On Sunday night, John McCain made a campaign stop in Florida– Coral Gables to be more precise– for a midnight rally with staunch supporters. Coral Gables has a very active and engaged Cuban community that has long been a bastion for the Republican Party. A week before, Palin sat down with Pedro Sevcec for a one-on-one interview on Telemundo. On Oct. 22, Jorge Ramos also had a turn at an exclusive interview with the proposed Republican VP. To read the transcript in English, click here.  McCain also has been interviewed on the network.

For comparisons sake following Marisa's post yesterday, a search for ’Latinos con McCain’ turned up around 400 results on Google, while ’Latinos for McCain’ shows about 11,200.  Wonder if acculturated voters are more of the target for the GOP?

Daddy Yankee and Eduardo Versategui are two of the Hispanic celebs who have come out publicly endorsing McCain.  FYI– Hispanics make up 30 percent of Arizona's population– the fourth largest percentage behind New Mexico, California and Texas.

With 9 million plus votes at stake, the Latino vote has been heavily courted by both parties' candidates– through ads, interviews, online and activist groups.  As of yesterday, polls are giving the majority of the Latino vote to Obama, but many still seem to be undecided just hours before voting ends. 

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There is no escaping election coverage at this stage. Flip channels and you see the McCain/Obama analysis on all networks, cable, even SNL. But what about Hispanic media? At the start of the race, immigration was a critical point of attention. Now, the economy is center stage based on the unique and extraordinary developments of the last few weeks (in development for much longer, but memory is short). Regardless, the contest is still a focus for Hispanic media. Even though we don’t have as many opinion and analysis programs in Spanish, Spanish dominant viewers can turn to Univision and Telemundo or their Spanish-language newspaper of choice for the latest news.

Candidates are amping up campaigns and media are too. Obama took a full page in Sunday’s edition of El Nuevo Herald– with Florida being a key state and all. Ads aside, some media also have elected to show their endorsements very prominently. Such is the case of El Diario La Prensa (part of Impremedia) which devoted their first page on October 17 to Obama, the same day the LA Times backed him. Univision continues with its heavy online coverage.

Jorge Ramos, the Hispanic media’s Tom Brokaw who looks a lot like Anderson Cooper, has stated that these are ’life or death elections.’ He developed a column posted yesterday on Univision.com with some notes for voters to consider before making their decision on the 4th. La Opinion, one of the leading Hispanic newspapers, has long-time political reporter Maribel Hastings on the campaign trail. This just to cite some examples.

Nobody can argue the fact that this year’s vote is historic for many reasons: the capitalist system has been dealing with the worst blows to its foundation, and regardless of who wins, either an African American or a woman AND the oldest presidential candidate will take the White House.

Voter registration is an at all time high. Of the record number of registered voters, this year 9 million will be Hispanic. And all will be affected by the decisions of whoever wins– immigration included or not.

In what continues to be a year of firsts in election history, both presidential candidates yesterday addressed attendees at the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) annual conference taking place in DC this week. Hillary Clinton, along with other influential government officials, also will address the crowd later this week. McCain spoke during a diversity luncheon, while Obama led an open dialogue session: and each touched on immigration as they seek to solidify the support from the Latino vote. The importance of the Latino vote has been well documented and reported since this election cycle began. This link to NPR provides a library of recent stories that document how the battle for the Hispanic vote is continuing to heat up. With voters preoccupied about the economy and how it is personally affecting them, candidates are amping up their campaigns and seeking opportunities to be closer to potential poll goers.

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Fidel Castro has made some major headlines in his lifetime, some by his own design and many others by the impact of his actions. During the last couple of years, those headlines have turned to documenting his demise, including some proclaiming his impending death, his transfer of power to brother Raul Castro and his outings after his closely-watched and long road to recovery from the illness that has spun change in Cuba. Today, the world is abuzz with the anti-climatic news that he has resigned as president. To many Cubans, that only means the succession plan of positioning Raul is now complete.

Hispanic and general market media have prominently covered the news today, with lead stories in the online sites of La Opinion, El Nuevo Herald, El Diario La Prensa, and on portals Terra.com, Univision.com, MSN Latino, in addition to coverage on leading general market media. In this era of multimedia, galleries documenting Castro’s life are prominently featured alongside extensive coverage of what the news means for Cuba, expert commentary and forums, and media have flocked to the microcosms that is Little Havana to get the reaction of the Miami Cuban community.

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