New poll examines Latino’s views on health care and immigration
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A new poll was released this week by Latino Decisions, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Center for Health Policy at the University of New Mexico (UNM-RWJF Center), and impreMedia.
The new poll of Latino registered voters finds widespread consensus about the importance of health care reform and significant support for robust efforts in this direction.
The poll queried 1,000 Latino registered voters from November 1‐16 regarding their views about politics in general, the nation’s health care debate and their views of the administration.
Overall, Latino registered voters are very supportive of efforts to reform the nation’s health care system, and show especially strong support for including the ‘public option’ as part of the reform effort.
While President Obama continues to enjoy strong support from the Latino electorate, less than 1 in 7 survey respondents felt the needs of the Latino community were fully taken into account during the health reform debate.
When asked what “the most important issue that President Obama and the Congress should address over the next year”: 32% reported health care, 30% identified the economy—including jobs and mortgage issues, 17% picked immigration as the biggest issue, while another 9% identified the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
In April 2009, a Latino Decisions poll found 56% of Latinos stated the economy was the top issue, compared to just 6% who mentioned health care.
Priorities differ between native born and naturalized citizens. Naturalized citizens identified the economy (33%) and immigration (28%) more frequently than health (25%) and the wars (4%).
US‐born Latinos identified health (37%), the economy (28%), and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (14%) as more urgent than immigration (7%).
Among all Latino registered voters, 84% report that it is important for Congress to pass a bill on immigration before the 2010 election.
When asked which of the two was the more important, two‐thirds (67%) of respondents picked health reform, compared to just 20% for immigration reform, and 10% thought they were of equal importance.
This order of priority is consistent between immigrant citizens and the native born, with 62% of the foreign born and 69% of the U.S. born indicating health care was more important.
While immigration reform looms as a very important concern to the Latino electorate, passing health care reform is such a grave concern that its importance outpaces immigration reform by over a 3‐1 margin
Those Latinos surveyed prefer some form of universal health insurance, even if it means higher taxes, to the current system, 61% to 28%.
Among those Latinos opposed to universal health insurance, 33% said they were against government take‐over.
Latinos have a decidedly mixed evaluation regarding whether their views are considered. Only 14% believe that public officials care very much about the Latino communities health care needs when crafting the health legislation.
President Obama remains widely popular among Latino registered voters. However, his approval rate drops 7 points in seven months.
Obama is somewhat more popular among foreign born Latinos compared to U.S. born.
All phone calls were administered by Pacific Market Research in Renton, WA. The poll was overseen by Drs. Matt Barreto and Gary Segura, experts in Latino public opinion. A total of 1,000 Latino registered voters were interviewed, with a margin of error of +/- 3.1%.
The Americano / Agencies
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It is very hard to believe this poll, especially if those polled agreeing with Obama were born outside the US.
It would be very interesting to know how the questions were presented. If those polled were born in any Latin American country, the would know first hand that socialized health care does not work. All Latin American countries have socialized health care or some form of it.
The other explanation for the poll’s result is that they are not informed of what this health proposal contains and how it will ruin the best health care system in the world and how expensive and inefficient would be if the government runs it. I really do not know which one of these options is the worst. God Help us!