Democrats Believe Hispanics the “Key” to Obama’s 2012 Bid

It is worthwhile noting that these Democrats are counting on Hispanic voters in all of these states to win the election.

Even its abstract form, one that comes from several Democratic sources 18 months before the presidential election takes place, President Barack Obama needs Latino voters to win states he already won in 2008. It makes no difference if in some of these states Hispanics are not a large percentage of the overall electorate. They just would be enough to swing the election.

According to Roll Call, the 2012 electoral map is different than the one that saw Obama win by a large margin and many states Democrats had not won in many years. Democrats believe Obama can still win enough battleground states to win the upcoming election.

No, it is not the ambitious 2012 strategy that worked to perfection and allowed Obama to carry more states than he expected. This time his re-election team knows the field is different and a much less aggressive path than the one he forged in 2008.

A Democratic official familiar with the still-forming re-election campaign told Roll Call that the focus will be on holding the 2008 pickups of Colorado, Virginia and North Carolina, winning over Latino voters in the West and flooding the traditional swing states of Ohio and Florida with resources. The Democrats feel good about winning New Mexico and Nevada, especially given the population growth among Hispanics.

It is worthwhile noting that these Democrats are counting on Hispanic voters in all of these states to win the election.

According to Roll Call this campaign will be focused on maintaining popularity with the black voters who can help Obama win Virginia and North Carolina a second time. It means the president must keep Latino voters interested in the election to help him lock down Nevada, New Mexico and Colorado — and, as is the talk in some optimistic circles, Arizona.

Former Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean said that when he led the party in 2008, his strategy accounted for Obama losing Ohio and Florida but still winning the White House. Obama exceeded his expectations by running the table with swing-state victories, and Dean feels even more confident today.

“The West is a big cushion. If we win Florida, we win the whole thing, and Florida is very, very winnable,” Dean said in an interview. That, however, is an overly-optimistic view.

At present Florida has only one state-wide Democratic elected official and that is Sen. Bill Nelson, elected in 2006 and up for re-election in 2012. In 2010 Florida voters wiped statewide Democratic candidates from the map. With unemployment higher in the state higher than the national average, Florida, a state with no mountains, will still be a steep hill for Obama to climb.

Despite the lousy economy and the president’s sagging poll numbers, Democrats aren’t ready to cede Ohio and even privately insist they think it’s winnable.  Privately, Democrats say Indiana will be much tougher to hold. Missouri is likely to come off the 2012 battleground map, given that it has only trended more conservative since Obama narrowly lost it in 2008 and Sen. Claire McCaskill will be facing a tough re-election battle and a strengthened Show-Me State GOP base.

But Democrats are putting Arizona on the 2012 map.

A Republican strategist who worked on the 2008 campaign said Obama was only able to expand the playing field into states such as Indiana because he was an unknown quantity.

“Now that he has a record, he’ll be judged on the economy in these battleground states. And that’s going to limit where he can play,” the strategist said.

Because of reapportionment, Obama would have a net of six fewer Electoral College votes in 2012 than he scored in 2008. Democrats say those numbers don’t worry them.

For their part, Obama’s team has publicly played up the fact that things won’t be so easy this time around, if only to help drum up grass-roots support and donations. “The electoral landscape will be more challenging,” campaign manager Jim Messina recently told supporters in a Web video.

That is one thing on which both sides can agree.

The Americano/Agencies