Former Republican Hispanic Outreach Director Pablo Pantoja Leaves Party for Democrats

The former Latino outreach director for the Republican Party in Florida switched his party allegiance to Democrat, citing his former party's troubles with minorities.

Pablo Pantoja resigned from his position as head of the RNC's Hispanic outreach committee in Florida last summer, after working to drum up support for conservative candidates during elections in 2010 and 2012. The emergence last week of a racist dissertation written by the author of an anti-immigration report for the conservative think tank he Heritage Foundation was the last straw for Pantoja.

'Yes, I have changed my political affiliation to the Democratic Party," Pantoja wrote, initially on a friend's blog and then in correspondence with Florida newspapers. "It doesn't take much to see the culture of intolerance surrounding the Republican Party today. I have wondered before about the seemingly harsh undertones about immigrants and others. Look no further; a well-known organization recently confirms the intolerance of that which seems different or strange to them," he wrote.

"A researcher included as part of a past dissertation his theory that 'the totality of the evidence suggests a genetic component to group differences in IQ.' The researcher reinforces these views by saying 'No one knows whether Hispanics will ever reach IQ parity with whites, but the prediction that new Hispanic immigrants will have low-IQ children and grandchildren is difficult to argue against,'" Pantoja continued, referring to the 2009 Harvard dissertation of Jason Richwine, who was forced to resign from his position at the Heritage Foundation last week as a result of the scandal.

Pantoja was born in Puerto Rico, so he and his family haven't had to deal with complicated immigration issues; they are allowed to live, travel and work anywhere in the United States. Pantoja joined the National Guard and served in both Iraq and Kuwait.

Tasked with convincing his fellow Hispanics that the Republicans have their best interests in mind, Pantoja was likely well aware that many in the party don't, as evidenced by much of the anti-immigrant rhetoric that's been floating about lately.

"Other immigration-related research is still padded with the same racist and eugenics-based innuendo. Some Republican leaders have blandly (if at all) denied and distanced themselves from this but it doesn't take away from the culture within the ranks of intolerance. The pseudo-apologies appear to be a quick fix to deep-rooted issues in the Republican Party in hopes that it will soon pass and be forgotten," Pantoja wrote.

He also called out Republican fear-mongering and race-baiting. "Others subscribe to motivating people to action by stating, 'In California, a majority of all Hispanic births are illegitimate. That's a lot of Democratic voters coming.' The discourse that moves the Republican Party is filled with this anti-immigrant movement and overall radicalization that is far removed from reality.  Another quick example beyond the immigration debate happened during CPAC this year when a supporter shouted 'For giving him shelter and food for all those years?' while a moderator explained how Frederick Douglass had written a letter to his slave master saying that he forgave him for 'all the things you did to me.' I think you get the idea. When the political discourse resorts to intolerance and hate, we all lose in what makes America great and the progress made in society."

Pantoja certainly isn't the first Republican of color to lament the party's turn away from inclusiveness. Bobby Jindal, Republican Governor of Louisiana admonished fellow Republicans earlier this year, telling them to "stop being the stupid party."

But many Republicans are still retreating into old biases and race-based attacks. Senators continue to try to derail the immigration reform bill currently being considered by the Judiciary Committee, invoking latent fears of a country overrun by immigrants and non-whites.

Pantoja may finally be leaving the Republican Party, but the party left him, and people like him, long ago.