Immigrants slow to rush to polls

By Timothy Pratt

Tuesday, May 23, 2006 | 7:32 a.m.

A slogan splashed across banners held high in recent marches on immigration reads, "Today we march, tomorrow we vote."

But despite the high turnout for the marches, petition drives and the campaign to call members of Congress, it remains unclear whether those activities to influence immigration legislation will translate into political power anytime soon.

"I don't think this will change who people will be voting for in the 2006 elections," said Pilar Weiss, political director for the Culinary Union.

The union recently organized a 47,000-signature petition backing pathways to legalization for immigrants who are in the country illegally and a worker program for future immigrants.

The union also ran phone banks at 22 casinos to facilitate calls to Congress.

Weiss said the future may look more like, "Today we march, tomorrow we become citizens, the day after tomorrow we vote."

Analysts said the question is whether the issue will continue to arouse interest in future elections, how many immigrants - Hispanics or otherwise - are or will become citizens and vote, and whether the U.S.-born children of immigrants will see the issue as something important when they reach voting age.

David Damore, assistant professor of political science at UNLV, said the stance of House Republicans on the issue may help mobilize Hispanics in particular, as Proposition 187 did in California in 1994, driving many to vote Democrat.

Gary Gray, a local Democratic consultant, noted that many Hispanics who had delayed taking the step from being legal permanent residents to becoming citizens were motivated by that bill and then went to the polls.

But Steve Wark, a local GOP consultant, said "a significant number" of the people marching, signing petitions and calling Congress in recent weeks are "not qualified to vote" - meaning they're not citizens and may not become citizens or, if they do, may not turn out in future elections.

Additionally, Wark said, immigrants are outnumbered by the "uniform response" local surveys have shown - most voters think "people should be in the country legally, and if not, they should not get the benefits that people in the country legally get."

In other words, Wark thinks the issue "will not be nearly as significant (politically) as it seems to be today."

Still, there are two groups of people who may see the current debate on immigration legislation - and the idea that they can influence such laws in the future - as motivation for participating in political life in the future.

One group is native-born children of immigrants. Damore says high school and college students seeing the debate unfold in Congress may participate in future elections. Another group is made up of those who are just now taking the step from being a legal permanent resident to becoming a citizen.

That step takes about $400 and the ability to pass a test on U.S. history and government.

The Citizenship Project - a local nonprofit group that helps prepare people for taking that step - reports that more people are passing through its doors in recent weeks, signing up for citizenship classes and becoming citizens.

From January to March 2006, 276 people had completed applications for citizenship, up from 229 during the same period in 2005 - a 20 percent increase, said Weiss, who serves on the project's board.

Perhaps more telling, in April 2006 - as the issue began occupying front pages almost daily - 108 people filled out applications for citizenship, up from 67 in April 2005 - a 61 percent increase.

Forty-seven percent of those who sought help from the project during the January to April period were from Mexico, 15 percent from Central America, 12 percent from Europe, 10 percent from Asia, 6 percent from the Caribbean and 5 percent from South America.

At the project's offices Monday, Alma Rebolledo was filing out of her government and history class. After being in the United States for 12 years, she was looking forward to becoming a citizen soon, especially because her take on recent events is that "you never know if they'll take away our residency tomorrow."

She also looked forward to voting, she said, for "someone who takes us into account."

"Even though there's a lot of us," she said, "so far, we don't count for much."