Thursday, June 4, 1998
Latino Voter Participation Doubled Since '94 Primary
By AMY PYLE, PATRICK J. MCDONNELL,
HECTOR TOBAR, Times Staff Writers
Latino presence at the polls continued an upward
trend Tuesday, amounting to 12% of all
California voters--double the number who voted in the
1994 primary, but not yet enough to determine the
outcome of issues crucial to the state's
fastest-growing population group, according to Times
exit polls.
On Tuesday, the diminutive size of the Latino
electorate compared to the group's 29.4% share of
the California population led Latino voters to lose the
very fight that brought many to the polls.
The issue was the bilingual education abolition
measure, Proposition 227, which the exit poll found
was second only to the governor's race in luring
Latinos to vote.
Latinos polled Tuesday said they opposed the initiative
by a margin of 2 to 1, many describing it as
discriminatory, but it passed in an almost mirror
image of that vote.
"It leaves you feeling deflated," said Francisco
Dominguez, an Oxnard school district trustee and
executive director of the Latino advocacy group El
Concilio del Condado de Ventura. "Now we just need to
convince voters to become much more active. That's
when we will make a difference."
4 Latinos in Bids for Statewide Office
Still, Latinos' growing potential as an electoral
powerhouse was evident Tuesday. For the first time
this century, the likelihood of an elected Latino
statewide official looms near, with four Latinos winning
spots to compete in November for lieutenant
governor, controller, state superintendent of public
instruction and insurance commissioner.
Based on Tuesday's results, state Assemblyman Cruz
Bustamante (D-Fresno) will face state Sen. Tim Leslie
(R-Tahoe City) for lieutenant governor;
Assemblywoman Diane Martinez (D-Monterey Park)
will face incumbent Insurance Commissioner Chuck
Quackenbush; and San Mateo County Supervisor
Ruben Barrales, a Republican, will face incumbent
Controller Kathleen Connell.
In the nonpartisan race for state superintendent of
public instruction, pro-227 Latina Gloria Matta
Tuchman also forced Supt. Delaine Eastin into a runoff.
election.
The one area where Latinos may have made a
difference in Tuesday's vote was the defeat of
Proposition 226, which would have restricted use of
union dues. Exit polls showed they voted against it in
larger-than-average numbers, likely in part because of
the community's higher-than-average union
membership.
Earlier Times polls had shown Latinos favoring
Proposition 227, albeit by a narrower margin than
other voters. Poll Director Susan Pinkus said that
last-minute campaigning by anti-227 groups in Latino
media and the opposition of all four gubernatorial
candidates probably tipped the balance.
"Being largely working-class communities, many
Latinos do not start paying attention until two or
three weeks before the actual elections," said Harry
Pachon, president of the Tomas Rivera Center, a
Latino think tank. Pachon said that was precisely when
mailers opposing 227 started arriving en masse and
television commercials picked up.
According to the exit poll, Latino voters were younger,
poorer, less-educated, newer to the political process
and primed for change. Two-thirds of Latinos polled
were under age 50, 15% earn less than $20,000 a
year, a third have at most a high school education and
nearly a third voted for the first time in a primary
election.
Since they are predominantly registered as
Democrats, Latinos were far more likely than
non-Latino white voters polled to advocate for a
change from 16 years of Republican occupation of the
governor's seat.
Of course, the notion of a Latino voting bloc is
increasingly disputed in political circles as naive,
particularly as electoral rifts emerge, often between
newer and more established immigrants.
For example, Jose Sandoval, a Huntington Park father
of three voting in his first primary, favored Proposition
227 because he felt his children's years in bilingual
classes were a waste. "They couldn't even read
English," he said.
By contrast, a mother of four from Bell said she voted
against the measure out of concern for the
educational experience of her youngest daughter who
"says some words in English but she's still learning."
Still, Tuesday's outcome appeared to follow other
recent elections, where Latinos went against the tide
on measures they took personally: the anti-illegal
immigrant Proposition 187 and the anti-affirmative
action Proposition 209. Latinos opposed both
measures passed by state voters.
"Contrary to state voting patterns, Latinos continue to
reject wedge propositions," said Antonio Gonzalez,
president of the Willie Velazquez Institute, which
analyzes Latino voting patterns. "The story here is that
Latinos, again contrary to statewide currents, reject
Prop. 227 with a big turnout . . . We're kind of like
Michael Jordan right now: Every time he scores a point
in the playoffs he sets a new record."
