Spanish Lesson

(Youtube.com)

"Abogada," answers McGovern, mistakenly giving a character's profession (lawyer), not where she is from.

"Pero, ¿de dónde es?"

"California," says Baldwin.

Muy bien, Congresista.

Brand Loyalty

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Beneath all the talk, a question: Why bother?

How many Hispanic citizens -- those eligible to vote -- can understand a political message only in Spanish?

To start with, the nation's largest minority is under-represented at the polls because so many aren't citizens or aren't 18. Only 39 percent of Hispanics were eligible to vote last year, or about 17.2 million, according to the Pew Hispanic Center.

Most Latino voters speak English -- after all, to become a citizen you have to pass the test in English. Just 9 percent of Latino voters live in households where only Spanish is spoken, according to Pew and Census estimates.

But it's a big mistake to assume this scant 9 percent -- this minority of a minority -- is the entire audience for Spanish communication, according to operatives in both parties.

It doesn't take fluency in English to become a citizen, and for important communication, such as making political decisions, many English-learners prefer their native language.

Political parties also must look beyond the next election, says Fabiola Rodriguez-Ciampoli, another pioneer of bilingual communication when she was hired by then-minority leader Dick Gephardt to handle the Democrats' Hispanic media and outreach in 2000.

"You have to reach out to Spanish-speaking Latinos even before they become citizens," says Rodriguez-Ciampoli, now director of Hispanic communications for Sen. Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. "We as Latinos have brand loyalty. . . . The sooner you start talking to them, the sooner you start helping them to identify with the Democrats."

San Antonio-based media consultant Frank Guerra, so successful at crafting messages for the Bush brothers, says that for the president and the former Florida governor, "it goes way beyond the language piece. Hispanics perceive them as two individuals who understand them, who are interested in them, and are attempting to communicate with them, whether it's in halting Spanish on special occasions" -- George -- "or whether through fluent conversation" -- Jeb.

Guerra worries that some GOP rhetoric in the immigration debate could turn off the new brand-shoppers that President Bush won. Guerra's advice to the GOP could stand for the Democrats as well:

"You're speaking to the fastest-growing, youngest population in the country. And what we do now will forever set the course for what kind of party we're going to be in the future -- majority or minority."

'We're Not in Spain'

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Around the Capitol, the subject is immigration, and however you define the national language, the conversation is taking place partly in Spanish.

Rep. Albio Sires (D-N.J.) is behind his desk in the Longworth House Office Building, speaking into a microphone to record the Democrats' Hispanic Radio Address, sent to 130 Spanish-language stations every Saturday. In it, he tells the story of his boyhood journey from Cuba, and he calls for immigration reform.

He makes some last-minute edits. He opts for the slightly more colloquial word here and there, changes "Nueva Jersey" to New Jersey.

"We're not in Spain, we're in America," Sires explains. "The Spanglish jumps in, and sometimes now it becomes acceptable. Not too many Spanish [speakers] in New Jersey say 'Nueva Jersey.' "

In another part of town, a professional Hispanic narrator with a rich, cultured voice will render President Bush's weekly address into Spanish. Three out of the last six of Bush's addresses have been on immigration. Spanish speakers who missed them on the radio can hear them on the "En Español" portion of the White House's Web site.

In the Senate, five Democrats, including two Latinos, come off the floor to take questions from reporters about the evolving immigration-reform compromise. Sen. Bob Menendez (N.J.) makes a few points in Spanish, until a buzzer signals it's time to vote again.

"¡Tengo que votar!" Menendez apologizes to the dozen or so journalists for Spanish-language outlets.

Upon returning after the vote, "Are we doing this in English or Spanish?" Sen. Pat Leahy (D-Vt.) asks the reporters, who are bilingual.

"We're doing it in French today," says Armando Guzmán, a veteran on the Hill now with TV Azteca. He remembers when there were no Latinos in the Senate and reporters flocked to Dodd for Spanish sound bites. Now, the Spanish-language press corps operates with increasing ease. The growing audiences for Univision, CNN en Español , Telemundo, TV Azteca and the rest are so prized by politicos that both parties deploy bilingual spokespeople.

"Très bien," says Leahy. "I wish I remembered my Italian. When you were speaking Spanish earlier," he says to Menendez, "I was picking up about every other word!"

And then, just when you think you've roughly mastered the grammar of the politics of language, and the language of politics, up pops an irregular part of speech.

Over on the House side, Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) is chairing a hearing of the House Judiciary subcommittee on immigration. Rubén G. Rumbaut, professor of sociology at the University of California at Irvine, is testifying about language -- and how long it takes before immigrant families lose their Spanish.

The answer is . . . not terribly long.

"Spanish appears to draw its last feeble breath in the third generation," Rumbaut says in prepared remarks.

It's a controversial subject, disputed by others who claim Latinos resist adopting English.

But then here comes Charlie Gonzalez, leaving Nancy Pelosi's office after a gathering of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus to discuss immigration reform. In that meeting, Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) and some others spoke Spanish, but not Gonzalez. His Spanish is not so good.

He is the son of the late, legendary representative Henry Gonzalez, who was the son of Mexican immigrants who did not speak much English. Henry Gonzalez spoke beautiful Spanish, as well as English, according to his son.

"Dad was just horrified as my Spanish deteriorated," Charlie Gonzalez says.

"People expect if your name is Gonzalez that you can speak Spanish. It's always going to be a source of kidding."

He can laugh about it. The voters in Gonzalez's majority-Hispanic district in San Antonio understand. The Spanish of their grandchildren is disappearing, too. This is what happens. They've elected Gonzalez five times. "This is a shared experience," the congressman says. "The degree of proficiency in Spanish varies from generation to generation."

Sooner or later, Spanish becomes a language to study -- " . . . gato, gusto, guitarra, bilingüe . . . " -- and English wins.

But until then, in gringo politics, "se habla español."