Today immigrant advocates will announce a campaign to transform the passion of the millions of people who took to the streets this spring into election-changing votes in the fall. The We Are America Alliance will release its state-by-state report detailing the numbers of immigrants eligible to become new voters and the potential impact they could have on key races in November.
Nationwide, the number of immigrants who are registering to become citizens has risen 15 percent and Johnny Simancas, the executive director of United Hispanics of Virginia, estimates that his organization has registered 20 percent more than last year.
But he’s not sure the new voters will vote as a bloc.
“Some are Republican and some are Democrat, some like Bush and some don’t like Bush,” said Simancas, whose organization is based in Seven Corners.
The Hispanic population has grown to about 418,130 in Virginia, or about 5.8 percent of the population, according to the 2004 U.S. Census survey. In Maryland, there are 294,000 Hispanics who make up 5.4 percent of the population, according to the 2000 Census.
The numbers may not seem large, but they’re enough to decide who will be Maryland’s next governor, said Peter Shapiro, senior fellow at the University of Maryland’s Academy of Leadership and a former chairman of the Prince George’s County Commission.
“Neither party should take any votes for granted,” Shapiro said. Hispanics historically vote Democrat, but President Bush has tried to reverse that trend.
In Maryland, Zara Urgiles, 25, immigrated to Baltimore from Ecuadorsix years ago. She became a U.S. citizen last year and in five months will cast her first ballot. She won’t reveal who she’ll pick for governor, but she said immigration reform is her top issue.
Such immigrants have already made their mark in the 2006 elections, said a spokeswoman for U.S. Senate candidate Jim Webb.
North Virginia’s burgeoning Vietnamese-American population helped propel Webb to the Democratic nomination to face Sen. George Allen in November, Webb spokeswoman Kristian Denny Todd told The Examiner. Webb’s wife is Vietnamese, Todd said, and the Democratic nominee had a long relation with the community in Virginia.
“Obviously, the immigrant vote is going to be very important,” she said.
Bill Bozin, spokesman for Allen, said the nation is “truly a nation of immigrants” and “our campaign will be reaching out to unite all Virginians behind positive ideas.”