Latinos bucked the trends elsewhere as well on
Tuesday, largely without success: They were more than
twice as likely as voters overall to support
multimillionaire Al Checchi--liking him almost as much
as they liked Democratic nominee Gray Davis--a nod to
Checchi's attempt to beat a Populist tom-tom over
the condition of public education. And they favored
fellow Latino Charles Calderon for attorney general,
while the rest of Democrats whisked Bill Lockyer into
the general election slot.
Only Proposition 226 seemed to offer a glimpse of the
shape of things to come in this state, where Latinos
are expected to become the majority in 2040.
Like three in four Latino voters, Jose Montenegro, a
former warehouseman and Teamster from South Gate,
voted against the union initiative. He thought it
threatened to diminish the power of working people.
And the way he figures it, from his current vantage
point as an independent truck driver working out of
San Pedro, large corporations already trample
truckers' rights at every turn.
"Unions have lost a lot of power," said Montenegro, 50,
who has lived in California for three decades. "They
need the money to get more active, to start
organizing people more."
The measure did lose and by just a few percentage
points. Without Latinos, the exit poll of 5,143 voters
showed, the measure would have been a dead heat.
"Lots of interesting things are going to start happening
in the next couple of years," said assistant professor
Abel Valenzuela of the Cesar Chavez Center at UCLA.
He said that as the impact of Latino voters grows, so
too will their diversity of interest and options.
"You're going to see [Latino] movement into statewide
campaigns, as you did this election, and into
Republican races and into predominantly white areas,
too," Valenzuela said.
Welcome News for Latino Politicians
Although they are by no means assured of Latino
support, Latino politicians generally consider this
trend good news. This year, there are more vying for
office than ever before.
Barrales' campaign consultant, Kevin Spillane, said he
considers the candidate a "benchmark for the
Republican party," which lost the confidence of Latinos
following Gov. Pete Wilson's advocacy for Proposition
187.
"Obviously, the perception has developed that the
Republican party is not friendly in the Latino
community," Spillane said. "We have some work to do."
The Latino Issues Forum in San Francisco issued a
news release detailing those and other gains: of 20
state Senate seats up for grabs, seven have Latino
candidates in the general election; of the 80 Assembly
seats, 25 have Latino candidates.
If November results emerge as expected, those
candidacies could increase Latino representation in
both houses to nearly one-fifth.
"The giant is awake!" declared forum Director
Guillermo Rodriguez. "No longer are we just electing
Latinos from East L.A., but from places like San Luis
Obispo and Monterey."
In Los Angeles, statewide Latino political power follows
a meandering route through East Los Angeles and the
San Gabriel Valley. Tuesday's election indicates that
trail may soon lead to the San Fernando Valley as well.
There, the hotly contested state Senate race, which
remained too close to call Wednesday, also had
distinctly Latino overtones.
City Councilman Richard Alarcon has repeatedly
downplayed the role of the Latino vote in the race, but
election returns pinpointed his base of support in the
heavily Latino northeast Valley, while competitor and
former Assemblyman Richard Katz drew more
backers from the predominantly Jewish, middle-class
neighborhoods of the southwest Valley.
"I am only hopeful that people in the Northeast Valley
now know they have this ability to impact the process,"
Alarcon said.
An interesting case study in the pitfalls of defining
Latinos as a monolith can be seen in the sharply
contrasting voting results from from Huntington Park
and Montebello, two largely Latino blue-collar suburbs
of Los Angeles with similar population numbers--more
than 60,000 residents each--but widely varying
demographic make-ups.
Huntington Park, where 92% of residents are Latino,
is a new-immigrant enclave that is home to growing
numbers of recent arrivals, especially from Mexico.
Montebello, with a 68% Latino majority, is a more
middle-class bedroom community, home to many
multi-generational U.S. residents of Mexican ancestry.
In Montebello, residents voted 58%-41% against 227,
according to the Los Angeles County
Registrar-Recorder. But voters in Huntington Park
weighed in against the anti-bilingual education
measure by 71% to 28%--almost matching the 3-to-1
margins by which Latinos statewide rejected
Proposition 187 four years ago.
The two cities' voting trends also show the more
unified opposition to 226 among Latinos.
In Huntington Park almost 80% voted against
restricting union ability to fund political measures.
Times staff writers Fred Alvarez in Ventura and Hugo
Martin in the San Fernando Valley also contributed to
this story.
