Q&A with Biden’s campaign manager, Luis Navarro
October 24, 2007There are two Hispanics managing presidential campaigns in this race - Patti Solis Doyle for Hillary Clinton and Luis Navarro for Joe Biden. The first Latino campaign manager was Sergio Bendixen who ran Alan Cranston’s 1984 campaign. That’s it - a total of three.
Yesterday, I interviewed Luis Navarro and he spoke about immigration, Iraq and Latinos in Iowa among other topics. Prior to working for Joe Biden, Navarro was the executive director of the Florida Democratic Party. Before that he worked for the Kerry campaign and previously was the National Political Director for the SEIU.
Below, is a partial transcript of the interview:
Q: Why did you take the job as campaign manager?
A: There are three reasons. The most important issue to my mind going into this election cycle is ending the war in Iraq. And I truly believe that Senator Biden has the best answer to that and it was the chief reason for my going to work for him. I didn’t have long ties to him either personally or professionally. I made that judgment considering the historic nature of the field in the race this year. And because that was the issue of greatest importance to me
Second, I am very mindful of the fact that prior to this election cycle to my knowledge anyway there has only been one Hispanic campaign manager and that was Sergio Bendixen a fellow Peruvian-American back in ´84 when Alan Cranston ran. I think part of the challenge we face as a community ís trying to broaden our impact in politics beyond the narrow focus of politics as it exclusively relates to our community. Too often, folks tend to put Latino and African American and Asian political operatives in a very narrow context that these folks only have the ability to operate within their communities and not within a larger field. I think our ability to demonstrate that it is not the case has important ramifications for the community as a whole.
The third reason for doing so, in terms of my own political interests, like a lot of different people I have grated under the administration of the past eight years. I am very much looking forward to be part of the change that can take place.
Q: In Florida when you were the executive director what did you do to increase the Hispanic vote?
A: Three things. The first which may be hard to believe. There really had not been a coordinated Hispanic paid media effort in an off-year election until 2006 or at least not one that anyone in the state could recall. In other words while it was fairly accepted and understood that there would be communication to the Latino community through Spanish-language and bilingual media in presidential elections, a similar effort had not been undertaken in off year election. We did radio, we did television, we also did mail. One of the benefits we had particularly in the Miami area is that we had a Cuban American Democrat running for the House. And that served as an anchor for a lot of our communications in South Florida.
The second thing I think this was the first off-year election and perhaps the first election in sometime in Florida where you saw a real generational differentiation on the Castro issue. Late in the election, in a direct response to our heightened activity in South Florida, Republicans went on the air with an ad attacking Jim Davis as having been soft on Castro. Now, Jim Davis had supported the embargo against Cuba throughout his entire career. He had gone to Cuba. He had met dissidents. And had made a very big point of pointing out the resistance to Castro there. We responded immediately with an ad that said look, once again they are trying to pull out this old, straw man when the real issues here are Republican policies on immigration, Republican policies on the middle class and education. Especially with the Latino radio in South Florida we saw a lot of activity where this was a hotly debated issue. That it should not be the case that the context in which Hispanic politics are defined in South Florida is one in which all the Republicans have to do is talk about Castro and be worthy of receiving Latino votes.
Q: How important is immigration an issue to Hispanics and to non-Hispanics?
A: I think immigration will be one of the hot-button issues in 2008. For the non-Hispanic community it really depends on what segment you talk about. One of the galvanizing realities that I think gets lost in the immigration debate is that fully 40% of the folks who are undocumented are not Spanish-speaking. They are Asian, Eastern European and African. It will be a hot-button issue.
For Hispanics the issue will be that they’re not simply targeting undocumented workers. When you talk about English-only laws, that doesn’t have anything to do with undocumented workers. That is an attack on the Hispanic community. When you talk about the desire to allow ICE to continue its policies in terms of operating without warrants because they are based on a civil not criminal law basis, that is a concern for Hispanics who are legal residents, citizens who have family members that have a different legal status and find themselves targeted by virtue of living in the same neighborhoods and possibly the same homes.
For Hispanics that are not tied to the immigrants, they suffer from the insecurities that this Administration has wrought. Historically, every twenty or thirty years you have this revisitation of immigration and at least since the 1950s the onus has fallen largely on the Hispanic community because of anxieties within the broader middle class around access to health care, access to education, access to employment and we become, the Hispanic communit becomes the scapegoat for those insecurities.
Q: What about your campaign’s Hispanic marketing efforts.
A: Obviously, we certainly have a desire down the road to engage more broadly with the Hispanic community. But, clearly our challenge is one of a campaign that has relatively modest resources compared to a number of other candidates in this race. And we are also mindful of the challenge that comes in a race in which you have not only a Hispanic candidate but a brand name in the context of the Clintons that has a market within the Hispanic community. Our first priority because we believe it offers a level playing field to compete is in Iowa. And we are beginning to impact the growing Latino community in Iowa. But, as yet, we are still operating largely from the context of surrogates and activists. We are not as yet at the level of competing in terms of paid media. (See more about Latinos in Iowa here.)
Q: What is the significance, if any, of there being two Hispanic campaign managers in this race?
A: Hopefully, as with any other profession as Latinos move higher into the echelons of national politics that will not only afford us the opportunity to have greater opportunities communitywide but provide a real opportunity either by example or action to bring more Hispanics into the political process. That this is not simply a game that is reserved for folks who can trace their roots back to the Mayflower. This is about trying to ensure as our perception of the population grows that we are participating not only in elected offices but in the roles of those decision makers that do not hold elected office and who have the ability to impact public policy.
Q: Given the current setup of the primary - is all the talk of the importance of the Latino vote perhaps overblown?
A: I wouldn´t say that it’s overblown. One thing that gets overlooked again is that there is a growing Latino community in Iowa, which often does not fit into the paradigms when other reporter talk about the early stages in this process. And I think that is an important marker for us to constantly remind folks about. The second thing is that look at this juncture based on the calendar as it currently exists, Hispanics have the opportunity to have a huge impact.
Number one, for the first time we have a contest between Iowa and New Hampshire. Number two, in the proportion of Latino voters that will be participating on February 5th when almost all of the large states and a fair number of Southern states [where] Latino population growth has skyrocketed. If the argument is in terms of being overblown - are we the deciding factor? - probably not. But, will our votes have more impact in determining who the nominee is than ever before - the answer is absolutely.
Biden
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