Behind the economy and education, Tarzana father of two Nain Ramos ranks immigration as his third-most pressing concern.
The Chilean immigrant, who legally came to this country with his mother and siblings when he was 12, feels betrayed by President Barack Obama and frustrated with Congress for failing to achieve comprehensive immigration reform. Largely due to his disenchantment over the issue, the wireless consultant — who usually votes Democrat — said he opted to cast votes for at least some Republican candidates in last week’s midterm elections.
“I don’t think (Obama’s) made good on his promises or propositions on immigration,” Ramos, who is 39 years old and acquainted with several undocumented immigrants, said at a Canoga Park eatery this week. “I think there has been more deportations and anti-immigrant feelings since he has been in office. … I thought it would be the other way around.”
Indeed, 57 percent of Latinos polled nationwide were either “not at all satisfied” or “not very satisfied” with the current federal immigration policy, according to a new W.K. Kellogg Foundation survey of about 1,000 Latino adults. Thirty-five percent were “somewhat satisfied” or “very satisfied” with the policy while 8 percent said they did not know, according to “The State of the Latino Family 2014 Survey” that was conducted by Latino Decisions in September and October and whose results were released Tuesday.
Even more striking is that the Latinos surveyed said they consider immigration as the second-highest concern after the economy/jobs, experts say.
That’s significant because immigration is normally ranked as the fourth- or fifth-highest concern for Latinos after jobs, education and health care, said sociology professor Manuel Pastor, director of the Center for the Study of Immigrant Integration at USC.
“In the current atmosphere, I think immigration is a particularly salient issue,” Pastor said. “There’s a lot of people waiting on pins and needles with regard to executive action” from Obama.
Despite opposition from Republican leaders, Obama said earlier this week that he intends to issue an order easing the threat against deportation of undocumented immigrants and is expected to do so by the end of the year, The Associated Press reported.
‘Warning sign’
The survey’s results should be taken as “a warning sign” to politicians not to dismiss the significance of immigration as a political issue, Pastor said.
In addition, a significant percentage of respondents (36 percent) felt that the country is getting worse in reducing anti-Latino and anti-immigrant attitudes than five years ago, which is something that was believed more by educated people who tend to vote in greater numbers, he said.
Latinos, the largest ethnic minority group in the U.S., compose 17 percent of the nation’s population with 54 million people and are expected to reach 31 percent by 2060, according to Latino Decisions.
The Kellogg Foundation survey, in which 15 percent of respondents were undocumented and 16 percent were noncitizen legal permanent residents, also found that 61 percent knew someone who was an undocumented immigrant while just over one-third knew someone who faced detention or deportation for immigration reasons.
These numbers suggest that citizen and noncitizen “communities are deeply intertwined,” Pastor said, “and that immigration is a personal issue as well as a political issue.”
For parents of children in kindergarten through second grade, immigration/deportations was ranked most often as their top concern followed by the economy and then education. That could be because many of the parents of these children themselves are undocumented immigrants or live in communities where there are such immigrants, Pastor said.
Following immigration and the economy, the survey’s 1,000 respondents also ranked crime, education, health care, terrorism/war and race relations as top concerns respectively.
For Paola G. of Winnetka, an undocumented immigrant from Argentina and a mother of four, immigration reform is her foremost concern. Paola’s mother and two siblings are citizens but she didn’t apply for legal status through them when she arrived because she never imagined she would stay in the country for 15 years, she said. Now her life and that of her husband are so difficult, she said, they are considering moving back to Argentina with their children, who range in ages from 7 to 16, sometime next year.
“Without being a legal resident or a citizen, you can’t advance economically, family-wise or socially,” Poala, who works as a waitress and asked that her last name not be used, said in Spanish. “A person who is undocumented has to conform with the minimum.”
Optimism mixed with pessimism
Meanwhile, the Latino adults surveyed expressed a mix of optimism and pessimism about the country’s future.
About 45 percent of respondents said they believed the country is generally “pretty seriously off on the wrong track” while 39 percent said they believed things were headed in the right direction. For many Latinos, that likely has to do with their perception of the economy; about one-third of respondents said they believe the country is worse in creating and providing access to well-paying jobs while 37 percent said it was about the same.
“When it comes to finding minimum wage jobs, you can find them but for middle class people making a decent class wage, those jobs are not there,” said Miguel Hernandez, a Highland Park resident who was among the survey’s respondents and who works as a loan officer in the San Fernando Valley.
Hernandez, 42, said he’s earning 75 percent less today than he did four years ago as a senior analyst at a bank before he was let go while caring for his ill mother. After the native Angeleno took some time off, it took him more than a year to find a job, he said.
More survey respondents also believed the country was faring worse in terms of crime, affordable housing, respect and Latino discrimination than five years ago, the survey found. However, more believed the country was faring better when it came to health care, equal opportunity and education than it was five years ago.
“We were all struck by the optimism that was expressed on critical issues of concern to the health and well-being of the family,” said Gail Christopher, vice president for policy and senior advisor at the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. “It wasn’t a naive optimism but generally they felt there was progress and things were going in the right direction in terms of health care and education in a general sense.”
Latinos newer to the country generally had more hope and optimism than U.S.-born Latinos and those with greater education and incomes on nearly all issues examined, the survey found. For example, 27 percent of noncitizens believe anti-Latino and anti-immigrant attitudes are worse while 39 percent of American citizens and 46 percent of fourth-generation respondents thought the same.
The survey, which had a margin of error of 3.1 percent, was conducted in the interviewees’ preferred language on issues related to demographics, social progress, education, economic conditions, health and Latino-specific content.
