There are a few days left until the Florida primary and Senator Marco Rubio –- Florida’s anti-immigrant golden boy — is on it. He’s one of the leading contenders in the GOP’s choice for Vice President, thinking once again that just because he has a Latino last name, he’ll be able to deliver the Latino vote.
That’s the Republican fantasy. But the truth is that Senator Rubio is at heads with the Latino community on immigration reform – an issue that’s not only important to yours truly, but to the Hispanic population. Ruben Navarrette wrote in his column last year about how Rubio is a “falling star” among Latinos.
“In parts of the Hispanic community, Rubio is thought of as just another ambitious politician who is willing to sell out Latinos to curry favor with Anglo colleagues,” he wrote. “That’s what you hear from Internet chatter, letters to the editor, Latino listserves and comments on Spanish-language media.”
He was spot on. From Presente’s Felipe Matos:
Marco Rubio loves to tell his family’s immigration story, but his positions on immigration policies are devastating to millions of immigrant families. Marco Rubio is the anti-Immigrant son of immigrants, who supports Arizona’s racist SB-1070 law, rejects the DREAM Act and thinks that Latinos won’t notice that he’s closer to the Tea Party extremists than he is to Latinos on immigration and other key issues.
That’s why earlier this morning, Felipe and other DREAMers protested outside of the Hispanic Leadership Network’s 2012 Conference, as part of a campaign launched by Presente called NO SOMOS RUBIOS” (We are not Marco Rubios!).
The students protested as an airplane circled overhead for an hour, attached to a “No Somos Rubios” banner.
And, as the Miami Herald notes, there’s a double meaning to that phrase:
In the lead-up to Rubio’s speech, critics from a group called Presente Action had a propeller plane circling the Doral Golf Resort & Spa with a banner reading, Hey Marco: No Somos Rubios, which translates to “We aren’t Rubios.” It’s a play on words on the word rubio, which in Spanish means blond or fair. The group is attacking Rubio largely over immigration, protesting that the senator doesn’t support the pro-immigrant DREAM Act.
Presente is also launching a video to accompany the campaign. “Since Marco Rubio doesn’t stand with Latinos, why should Latinos stand with him?” the narrator on the video asks. Watch it:
