Voting. As an American citizen with a
very political family, I have never had a doubt in my mind that I
would vote. Even as a young child, I was always included in political
discussions with my parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles. There
was never a doubt in my mind that once I turned eighteen I would
vote. As I've gotten older, I have realized that this is not the case
for many people. Especially those who immigrated to this country. A
few questions that have come to my mind while learning about politics
in the Latino Community is, is voting something that all immigrants
who become citizens want to do, if not why? And do the children of
immigrants follow the political views of their parents? Do they vote,
are they encouraged or discouraged to do so? These topics are what I
want to cover while pondering the political ideas of the Latin
American culture in America.
For a while, Latino immigrants who
became naturalized citizens have been a mystery in the voting
circuit. These people who have moved to large cities, often get lost
in translation. A new article in the American Politics Research has
decided to dig deeper into this topic. Most research done on this
topic finds that naturalized citizens do not vote in as large of
numbers as Latino's born in the U.S. This is attributed to many
immigrants lack of knowledge on the American political system. This
may have stopped some people from participating in the voting
process, but many are still willing and eager to try and help change
the political system from Latin Americans in the U.S. Another factor
that causes some naturalized citizens to not vote as often is the
process of moving. Many people move around to different parts of the
United States that offer better opportunities. The reason this
hinders voting is that people who do not have a thorough
understanding of their political system in their community tend not
to vote because they have no real ties or cares about that community
politically. Something that would encourage naturalized citizens to
vote is that when they decide to go through the process of becoming a
citizen, they have to take classes to have a thorough understanding
of the American political system. This might inspire these people to
want to take part in the voting process. Many native-citizens are
turned-off from voting because they have been witness to the
political turmoil their whole lives and are often discouraged from
voting.
Going with the idea of natural born
citizens of the United States, comes the question of young Latino
voters. Are their political views similar to their parents or are
they branching out and trying to have different ideas. A study has
shown that second generation Hispanic members of a family with one
parent born outside of the U.S. Are identifying as very Democratic.
While the vast majority of Latino voters identify at Democratic,
parents who immigrated to the United States have a slightly more
conservative view than their children. 71% of Hispanic young adults
now identify as Democratic. The largest gaps between the parents and
their children comes in their ideas on gay marriage and abortion. It
seems that while children of immigrants tend to have similar ideas on
political issues as their parents, they are adopting an overall more
liberal view. This is affecting their voting pattern for politicians
running for major offices.
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