An Upside Seen for Latinos, Despite Villaraigosa’s Loss

Antonio Villaraigosa’s loss in last week’s mayoral election overshadowed clear signs that the long-delayed political power of Latino voters continues to expand.

Even as supporters bemoaned Villaraigosa’s failed bid to become the city’s first Latino mayor since 1872, political analysts were seizing on the positives: the overwhelming support he had among Latinos, the group’s higher-than-average turnout and the victory of City Atty.-elect Rocky Delgadillo.

“The loss is a disappointment to a lot of folks, but you’ve got to look beyond the loss,” said Harry Pachon, president of the nonpartisan Tomas Rivera Policy Institute. “A Latino candidate can mobilize the community in an unprecedented way. It represents really a new milestone.”

Community leaders say excitement generated by Villaraigosa’s candidacy--even as he lost--will motivate Latinos to make their votes heard more and more in the coming years.

“This was historic, and there’s no going back,” said Arturo Vargas, executive director of the National Assn. of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials. “The fact that he didn’t win doesn’t diminish the importance of this election.”

The next tests of Latino political might may not be as high-profile as the mayor’s race--which drew international attention--but political leaders say the 2002 elections will be important proving grounds for Latino candidates.

State Assemblyman Tony Cardenas (D-Sylmar) is planning to run for California secretary of state and Assemblyman Thomas Calderon (D-Montebello) is considering a bid for insurance commissioner, while Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante will be running for reelection.

At the same time, state officials are preparing to joust over California’s redistricting, a process that could open up new seats for Latino candidates.

Although he fell short of winning a majority of Los Angeles voters, Villaraigosa went from 11% of the potential vote in a Times poll a year before the election to 47% of the ballots cast June 5, a showing that supporters cite as evidence of a potent appeal.

Many community leaders heralded the victory of Delgadillo as a sign of growing prominence of Latinos in local politics. Delgadillo--the first Latino in more than a century to win citywide office in Los Angeles--was propelled to office partly by organized labor’s get-out-the-vote effort for Villaraigosa, which helped send a record number of Latinos to the polls.

“We’re dealing with a history that goes back hundreds of years in which people have felt disenfranchised and felt their vote didn’t count,” said Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-Los Angeles). “Delgadillo’s race . . . is an example we can point to and say to people that their vote does count.”

Latinos made up about 22% of the electorate June 5, up two percentage points from April and more than twice as large as their share of the vote in 1993.

“I think there’s a lot of us who are very disappointed that Antonio didn’t get elected,” said former Democratic National Convention Committee head Lydia Camarillo, who helped the candidate rally Latino support. “But we’re losing an important point, which is that Latino turnout was extremely high.”

That is a comparative figure, of course. About 40% of Latino registered voters went to the polls, compared to a citywide turnout of 36%, according to an analysis by the William C. Velasquez Institute, a nonpartisan think tank.

The turnout figures--combined with the ever-increasing numbers of registered Latino voters--have convinced many who advocate for greater Latino political involvement that a Latino mayor is inevitable.

“The part of Los Angeles that doesn’t want to change, they won the first game,” said Antonio Gonzalez, president of the Velasquez Institute. “But this is a seven-game series. Tomorrow will always overcome yesterday.”

But others point to a jarring reality: Villaraigosa lost, at least in part, because a majority of registered Latino voters spurned his bid to make history. These observers worry that his defeat could demoralize a newly energized group of voters.

“There’s immediate disillusionment on the part of some,” said Jaime Regalado, executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at Cal State L.A. “It’s hard to appreciate the real coming of age of the Latino vote and the fact that Antonio was really competitive if you’re the average Latino voter who just understands a loss is a loss.”

The day after the election, Miguel Contreras, head of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, was having breakfast at a Mexican restaurant near his office when he encountered a grief-stricken waitress, who told him she woke up crying because Villaraigosa had lost.

“Those of us who are insiders know there will be other battles,” said Contreras, who led a union effort on Villaraigosa’s behalf. “But I’m not sure that’s the case for other Latino voters. We sure hope that the anger and frustration of this election doesn’t keep them away from the polls.”

Some analysts note that although Latino turnout edged upward last week, it didn’t come anywhere near the turnout of African American voters in 1969 and 1973, when Tom Bradley was running to become the city’s first black mayor.

Overall turnout in those years was 76% and 64%, respectively, with African Americans voting at the highest rate of any group, according to Cal State Fullerton professor Raphael Sonenshein’s book “Politics in Black and White.”

Before this year’s election, some Latino political leaders expressed anxiety that Villaraigosa’s campaign had not done more to reach out to Latino voters. In the end, the former assemblyman garnered more than 80% of the Latino vote, but some contend that he could have won had he more aggressively urged Latinos to go to the polls.

“Had Latino registered voters turned out at the same rate as black registered voters did in 1969 and 1973, Antonio Villaraigosa would have been mayor,” said Fernando Guerra, director of the Center for the Study of Los Angeles at Loyola Marymount University.

One problem, noted Sergio Bendixen, a veteran pollster of Latinos, is that many new Latino voters added to the rolls in the last seven years are recent immigrants who prefer Spanish to English, unlike most of their political leaders.

“You have a political establishment that really struggles with its Spanish and with communicating with its base,” said Bendixen, who noticed the disconnect during interviews on Spanish-language television and watching labor organizers trying to give their union workers directions for precinct walking.

Now, Bendixen added, “the Latino electorate realizes that they need to register and vote in greater numbers if they are going to be able to elect a Latino mayor next time around.”

Organizers like Gonzalez are convinced that will happen.

“I think in the community, at the kitchen table, there’s a conversation going on with some people saying, ‘See, they’re not ever going to let us win,’ ” he said. “But other people are saying, ‘We voted more than ever before. We came close. We had a great candidate, and a new leader is born. We’re going to continue this long march.’ ”

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L.A. Voters in Mayoral Races

June 2001

White: 52%

Black: 17%

Latino: 22%

Asian: 6%

Other: 3%

*

April 1997*

White: 65%

Black: 13%

Latino: 15%

Asian: 4%

Other: 3%

*

June 1993

White: 72%

Black: 12%

Latino: 10%

Asian: 4%

Other: 2%

*

* There was no June runoff in 1997.

Source: Los Angeles Times exit polls