Fiscal concerns drive Latinos

More than a third of the Democratic voters in the Texas primary on Tuesday will probably be Latinos. And as they choose between Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton, many of them -- like the established Latino families in this Central Texas town -- will have one issue paramount on their mind: the economy.

Here in Seguin, a city of about 27,000 where Latinos recently became the majority, many voters said that making ends meet was becoming harder because profits and paychecks had flat-lined while costs had soared. They wanted a president who had a real plan to turn things around.

“I’m concerned about the economy,” said Ramiro Hernandez, 54, the owner of a Sonic Burger franchise, who is fed up with high gas prices that have led to surcharges on the food and paper towels he buys. “We haven’t felt the real estate crunch here as much as other places, but that’s coming. When I vote for president, it’s going to be for someone who’s got some solutions for that.”

Clinton’s once-large lead over Obama in Texas appears to have evaporated, with recent polls giving Obama a slight edge. Clinton appeared to be holding her advantage among Latinos, but Obama, who has won 11 straight nominating contests, has chipped away at this voting bloc, making particular inroads with young voters.

Those generational differences were apparent in Seguin, where a father and son viewed the Democratic candidates differently.

Edward Davila, whose family has run barbecue restaurants for half a century, said he remembered when they couldn’t get a loan to open one on the eastern end of town past Guadalupe Street, the invisible line that separated the city’s Anglo and Mexican worlds.

A Clinton supporter, he said he valued the New York senator’s experience, as well as former President Clinton’s record of including Latinos in his administration. Davila, 57, said he wanted to see a new president revive a stagnant economy that was affecting business at his restaurant, and fix what he saw as a decline in education.

“Some of these kids working for me can’t even make change without a calculator,” he said.

The next-generation Davila -- his 34-year-old son, Adrian -- had a more freewheeling take on politics. Whereas Edward Davila talked about tangible concerns such as paying the energy bill, Adrian Davila, who now runs the family business with his dad, said the election was about repairing damage done by President Bush and restoring the goodwill America lost abroad.

“It’s not Norman Rockwell’s America now,” said Adrian Davila, who was intrigued by Obama. “We’re not looking for that Ronald Reagan-John Wayne figure. We’re looking for someone who’ll say to the world, ‘We’re a friendlier America.’ ”

Janie Trevino, who co-owns a rollicking honky-tonk called the Fiesta Ballroom along with her husband, Johnny, said she had expected to retire by now. Instead, at 66, she is working harder than ever.

For 32 years, the Trevinos managed to shuffle forward as music fads faded and dance steps fell out of fashion. But high gas prices are squeezing many music fans, who are staying home instead of driving to hear the accordion-drenched norteno music that’s now in vogue here. That means that Trevino still can’t earn enough to hire someone to take her place.

“We’re working like idiots,” she said, adding, “It’s not that people don’t want to pay $20 to $25 to see an act -- it’s that they can’t.”

Trevino said she was not distressed only about beer prices that seemed to be increasing even as her customers’ incomes remained the same. A diabetic, she also was upset with rising drug costs, saying that she recently spent more than $450 on two prescriptions.

“It’s so screwed up,” she said, as she sat in her office beneath a portrait of the late Tejano star Selena. “How can regular people afford this?”

Mary Louise Gonzales, an official with the Seguin Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, echoed Trevino’s concern.

“I was in the pharmacy and saw an elderly lady trying to buy half a prescription, because that’s all she said she could afford,” said Gonzales, 62. “I gave her the money. I wish we could do something about that issue because it’s becoming tragic.”

Like Texans everywhere, many Latinos in Seguin said they voted for President Bush despite usually supporting Democrats. “He was a Tejano,” or native Texan, said Louis Q. Reyes III, 52, an insurance agent and school board member.

Immigration policy did not appear to be a major concern for Latinos in Seguin, many of whom descend from families that have been in Texas for more than a century. However, what Latinos saw as race-baiting rhetoric in the debate over illegal immigrants was coloring their view of the GOP and swaying which party they would support in November, strategists in both parties said.

Some older Latinos said they saw the illegal immigration backlash as an extension of the prejudice they had endured earlier in life -- experiences that had shaped their political consciousness and would continue to affect how they voted.

Edward Davila has a new restaurant in the formerly Anglo part of Seguin, next to a well-traveled highway, but he said he hasn’t forgotten that his aunt Sopopa Davila was the first Mexican American allowed to attend a nearby high school, or that earlier in his lifetime people had to pay a poll tax to vote.

“I was here in the old years, when the sheriff would buy everyone a beer and influence the outcome,” Davila said. “You wouldn’t see that anymore. We vote for who we want to now.”

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miguel.bustillo@latimes.com

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(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Texas’ primary

The state’s primary system is part election, part caucus, and very confusing.

First, the popular vote

The state awards 228 Democratic delegates, the most of any state left on the primary calendar. Of those, 126 are doled out according to the popular vote. Sixty-seven are awarded as the result of caucuses that will be held after polling places close Tuesday at 7 p.m.

The caucuses are open to all who cast ballots in the Democratic primary; locals call it “the Texas two-step.”

The 126 Democratic delegates awarded by popular vote are divided among Texas’ 31 state Senate districts, but not all districts have the same number of delegates. Most have four, but some have eight and some have two. The number depends on turnout in the last two general elections.

The state also has 35 superdelegates who are free to back whomever they choose.

Then, the caucuses

The caucus process for divvying up the additional 67 Democratic delegates is even more arcane. Voters at 8,000 precinct meetings will choose representatives to county and Senate district conventions to be held in a few weeks.

Those in turn will choose delegates to the state Democratic convention in June, which will decide on the final allotment to the Democrats’ national nominating convention in August.

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Source: Times staff reports