Latinos now view immigration as their leading concern along with the economy in what activists say is a major shift most likely driven by controversy over Arizona’s tough law against illegal immigrants.

Nearly a third of Latinos also believe that racism and prejudice are the central issue in the immigration debate, over national security, job competition and costs of public services for illegal immigrants, according to a national survey released Wednesday.

The poll of 504 Latinos, stratified by region, gender, age, foreign-born status and other factors, was conducted by LatinoMetrics from May 26 to June 8 for the Hispanic Federation and the League of United Latin American Citizens, or LULAC.

The poll found that the vast majority of those surveyed strongly opposed the new Arizona law and strongly supported an immigration policy overhaul providing for a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants and deportation of felons. Republican Latinos showed similar views on these issues as Democrats and independents.

More than half of the nation’s young Hispanic voters do not identify themselves as liberal or conservative, though almost three in four say Democratic President Barack Obama is doing a good job, a poll released Wednesday shows.

“It’s an opportunity for anyone politically to bring them into the fold,” said Jorge Mursuli, president of Democracia USA, a non-partisan, voter-registration group that sponsored the poll of 1,500 Hispanics under age 29.

The poll, however, did find that young Hispanics who do register to vote are signing up as Democrats by a 4-to-1 margin over Republicans or as independents.

Also, a large majority — 83 percent — said they thought discrimination was a problem to them personally, while 73 percent considered themselves as bicultural. Most were born in the United States.

Hispanic voters nationwide haven’t shifted their congressional voting preferences since the signing of Arizona’s new immigration law on April 23. Their preference for the Democratic candidate over the Republican candidate, 61% to 32%, in April 23 to June 8 interviewing almost identically matches the 60% to 32% margin recorded between March 1 and April 22. White voters and black voters also haven’t changed their voting intentions.

…

hat said, President Obama’s job approval rating is down among Hispanics this year. This drop appears to have begun prior to the April 23 signing of the new Arizona law. It should be noted that the drop in Obama’s approval rating between January and May of this year was primarily among Hispanics who chose to be interviewed in Spanish, while the current sample of registered-voter Hispanics includes significantly fewer of this group.

Here is a quick summary from the story:

Overall, 50% of registered voters surveyed said they support the law, which compels police to check the immigration status of those they suspect are in the country illegally, while 43% oppose it. That level of support is lower than polls have indicated nationwide.

But attitudes among the state’s voters are not uniform. Strong majorities of white voters and those over 50 support the Arizona law, while Latinos and those under 30 are heavily opposed.

Presuming that a strong relationship exists between one’s identity and political behavior, American politicians have long targeted immigrant and ethnic communities based on their shared ethnic or racial identity. But to what extent do political campaign messages impact voters’ actual decisions and behaviors?

This new book is one of the first to examine and compare the campaign efforts used to target Latinos with those directed at the rest of the electorate. Specifically, it focuses on televised Spanish and English-language advertising developed for the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections, as well as for dozens of congressional and statewide contests from 2000–2004. Author Marisa Abrajano’s research reveals exposure to these televised political ads indeed impacts whether Latinos turn out to vote and, if so, for whom they vote. But the effect of these advertising messages is not uniform across the Latino electorate. Abrajano explores the particular factors that affect Latinos’ receptivity to political ads and offers key findings for those interested in understanding how to mobilize this critical swing group in American politics.

Here is the book’s page on Amazon.