* * *
The Latino Vote
Primary Turnout
1994: 6%
1996: 8%
1998: 12%
* * *
Proposition 227
Yes: 37%
No: 63%
* * *
Proposition 226
Yes: 25%
No: 75%
* * *
By Candidate:
Checchi: 30%
Davis: 36%
Harman: 11%
Lungren: 17%
Source: L.A. Times / CNN exit poll
* * *
Ballot Breakdown (Southland Edition, A1)
63% of Latinos voted no on Prop. 227 (to end bilingual
education).
57% of Asians voted yes on Prop. 227.
20% of Democratic women voted for Jane Harman for
governor.
49% of Democratic women voted for Gray Davis for
governor.
Source: L.A. Times / CNN exit poll
Copyright Los Angeles Times
=======================================
[Excerpted from LA Times Website]
Thursday, June 4, 1998
FINAL CALIFORNIA ELECTION RETURNS
PROPOSITIONS
How California Voted
100% Precincts Reporting: votes (%)
219--Ballot Measures. Application.
Yes: 3,179,530 (67%)
No: 1,571,721 (33%)
220--Courts. Superior and Municipal Court
Consolidation.
Yes: 3,126,701 (64%)
No: 1,741,016 (36%)
221--Subordinate Judicial Officers. Discipline.
Yes: 3,851,146 (81%)
No: 924,688 (19%)
222--Murder. Peace Officer Victim. Sentence
Credits.
Yes: 3,869,678 (77%)
No: 1,162,928 (23%)
223--Schools. Spending Limits on Administration.
Yes: 2,327,342 (46%)
No: 2,777,825 (54%)
224--State-Funded Design and Engineering Services.
Yes: 1,885,601 (38%)
No: 3,053,797 (62%)
225--Limiting Congressional Terms. Proposed U.S.
Constitutional Amendment.
Yes: 2,617,937 (53%)
No: 2,335,969 (47%)
226--Political Contributions by Employees, Union
Members, Foreign Entities.
Yes: 2,442,587 (47%)
No: 2,808,678 (53%)
227--English Language in Public Schools.
Yes: 3,253,333 (61%)
No: 2,091,449 (39%)
* * *
How L. A. County Voted
100% Precincts Reporting: votes (%)
219--Ballot Measures. Application.
Yes: 687,548 (63%)
No: 412,157 (37%)
220--Courts. Superior and Municipal Court
Consolidation.
Yes: 729,914 (65%)
No: 390,870 (35%)
221--Subordinate Judicial Officers. Discipline.
Yes: 885,724 (80%)
No: 220,022 (20%)
222--Murder. Peace Officer Victim. Sentence
Credits.
Yes: 852,693 (73%)
No: 312,223 (27%)
223--Schools. Spending Limits on Administration.
Yes: 549,870 (47%)
No: 631,448 (53%)
224--State-Funded Design and Engineering Services.
Yes: 423,019 (37%)
No: 711,702 (63%)
225--Limiting Congressional Terms. Proposed U.S.
Constitutional Amendment.
Yes: 533,410 (47%)
No: 597,355 (53%)
226--Political Contributions by Employees, Union
Members, Foreign Entities.
Yes: 479,980 (39%)
No: 737,309 (61%)
227--English Language in Public Schools.
Yes: 700,171 (56%)
No: 546,257 (44%)
Key to Election Tables
An asterisk (*) denotes an incumbent candidate.
Elected candidates and approved measures--or
those leading with 99% of precincts reporting--are in
bold type. Runoff elections may be required in
nonpartisan races where no candidate receives over
50% of the vote. Results are not official and could be
affected by absentee ballots.
For primary races, candidates are grouped by party.
0% indicates information was unavailable at edition
time or only absentee ballots had been counted.
District locations are identified by county. In Los
Angeles, Orange, San Diego and Ventura counties,
they are identified by community.
Uncontested offices and write-in candidates are not
included in the tables.
* * *
Contributing to The Times' election coverage:
Technical assistance: Victor I. Pulver, Stephen
Bergens, Jane Hwa, Dony Hu and John Bryan.
Compiled by: Times editorial researchers Nona Yates
and Tracy Thomas.
Contributing: Wendy Cota, Sheila Dixon-Howard,
Christopher Foster, John Hernandez, William
Holmes, Rasean Jones, Elsa Miralrio, Cecilia
Rasmussen, Lilia Thompson and Tomas Torres.
Sources: Election returns provided by California
Secretary of State, county registrars of voters and
city clerks.
Copyright Los Angeles Times
