence – answer is yes
Approximately 15 percent of all Mexican
immigrant adults report no interest in naturalizing
Behavioral evidence
Approximately, 2/3 of eligible have done
something concrete to naturalize
Yet, only half of those who try, succeed
Why the Gap?
Confusion
Fear of consequences of failure
Concern about loss of home-country citizenship
Bureaucracy
Form complex
INS impenetrable
Cost
Absence of community-level assistance
Naturalization often a collective experience
Resources available 1996-1998 are no longer
Why The Change in the
Late 1990s?
Changes in the law
1996 Welfare and Immigration Reform bills
IRCA beneficiaries become eligible for citizenship
Changes in the attitude toward immigrants
Proposition 187
Rhetoric of Pat Buchanan and the nativist right
Changes in administration
Requirement to replace aging green cards
Government promotion of naturalization
But, Mexican American naturalization has slowed
since 1999, or so
Naturalization and Mexican
American Participation
Do the naturalized vote at higher rates than the
native born?
No, but possible exception in California among registered
voters (see Barreto article assigned for today)
Why?
Participation requires political socialization and adult
migrants have had less
Political institutions don’t mobilize new citizens
When immigrant issues top the agenda, this dynamic can
change
Themes to Consider for
Midterm
1. Importance of historical exclusion/discrimination
on the current shape of Mexican American politics
2. Immigration/tension over immigration as an
ongoing dynamic of change in Mexican American
politics
3. The shape and possible trajectories of Mexican
American (and by extension Latino) electoral
politics
4. Opportunities for Mexican American political
influence/comparison of the various races we read
about and discussed