LAS VEGAS -- After two days of meetings at the Republican Governors
Association conference this week, New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez heard a
lot about the party's need to reach new constituencies--particularly
women and ethnic minorities--but few specifics about how.
As a Republican governor of Mexican descent who won all but four
counties in a Democratic state, Martinez has ideas for how the party can
reach voters who traditionally support Democrats. But it's going to
take some work--and a touch of humility--from her colleagues.
"Republicans need to stop making assumptions, and they need to start
talking to younger people, people of color, and ask them--not talk to them--ask
them, What is it that we can do better? How do we earn your vote? How
do we earn the ability for you to see that we can be the party that
will make your life better and that of your children?" Martinez said in
an interview after the conference here. "But we can't be the ones that
come and tell them how things are going to be and how we have all the
solutions."
President Barack Obama in 2012 expanded his lead among Hispanics,
black voters, Asians and women, according to exit polling, leaving many
Republicans wondering what they need do to adapt to the nation's rapidly
shifting demographics.
The topic has dominated much of the party's post-election soul
searching. Some have placed part of the blame on the Republican nominee,
Mitt Romney, who wrote off nearly half the electorate as inevitable
Obama voters when he told donors at a closed-door fundraiser last spring
that 47 percent of the population would support Obama "no matter what."
Martinez criticized Romney's comments when they were reported in
September, and on Wednesday reiterated that she found them "ridiculous."
"It's a ridiculous statement to make. You want to earn the vote of
every single person you can earn, whether they be someone who relies
on," she said. "Why would you ever write off 47 percent?"
Martinez, whose was discussed in the national media as a possible
running mate for Romney but was never vetted for the job, said she
disagreed with Romney's post-election assessment that he lost to Obama
in part because the president promised "gifts" to minority voters in
return for their support, a comment that many leading Republicans have
rebuked.
"That unfortunately is what sets us back as a party--our comments that are not thought through carefully," she said.
In order to make inroads with minority voters--particularly
Hispanics--Martinez urged Republicans to pursue immigration reform and
to begin grassroots outreach now instead of waiting until an election
year to seek votes.
"We need to embrace them not just at election time. We visit them,
and they don't appreciate that. And I don't blame them for not
appreciating that. We should not visit them when we need their vote and
then walk away," she said. "And then four years go by and we go visit
them again. We have to make them part of the solution, and the way you
do that is by listening to them. And then making that part of, 'how do
we do this together to make our lives all better?'
"And then once you've done it," she added, "you tell them we did it together."
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