Oppenheimer: Hispanics are changing the face of U.S. politics

In today's Miami Herald, Andres Oppenheimer takes an honest look at this past weekend's Univision Democratic Presidential Candidate forum. In "The Oppenheimer Report", he declared the forum "the clearest evidence yet of a growing Hispanic clout that will revolutionize American politics." From the article:

I'm not exaggerating: the debate among Democratic hopefuls organized by Univisión and the University of Miami averaged 2.2 million viewers -- an extraordinary audience for a debate that was broadcast in Spanish for an ethnic group that makes up 13 percent of the U.S. population. By comparison, the CNN-YouTube Democratic debate averaged 2.6 million viewers.

What's more, while the average age of viewers of Univisión's debate was 36, the average age of the English-language debates on ABC, CNN, Fox News and MSNBC viewers was 61.

"It was a tipping point in American political culture," says Simon Rosenberg, president of the New Democrat Network, a progressive think tank that advises Democrats on Hispanic issues. "This debate outperformed Univisión's wildest dreams."

...

But the fact is that this first Spanish-language debate sets a precedent that will be hard to ignore for Republicans, and for both parties in future presidential campaigns. And it comes after several signs of a growing Hispanic political clout. 

For more information check out NDN's new study, data from which is used in Oppenheimer's piece.