Matt Ortega

In the Wednesday edition of the Washington Post, there is a report on the steep decline in the housing construction market that is putting thousands of Latinos out of work.

Latino workers have lost nearly 250,000 jobs in the construction industry during the past year, with Hispanic immigrants getting hit hardest, the report by the Washington-based Pew Hispanic Center said.

Joblessness among Latino immigrants rose to 7.5 percent at the end of the first quarter of 2008, compared to 6.5 percent for all Latinos and 4.7 percent for all other workers in the U.S. The rise in unemployment for Hispanic immigrants also marked the first time since 2003 that foreign-born Latinos had a higher unemployment rate than that of native-born Latinos, the report said.

Latinos are hit incredibly hard in the Bush economy and you can bet that four more years of the same failed economic policies will not attract them to Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) in the fall. Costly tax cuts for the uber-wealthy and corporations will do nothing to put these workers, and millions more of all colors, back to work with decent jobs and healthcare.

Senator Barack Obama (D-Illinois), who clinched the Democratic nomination last night, and Democrats around the country will make sure every voter knows that John McCain and the Republicans who line up behind him offer more of the same that we can ill afford at this critical time in our history.