Will Romney’s hard line on immigration help in Florida?

Mitt Romney’s hard line on immigration is a high-stakes gamble that he can secure the Republican nomination and win states like Florida and Nevada in the general election while at risk of offending the large and growing Hispanic electorate. Romney-backer Kris Kobach Polls and interviews with Hispanic leaders in Florida indicate that he will win that gamble in the state’s primary on Jan. 31. Cuban-American and Puerto Rican Republicans, who are not directly affected by immigration issues, tend to support Romney even though many don’t agree with some of his policies. “On immigration, yeah, we have big-time differences,” said Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart of Miami, who hosted a “cafecito” campaign event for Romney at a Doral restaurant. “He is very much a hardliner, and that’s not going to change. So we will continue to disagree on many aspects of it. But on creating jobs, on national security, on getting the economy going, he’s just the right guy at this moment.” The general-election campaign is another matter. That’s when Democratic and independent voters enter the picture, and national polls have shown that two-thirds of

Hispanics still favor President Obama. Some are lashing out at Romney’s embrace of Kris Kobach, the co-author of state laws designed to root out illegal residents. Kobach is leading a national crusade to enlist state and local police to detain and interrogate suspected illegal immigrants with the aim of pushing millions to “self-deport.” The Kansas secretary of state endorsed Romney last week and campaigned for him in South Carolina on Monday. Democratic Congressman Luis Gutierrez of Illinois called Kobach “the dark lord of the anti-immigration movement,” and predicted that “Romney’s overt pandering to Cuban-American Republicans is not going to play well in a more diverse Latino community.” Romney is not backing down. “I’m so proud to earn Kris’s support,” he said when accepting Kobach’s endorsement. “With Kris on the team, I look forward to working with him to take forceful steps to curtail illegal immigration and to support states like South Carolina and Arizona that are stepping forward to address this problem.”

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Will Romney’s hard line on immigration help in Florida?

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