Wooing Hispanic voters at home, Republicans turn to Latin America

In Washington, Republicans keep taking steps that imperil their relationship with Hispanic voters, passing legislation to accelerate the deportation of Central American children at the southern border and comparing their influx to a warlike “invasion,” compounding an electoral disadvantage that many in the party are convinced cost them the White House in 2012.

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But in a vivid display of the strife within the party over immigration, likely contenders for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination are charting their own, very different course: delivering pointed and personal overtures to the native countries from which millions of Hispanic Americans have immigrated.

The result is a tug of war between congressional Republicans, who are unleashing ever-harsher language and legislation to rein in illegal immigration, and party leaders with their eyes on the White House, who are determined to build bridges to a crucial constituency that has long been neglected.

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