At the Cross-Roads of a Reform Era: The Impact of Health Care and Immigration Reform on Latino Support for President Obama and Congress

Abstract

The Obama administration has pledged to reform two failing policy systems in the United States; immigration and health care. The Obama administration is faced with the rapid growth of the immigrant population, and a lack of uniform set of policies and programs to aid in the social, economic, and political incorporation of this rapidly growing immigration population, including a lack of consensus about a path of citizenship for immigrants (Singer 2009). Furthermore, the contemporary health care system is plagued with escalating costs, economic and disparities related to access and quality, and there is also a rapidly growing uninsured population in the United States (OECD 2008). The Latino populations’ attitudes toward these two critical policy areas are particularly relevant for several reasons. First, 39.8% of the Latino community is foreign-born (Pew Hispanic Center 2009) and 28% of Latinos have at least one foreign-born parent (Suro and Passel 2003), making immigration policy a salient issue for many Latinos. Second, Latinos have the highest uninsured rates, and the lowest percentage of people with employer coverage health insurance when compared to other racial and ethnic groups in the United States (James, Thomas, Lillie-Blanton, and Garfield 2007). While researchers recognize the significance of these two policies for the Latino community, studies have yet to examine current public opinion toward these two policies, and more importantly whether these attitudes affect Latino support of the current administration. In order to fill this gap in the literature we use the 2009 Latino Decisions survey of Latinos to examine how Latino public opinion regarding health care and immigration reform affects Latino support of President Obama and Congress. We find that these two policies are significant in Latino support of President Obama and Congress. This shows that Latinos support is political in nature with policies driving their support of the current administration. Given the vital role the Latino electorate played during the 2008 election, the success of these two policy reform efforts may have major implications for the 2010 and 2012 elections.