2012 Presidential Election and the Issues

by Paul Nemergut

The way people voted on November 6^th clearly shows which way this nation will be going in the next four years. The election was decided by women and minorities who both heavily voted for Obama. Obama received 93% of the African American vote, 71% of the Hispanic vote and 73% of the Asian vote. He clearly locked down the minority vote and it was clearly a deciding factor in this election. On top of that, he received 55% of the vote from women. A more interesting fact is that Romney won 59% of the vote from Whites which is the highest percentage a losing candidate has ever received. I think this is a good indicator of how much America’s demographics have changed in the last few years and how the issues of our country are shifting in order to cater to certain demographic needs. In this election, the key factors were immigration, jobs, and the economy.

Hispanic immigrants and Hispanics in general played a huge role in this election. In Obama’s first 4 years of office, he made it his goal to overhaul our healthcare system. He made it more affordable for the lower class to purchase healthcare and since most Hispanics are part of the lower class, this appealed to them. Obama was and is a strong supporter of the Dream Act which makes it easier for immigrants to become citizens in the United States. He was a big supporter of it during his first four years, which appealed to Hispanics, and now is almost “repaying” the Hispanics by trying to push it through Congress. 71% of the Hispanic vote is a huge number and Obama made sure he held onto their vote during his 4 years in office.

Obama and Romney constantly battled about how to create jobs in America. Romney was hoping for the sake of the election that the unemployment numbers would rise so he could use the fact every chance he got. It is also true though that no presidential candidate has been reelected with the unemployment rate above 8%. Right before the election, Obama was able to get it down to 7.9% (from 8.1%) which really helped his chances. Romney didn’t have much to work off of other than critiquing Obama’s last four years. Romney only told the people what he planned on doing in his 5 step plan which the people apparently didn’t buy.

A majority of the population agreed that the economy was an important topic in this election. After the recession in 2008, Obama had his work cut out for him. As long as the economy improved, he was golden. Along with an improving economy represented by a small growth in GDP, he was able to blame the Republicans for the recession. Romney didn’t have much to brag about in this area. All he offered was his 5 step plan to improving the economy and decreasing the unemployment rate. Again, people clearly didn’t trust his 5 step plan.

If you were planning on running for election next year, I would give you a few pieces of advice. Focus on minorities. Minorities make up the largest part of this country than ever before and their votes allowed Obama to win this election. Create as many jobs as possible in whatever office you reside in, because it will give you something to brag about in the presidential debates. Jobs and the economy are very important to this country and people will like to see unemployment numbers fall. And lastly create a national disaster (where no one gets hurt) and help fix it right before the election. Although Hurricane Sandy was not a huge deciding factor, it definitely helped Obama.