5 Conservatives on GOP’s Minority Problem

Mike Huckabee, Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly are among the Republicans discussing the GOP's outreach to minorities following Obama's re-election.

When President Barack Obama won re-election Nov. 6, the media pointed out that voters of color helped him defeat Mitt Romney. Following the election, high-profile conservatives such as Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee weighed in on the perception that the GOP has a problem attracting minorities. Here’s what they said:

Hutchinson said that Texas Republicans have won over Latinos by prioritizing their concerns. “Texas is a way forward to show that you can be very conservative and talk about the issues that Hispanic small business people and people who want their kids to get a good education embrace,” Bailey said Nov. 8 on CNN. “I get a very large percent of Hispanic votes, as did George W. Bush.”

Bill O’Reilly remarked on his Fox News show Nov. 8 that Republicans have written off blacks, but that it’s not too late to reach Hispanics. “There are a lot of African Americans who feel grievance, who feel..the country has not looked out for them…They’re going to vote for a colored-based candidate like Barack Obama no matter what... But the Hispanic vote can be courted by the GOP if they figure out what the message should be.”

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Conservative radio host Laura Ingraham remarked on her radio show Nov. 7 that Romney missed an opportunity to touch base with voters of color. “With all these Latinos and African Americans across the country who are actually quite traditional in their thinking about family and the life issue, they really weren’t connected to Romney on those issues because he kind of stayed away from them. So in the end, we were left with a businessman who had a Bain [Capital] experience that the left was able to caricature.”

Huckabee said that he doesn’t believe the public votes primarily along racial lines. On Election Day 2012, he remarked, “I absolutely reject the notion that white people are voting for Mitt Romney, black people are voting for Barack Obama. I think conservatives are voting for Mitt Romney, and liberals are voting for Barack Obama.”

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Following the election, Rush Limbaugh wondered why minority Republicans don’t get more attention. “We have achieved, highly accomplished African Americans, blacks, Hispanics, you name it, throughout the Republican Party. … Why doesn’t the Republican Party get credit for Condoleezza Rice? Why doesn’t the Republican Party get credit for Marco Rubio?”

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