Campaign Web Sites Hablan Espanol

Presidential candidates build bilingual sites to court Hispanic voters.

Mark Fitzgerald, Medill News Service

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Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore unveiled his new campaign Web site this week with a newly added Spanish section. Republican nominee George W. Bush's site--established a few weeks before the GOP convention--is bilingual as well.

Political information site Voter.com launched a Spanish version of its site with the help of a mariachi band Tuesday at the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles. The Hispanic community "has and will continue to play a pivotal role in our nation's politics," says John Dangel, Voter.com chief executive officer. "It is imperative that Spanish-speaking voters, elected officials and candidates have the ability to communicate with one another."

More than 63 million Hispanics are eligible to vote, according to the Census Bureau.

Selena Walsh, also of Voter.com, says that as a Hispanic woman she believes everyone should have equal access to information on the Internet.

"We know that the young computer users get most of their information about politics on the Web, and we want to give the Spanish-speaking youth a place to go to get this information," she says.

Mixed Intentions

A recent study by Cheskin Research, however, found that most Hispanics prefer English-language Web sites to Spanish ones.

"Most of the people who get themselves to these sites already speak English," says Filipe Korzenny, head researcher for Cheskin Research. Korzenny says more than 45 percent of Hispanic households own a computer, a 68 percent increase since last year.

And despite his study's finding that Hispanics often prefer English-language sites, bilingual sites for candidates are useful for reasons other than getting people information, he says.

"I honestly think these are good-faith efforts to show commitment to the Hispanic community," Korzenny saus. "The actual usefulness of these sites is not pragmatic, it's emotional."

Hispanics will be more likely to use Spanish-language sites once they provide the same content as their English counterparts, he says.

"In the next five to ten years the Internet will be a dramatic determining force in politics," he says. "Since Hispanics will probably be the biggest minority [population] by 2005, the Internet will be a major driving force for the next generation."

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