Dr. Pitney on Romney Speaking Spanish

From Eunice Moscoso’s article in the Austin American-Statesman:

Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani often garners applause when he says that immigrants must learn to read, write and speak English to become U.S. citizens. Fellow GOP candidate Mitt Romney, is greeted with a similar response when he advocates making English the nation’s official language.
***
Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, said in a recent debate that he welcomed legal immigrants into his campaign and was “going to reach out to them in any language I can.”John J. Pitney, a political science professor at Claremont McKenna College in California, said there is would seem to be a disconnect between advertising in Spanish and stressing English as the nation’s official language.

“Republicans can say that Spanish advertising is merely a stopgap, which is necessary because of the government’s past failure to insist on English literacy,” he said. “They could say that once their policies are in place, candidates will no longer have to advertise in other languages.”