Four years ago, Republican presidential hopefuls were doing their best to attract the Latino vote, enthusiastically courting this constituency with promises on the campaign trail, some even tried to say a word or two in Spanish.
But no longer. Today the candidates Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum aren’t even trying. Where did all the love go?

The GOP seems to think it doesn’t need the support of Hispanic voters to capture the White House in November. But there’s a new reality in American politics: No one can win the presidency without support from this voting bloc.
Yet none of the Republican candidates favors an immigration plan that would grant citizenship to most of the 11 million undocumented residents living in the U.S. They haven’t specified what solutions they’d propose if elected.
For the most part, the candidates oppose the so called Dream Act, legislation that would provide a path to legalization for undocumented students who finish 2 years of higher education or who serve 2 years in the armed forces.

Take Mitt Romney, former governor of Massachusetts and current frontrunner for the Republican nomination. Romney’s father was born in Mexico to American parents and came to the U.S. when he was 5 years old. Theoretically, Romney could be our first Hispanic president. But has he used his Mexican roots to better connect with Latino voters? Of course not. Romney has done the opposite, declaring that if he were elected president, he would veto the Dream Act.

Romney and the other candidates are essentially using a hard stance on immigration to win their party’s nomination, though it is undoubtedly costing them the support of many Hispanics, at least 12 million of whom are expected to vote this year. But history tells us that any Republican presidential candidate who collects 33 percent or more can win an election: According to the Pew Hispanic Center, 23 percent of Hispanic voters would choose Romney.))